Bl**dy Garage- how do I complain?

[Tissy]

Took my car in to have a dent in the back sorted out this week. Went to pick it up, and noticed that there were some scratches and a dent in the two doors on the drivers side, that definitely weren't there when I dropped it off at the body shop.

Complained to the manager who produced a sheet on which they had written the inspection of the car before they started the work. Sheet says the dent and scratches were there....But I wasn't there when the inspection was done, so can't argue from a position of strength. The garage car park was very crowded (no room for 2 cars to pass), and one possiblility is that it was damaged in their car park, before the inspection was done, the other is that they did the damage in the workshop and filled in the inspection sheet retrospectively, IYSWIM.

Had paid for the work done before I noticed the damage, and had handed back the keys to the hire car, so had to take my car away, but made it clear to the manager that I was NOT happy- the cheeky get offered to do me a good "deal" if I had the repairs done with them!!

I have photographed my car as soon as I got home, and intend to write a stiff letter, with a big photo enclosed, showing the marks, but don't actually have any proof that the marks weren't there before....my word against theirs, how do I complain effectively? I want them to sort it out for free, of course!

TBH, I suspect that you've not got an ice cube's hope in hell of getting them to admit it was them Maybe there's a case to argue that you should have been ther when the inspection was done and signed the report to that effect - I've had to do that with Direct Line before when they collected my car for repair.

I would say that as you didn;t sign the inspection report that mentions those scratches etc then the rreport itself is worth nothing to anybody.
Stick to your guns, right a letter to the Managing Director of the garage. Are they a small local garage or a big chain? If a local garage then fi the worse happens you can contact your local newspaper and ask them to publish your story. I once spent most of a rainy saturday outside a car showroom telling my story to everyone who tried to visit it as I'd got nowhere with the management over my new but very dodgy car. It worked in mat case althought I wouldn;t necessarily advice it (I was childless then and weekends weren't as precious).

Good luck whatever you do.

exactly the same happened to us. It took 4 months of arguing but we got the job done. Be cool calm and assertive without being nasty. The fact that the report doesn't have your signiture on is absolutely key here. You can go to small claims court for damages if necessary. Yes, it is your word against theirs, but the magistrate in small claims court hear this stuff all the time and actually are quite reasonable.
It didn't get to small claims court for us, but it nearly did.
Good luck, remember it was not your fault so you are in the right.

You could also contact your local trading standards department ? they may have had other complaints about this garage. Even if not, a visit or letter from them will show the garage they can't get away with this and may provoke them into whatever action you want ? a free repair?

We had the same problem except it was a brand new car and DH's brother works for the garage. It was made worse by the fact he knew about the damage and said nothing. It took DH threatening everything from Watchdog to legal action to get it fixed and even then, it was a really poor repair. You could try contacting your insurance to see if they'd be willing to cover the repair and then they could pursue the garage for costs.
Incidently, this happened twice to us. The second time the workshop manager (national garage firm here) stood there with his arms folded and said 'Prove It'. DH has many contacts at local garages and managed to get a report done by a really good bodyshop on how the damage was done. We got the car fixed but again, it wasn't quick.