Damage to Courtesy Car :(

Bennie-Mac · 22 Mar 2011 at 21:32

Hello motors

Today i had a major service on my Audi A3, and was given a courtesy A4 S-Line 2.0 Tdi in return. Upon return of the car, just as i was about to leave, the service manager comes running over and claims ive damaged the car. Sure enough there's a substantial scuff on the front right of the cars bumper beside the number plate.

Long story short im now liable for £500 excess for damage i didnt cause

My one hope is that during the half hour between me leaving the A4 back and picking up my own car, someone has hit it in the car park with the side of their car while turning left across it. The scratches indicate that is the direction the car was hit from, and i had reversed it into the first parking bay so could easily have happened here.

Ive asked them to check the CCTV footage to see if this is the case and they say that if it was hit obviously i wont have to pay anything.

I was given a brief walk around of the car when i first picked it up, but due to the way the car was parked, we approached it from the passenger side, walked round the back of the car and to the drivers door, so i never actually saw the front of the car to ensure there was no damage. Hopefully CCTV will show that i wasnt shown the front of the car and im hoping this will work in my favour.

Yes i should have checked the car more thoroughly and i will probably incur the wrath of motors for being an idiot, but im just wondering if anyone can offer any advice? It just seems like im guilty until proven innocent, but i only drove the car home and back again, not hitting anything in the process and i parked nose first into my drive so nobody could have damaged the front while parked.

Am i screwed unless the car did happen to be hit in the car park?

Any helpful comments greatly appreciated

Edit - Im aware that using the term "long story short" then following with a wall of text is slightly misleading...

dsb · 22 Mar 2011 at 21:56

Did they tell you about the excess when you took the car? If not i would be inclined to fight it or at least only pay cost for the damage.

Bennie-Mac · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:07

dsb said:
Did they tell you about the excess when you took the car? If not i would be inclined to fight it or at least only pay cost for the damage.

Yes the excess was mentioned, and im ok with that. However its more the fact that i only drove the car home, then back to the Audi dealer without incident. This implies the damage was already there to begin with, or someone brushed it in the car park while i waited, as when it was in my ownership no one had a chance to hit the car from the front, nevermind in the direction the scrapes show due to the way it was parked. Its just a bit suspect to me, especially since the car was the personal demo car of guy i was dealing with.

With regards to the cost of the damage, i will get money back if the repairs come to less than £500, but with this being an Audi dealership they will most likely just replace the whole bumper so im not expecting much change...

MrM · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:11

A very similar thing happened to me with a loan Civic. It got damaged between parking it up and picking up my car. I told them it wasnt me but didnt have any proof. I ended up settling to pay cost for a new bumper, as corner of rer bumper had been completely caved in. Dealer attitude and this experience is enough to put me off courtesy cars. In future Id take photos of all 4 corners or sides before and after, just like I do with hire cars.

I feel for you, but unless you can prove otherwise I think you have to bite the bullet.

Bennie-Mac · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:18

MrM said:
A very similar thing happened to me with a loan Civic. It got damaged between parking it up and picking up my car. I told them it wasnt me but didnt have any proof. I ended up settling to pay cost for a new bumper, as corner of rer bumper had been completely caved in. Dealer attitude and this experience is enough to put me off courtesy cars. In future Id take photos of all 4 corners or sides before and after, just like I do with hire cars.

I feel for you, but unless you can prove otherwise I think you have to bite the bullet.

Well luckily for me the whole car park is well covered by CCTV, and the service manager has said this will be checked first thing in the morning so its a case of fingers crossed some knobber did do a hit and run.

I agree with you by the way about the dealer attitude, made me feel like a right criminal :mad:

Not very nice customer service in my opinion.

alex24 · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:20

Make sure you can also check it. Sounds like a good scam to me!

/cynical mode

Bennie-Mac · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:24

alexhull24 said:
Make sure you can also check it. Sounds like a good scam to me!

/cynical mode

Everyone ive told has said the same thing

Its the fact that it was the guys personal demo car and also that he didnt show me the front when first given the car, family and friends seem to think hes damaged the car but is blaming me to get out of paying the damage himself.

Obviously im not accusing him of that though*...

*I might be, just a little though.

Edit - Oh sorry i just realized you meant check the security footage... Thought you were talking about checking the car over before getting it. :rolleyes:

VFM Addict · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:27

Bennie-Mac said:
However its more the fact that i only drove the car home, then back to the Audi dealer without incident.

If this was the case then why the heck didn't you ask for a pick-up & return rather than have a C/Car for the day? Why waste your time driving both ways?

chippy08 · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:29

Its probably a scam i would have said it was already there when they gave it you its your word against theres.

alex24 · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:32

Bennie-Mac said:
Edit - Oh sorry i just realized you meant check the security footage... Thought you were talking about checking the car over before getting it.

Yeah, the CCTV. What's stopping someone from saying nothing touched it? Dealers already have a pretty bad rep, but I am being pretty cynical here. The only thing that makes me think it may be honest is that I can't see why they would bother unless they're doing it to everyone and pocketing a little cash. Hardly worth your job over really, unless they're all in on it.

Bennie-Mac · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:38

VFM Addict said:
If this was the case then why the heck didn't you ask for a pick-up & return rather than have a C/Car for the day? Why waste your time driving both ways?

Because i had a survey scheduled that ended up being moved to tomorrow, didnt want to take the chance of being stuck without a car and relying on a lift.

VFM Addict · 22 Mar 2011 at 22:58

Bennie-Mac said:
Because i had a survey scheduled that ended up being moved to tomorrow, didnt want to take the chance of being stuck without a car and relying on a lift.

Ah, now I see. It makes sense. I thought for a moment that you'd already planned a day working from home.

Bennie-Mac · 22 Mar 2011 at 23:03

VFM Addict said:
Ah, now I see. It makes sense. I thought for a moment that you'd already planned a day working from home.

I work from home anyway

I usually do use their "taxi" service and its very good, but i just thought better to be safe than sorry this time. Bit me in the ass though :rolleyes:

Bennie-Mac · 23 Mar 2011 at 18:44

UPDATE:

I got a phone call from the service manager, and the CCTV apparantly shows nothing suspicious while in the Audi car park, i havent seen it myself though yet.

A second more interesting phone call came through though from the customer services manager though about half an hour ago. He wanted to be brought up to speed with the whole situation so i explained in great detail, i also explained about the half attempted walkthrough which surprised him. His response was "Did you not sign the insurance document which also stated that the car was damage free after you were given the car?"

I said i did sign the document, but i had signed it at the service managers desk before id even seen the courtesy car, and was not aware it even contained any details about any existing damage as the service manager just mentioned it was for changing the insurance.

The customer service guy was shocked at this and stated this was not proper procedure, and should only have been given the form to sign after id inspected the car.

So im now waiting on a call back from him tomorrow afternoon while he investigates further. Fingers crossed the breach of procedure coupled with the poor damage walkthrough will work in my favour.

Irish_Tom · 23 Mar 2011 at 20:11

Good luck! I hope it goes well for you, keep us posted.

lordrobs · 23 Mar 2011 at 21:02

Bennie-Mac said:
A second more interesting phone call came through though from the customer services manager though about half an hour ago. He wanted to be brought up to speed with the whole situation so i explained in great detail, i also explained about the half attempted walkthrough which surprised him. His response was "Did you not sign the insurance document which also stated that the car was damage free after you were given the car?"

I said i did sign the document, but i had signed it at the service managers desk before id even seen the courtesy car, and was not aware it even contained any details about any existing damage as the service manager just mentioned it was for changing the insurance.

The customer service guy was shocked at this and stated this was not proper procedure, and should only have been given the form to sign after id inspected the car.

So im now waiting on a call back from him tomorrow afternoon while he investigates further. Fingers crossed the breach of procedure coupled with the poor damage walkthrough will work in my favour.

That seems strange. The very limited amount of customer service training that I had (for an old part time job years ago) was based around not admitting fault / liability / not following procedure EVER!

thepeganator · 23 Mar 2011 at 21:37

Hope this sorts itself out, let us know tomorrow!

Bennie-Mac · 23 Mar 2011 at 22:09

lordrobs said:
That seems strange. The very limited amount of customer service training that I had (for an old part time job years ago) was based around not admitting fault / liability / not following procedure EVER!

At the time i thought nothing of it, but i suppose looking back its not exactly covering your ass very well

Cheers for the luck comments!

jackthezipper · 23 Mar 2011 at 22:16

I always go round with my phone and snap any scratches/scuffswhen picking up. You should have been taken round the whole car by the salesman, but you should have checked it yourself..

jfp · 23 Mar 2011 at 22:19

Sorry to hear this, hope things turn out all right. Did you mention to the service managed that you wanted to have a look at the cctv footage when he phoned you?