Selling My Car

[redsheesha]

Hi everyone,

I haven't been on the forums for a while, been busy with work (good feeling) and trying to keep the head above water with my partner's attempts at finding work - bad feeling - (took her 7 months but she got there in the end)

To make a long story short, I bought a very nice VW Passat wagon from a colleague who was moving back to Germany. I bought new sparkplugs (what a fortune that was ), oil change and new oil filter. Problem is, there's a sensor issue that popped up last week. I took it in, paid another small fortune, and took it home. Next day, same problem. I don't think they fixed the actual problem, which is that an air flow sensor needs to be replaced.

I'm all out of money. I'm done. I want to sell it now. It's a fantastic car for someone who has the money to get this sensor changed. If anyone is interested in getting the info sheet, please PM me. But in short, it's a 2004 V5 wagon, 103,000 kilometers, with brand new CV boots, sparkplugs, oil filter, oil change. The car can be brought to a mechanic who can quote the price to get it changed - I don't want to make any guesses.

Thanks for reading. Will have to catch up on here!!!

[Falcon_XR6]

If it went into a garage with a problem and came out with the same problem then what basis have the garage got to charge you? You shelled out a load of cash and they misdiagnosed the problem, presumably due to incompetence on behalf of their mechanic who was tasked with "mending it", and gave you the car back in the same condition that it was when it went in. So why do you have to pay for them wasting their time because they can't do their job properly?
I'd take it back to them and get them to do it properly... and don't forget you have paid for this to be done once, surly they wouldn't expect you to pay for one of their employees incompetence would they?

Best of luck with it all...

[redsheesha]

Well, I'd normally agree with you (and maybe I'm still being stupid about it) but the fault that came up in the system was an ignition module fault. That made total sense and was in fact what a lot of people on the VW forum had suggested it might be. Now I find out it's the air flow sensor, which a colleague mentioned happened to his car, and it was difficult to diagnose, and does NOT show up on a diagnostic scanner. So I don't feel like I was gipped in this instance, although taking the car to a mechanic makes me all sweaty and nervous in general.

[Falcon_XR6]

although taking the car to a mechanic makes me all sweaty and nervous in general.

I know exactly what you mean... It has taken me 3 1/2 years to find a trustworthy garage that (as soon as you go in without a Kiwi accent) doesn't automatically add a zero just before the decimal point of the price on the bill and any work done costs over $1000 because they ALWAYS find something else that needs doing over and above the quoted price and the original fault, in my experience, is never usually properly fixed... A very cynical point of view you may say, but that has been my bitter experience of the Kiwi motor repair trade since coming here in 2008.

[Duncan74]

Sounds like you would be worth driving down to Tauranga - cost of hotel and petrol would be recovered by using my local.

(although he is an expat, so perhaps that has something to do with it).

[Falcon_XR6]

If it was a Surgeon would anyone put up with that type of treatment?

OK, so you came in with a pain in your back... so what we did was took out your tonsils but we noticed that you needed some teeth taking out so we did that while you were under... it will cost extra for that.
OK, still got back ache... back under the anesthetic and out comes your appendix.
Pay up... Still got back ache... OK, that didn't sort out the problem... So back in and back under again....

I mean, would anyone be expected to put up with this type of treatment?... NO.
So why should you be expected to put up with it because it's happening to your car?

[James 1077]

If I had paid to have your car fixed and they fixed something that didn't need fixing then I would ask them for my money back. They would be welcome to remove whatever it was they replaced and put the original back in but I wouldn't be happy to shell out due to their incompetence.

[redsheesha]

Well guys, here's a positive update. I called the shop, told them the car was still doing the same thing, and he says, 'glad you called me, i realized yesterday the scanner wasn't working right, I bet it didn't scan the fault code out,' and so I took it over to him, and long story short, he was able to clear the fault code out after a couple of days. He didn't even insinuate charging me, and he drove it around and tested it to make sure it was still working, scanned it a couple times more, no fault, so I drove it away Friday afternoon. Has been starting up fine since then, have tested it out about 6 times today going here and there, so phew.

Still selling it though.

[Falcon_XR6]

Glad it all worked out OK for you.

[sinjb007]

So nice experience sharing. Good ref for newcomers. Thanks!