2 years ago (almost to the day) against my better judgement, I bought a Renault Grand Scenic from Renault Croydon (an official Renault UK dealer).

The car was pre-registered to Renault UK, but upon me taking delivery had 56 miles on the clock, so materially a new car, though technically 2nd hand with, 30 months Renault manufacturers warranty remaining.

Soon after taking delivery we became aware of a strange noise - a squealing / howling sound. This was made when the car was warm - especially after it had been sitting in traffic, so I assume significant heat sink into components - when releasing the clutch.

I made Renault Croydon aware of this within a week or 3 of taking delivery & booked the car in for this to be looked at. Since this time, they have had the car in a further 4 times to fix this problem (which is of nuisance value rather than impacting the reliability/performance of the car). In the last 2 visits they have replaced all of the clutch & its ancillaries. This did make the noise go away for a 2 or 3 months, but it is now back again with a-vengeance.

The car is again booked in next week but it is clear that despite conversations with the Renault Technical Centre, they have no idea what the problem is.

So, where do I stand? I really am hacked off with the problem & feel I have been (more than) patient in giving Renault Croydon ample opportunity to resolve it. I am concerned that with the end of manufacturers warranty looming (September 2009) I will be left with a car which is difficult to sell because of this curious noise.

When I take the car in I am intending to speak to the Dealership Principal, but would welcome advice on a/ my rights (if I have any at this time) and b/ strategies for addressing this problem with him - my ideal solution would be for them to take the car back & pay me market value for a replacement (i.e. what they would sell the car for, not what they would give in p/x).

Thanks in advance.

 

In the first instance I would speak to Citizens Advice Ian, they'll have the relevant legal info, but from memory you're within your rights to have any fault fixed to a satisfactory standard.

Since you told them initially about the problem early on in your ownership, but they've failed to fix it, at a guess this is a continuation of the original problem.

The problem might be that since you've driven it for 2 years (save for the time it's off the road) so you could be said to have accepted the car and it's strange noise, and only when the warranty is coming to an end does the problem become an issue to you. 2 years is a long time, and I doubt the dealer will want to lose out financially with the current fall in sales.

If it were me, armed with CAB information on my rights I would go in and state what you want from them, in writing and verbally and see where they go from there. Make sure they're aware of the extent of the issue and the number of times they've failed to get to the bottom of it, and tell them you've lost faith that they'll ever resolve it and would like them to take the car back, and offer you the equivalent car in return.

Good luck.

 

I'd just start by listing the history, explaining you have had enough and asking them for their proposals

No demands until you hear what they say

 

After this length of time, you may have a problem, as you say.

Best outcome might be to get them to do it again under warranty and blow it off before the problem recurs.

 

I'm not sure how much of this is legislation and how much is our policy but............

With a significant fault that can affect the vehicle you can request a buy back. Typically it's done at the companies discression though. Typically significant faults are transmission/engine or chassis failures of some sort. I think it's normally only applicable to cars around 3 months old though (i.e. not fit for purpose). Therefore I don't think you'll get this but you could give it a try.

What there is more scope for is to treat the problem as an ongoing issue. If as task is done under warranty then the job shouldn't reoccur within a reasonable time. Keep a log of how often you've had it in the garage and when and confirm with both the dealer and the distributor (and if possible get written statements) saying they will carry out any remedial work within x-period of time/mileage.

With the exception of the letter I did this and my alarm was still being fixed by Honda after 5 years (6 faults in 5 years all documented and provided to Honda when it failed the 6th time)

 

Sell it - not just because of the rattle

Doesn't CiderBoy have the stupidest/arrogant mate in the world who spent

 

[QUOTE=Moggy,Mar 24 2009, 07:17 PM]

Doesn't CiderBoy have the stupidest/arrogant mate in the world who spent

 

Bankruptcy?

 

Thank-you for the constructive & helpful advice chaps.

 

I had a Mazda that had a gearbox problem, the dealer tried unsuccessfully for two years to fix it, they had the car about six months out of 24 I owned it. A small fortune was spent trying to rectify the problem(so I assume in case it happened again they would know what was wrong) and at the end of all this decided to replace the complete the gearbox, this is what I requested initially so they did come through in the end.
Morale, keep at them, if it's still under warranty they have a duty to sort it.