You thought you did your research, you followed up references, but unfortunately the service carried out at your garage left a lot to be desired. What remedy do you have?

The Legal Framework Protecting You

The law governing goods and services requires a supplier to ensure that any goods supplied to you are of satisfactory quality and any services you pay for must be carried out with reasonable care and skill by a qualified person working for that supplier. The work must also be carried out within a reasonable period of time and at a reasonable charge within the frame of pre-agreed costing or quotation.

The definition of ‘reasonable’ may be different in each case; in case of a dispute arising you should seek advice from a solicitor, what the term ‘reasonable’ refers to in your particular situation. You can check your consumer rights in the Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982. Car mechanics are supplying a service to you by carrying out repairs to your vehicle and they sell goods to you by fitting new parts.

In the UK a trade association such as the Motor Vehicles Repairers Association can give advice and guidance. Before booking a service for your luxury automobile you should check your chosen garage belongs to a trade body or association forcing its members to adhere to a code of conduct. That way you will have a degree of safety that repairs to your car will be undertaken in a satisfactory way.

Complaints Procedure

As with all complaints about services or goods, you should in the first instance contact the supplier, in this case your garage, as soon as possible. If you are still unhappy after discussing the matter with the manager of the garage and they belong to a trade association, you can take your complaint to the trade body. They usually have an independent dispute procedure or mediation service. Consumer Direct is a governmental department set up to give free legal advice and you can contact them via their website.

If the dispute arose over work on a new car still under warranty, your luxury car manufacturer should be able to advise you. The majority of new car purchases in Britain are covered by a conciliation service as part of the Motor Codes New Cars Code regulating new car sales. You dealership will supply you with the details when you purchase your luxury car.

If you are unhappy that a fault was not correctly dealt with or not even spotted at your garage or repairs were not carried out satisfactorily, the garage should be allowed time to set the matter right. If the garage fails to deal with your complaint in a mutually satisfactory manner, you may be entitled to let another garage carry out the work and recover the cost from the first garage. You should get legal advice either from Consumer Direct or your solicitor before you charge another garage with the work.

Reference: Auto Transport > Garage > Luxury Car Repairs: Protecting your Rights as a Consumer