Car repairs

[maeveiscurious]

I had some work done on my car over the summer, a week later it was clear that they had been negligent in their work and now at the service there is a more serious issue which needs repair

How do I recover the money for the repairs

What did they say when you approached them a week after they did the work?

What did you do at the time?

Did you go back after a week? Because if you did they would have done any further repairs

We took it to a local garage to be checked and the comment we had was "cowboys"

On the service they came back to me with pictures of the incomplete shoddy work. We wouldn't have known as it was deep in the engine

So what did you do?

I believe the first step is You have to give them an opportunity to rectify the fault, which is tricky when you don’t trust them.
Depending what went wrong the length of time may also cause you an issue.

You should have gone back to the garage as soon as you knew the work was unsatisfactory. Leaving it until now weakens your case.

Your first step is to talk to the garage and explain your problem. If that doesn't get you anywhere, you should next write a letter of complaint explaining what is wrong and what you want them to do to fix it. You must keep any claim against the garage as small as possible, so you should always give them a chance to fix the problems first.

If you are still unhappy, find out if the garage is a member of the Motor Ombudsman. If they are, submit your complaint to them.

If they are not a member of the Motor Ombudsman or you are unhappy with their decision, you can then go to the small claims court.

Note that, if the original work cost more than £100 and you paid using a credit card, you can claim from your card provider.

The problem is it’s been to another garage, so they’ll likely just blame them.
The time to deal with it was when you had the fault a week later

They may say that it could’ve been worked on at multiple other garages in that 6 month period and that it’s nothing to do with them.