Bought a bit of a turkey.. :/

rodenal said:
It's incredibly naive to expect VOSA to do anything to the MOT station, how would they ever prove the car didn't have the bulbs in when it went there? They can't and won't even try.

I wouldn't waste too much time, energy or money trying to get mney back on this if it was a private sale
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Depends on how many complaints they get about the station. They might not necessarily act on the word of one person but if they get several or even dozens of complaints?

Would they not act? It's not likely that they'll be handed concrete evidence by standard consumers.

I just had to report an automated phone call today on the ICO website today, individually it may not mean much but people are punished.
 
Matt82 said:
Why has everyone sided with the buyer and assumed theyre clueless and innocent?

Why cant the same clueless/innocent status apply to the seller?

Why should the buyer take no responsibility in the choice of car they buy?

its second hand, not brand new. if you have that little clue about buying cars, dont buy them
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Because you don't cluelessly/innocently pull the EML to disguise a fault.
 
Indeed ^^
Arguably, if the bulb no longer works, that is one thing, but removal is quite different - surely tantamount to misrepresentation/fraud/other similar words?
 
However annoying, as said its a case of buyer beware with a private sale and proving the car was unfit for its MOT won't be easy at all.

Put it down to experience and either swap the engine or advertise it as spares / repair and take a hit on it.

Whilst VOSA take iffy MOT's extremely seriously, your chances of proving it was not fit to pass are slim IMO, an MOT pass or fail is only effectively a piece of paper that says the car was either good or not when tested, not thereafter.
 
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muon said:
Depends on how many complaints they get about the station. They might not necessarily act on the word of one person but if they get several or even dozens of complaints?

Would they not act? It's not likely that they'll be handed concrete evidence by standard consumers.

I just had to report an automated phone call today on the ICO website today, individually it may not mean much but people are punished.
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Perhaps, but even if they have several complaints they aren't going to bust in there and demand that this poor guy with a dodgy golf MOT be recompensed. The most likely thing vosa would do is carry out a spot inspection or more frequent spot inspections, which won't help the OP. Said garage are never going to drop the seller in it either - as far as he is concerned the mot is fully legit.....
 
Lashout_UK said:
An MOT only looks at basic roadworthiness anyway. The car can still be a complete heap, or lethal to drive, or not really drive at all.
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Erm, no. The MOT is specifically aiming to remove cars that are 'lethal to drive' from the road. Complete heaps can pass though, I'll give you that. Providing they are safe and pass all relevant tests such as emissions. The car in OP supposedly wouldn't pass emissions.
 
MooMoo444 said:
Erm, no. The MOT is specifically aiming to remove cars that are 'lethal to drive' from the road. Complete heaps can pass though, I'll give you that. Providing they are safe and pass all relevant tests such as emissions. The car in OP supposedly wouldn't pass emissions.
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Because emissions are related to safety?
 
Quinnaay said:
I wouldnt ever buy another Fiat again put it that way
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Why do people make these completely ridiculous and illogical statements? You bought a cheap second hand car and it was a dog because you didn't know enough to check it properly. Obviously this was the car manufacturers fault.

I guess no one should ever buy another VW after the OP's experiences, and since people have suffered problem with every single marque on the planet, then obviously it's not a good idea to buy a car at all.
 
I'd never buy another Bentley after I saw one stood still in a showroom, I mean it weren't even running or anything.
 
MooMoo444 said:
Erm, no. The MOT is specifically aiming to remove cars that are 'lethal to drive' from the road.
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Not necessarily. You could have a shot clutch, an engine that barely runs, overheating issues, intermittent electronics, poorly designed suspension that causes hilariously dangerous handling issues (think kit cars), etc, and still pass.

Not all MOTs are carried out to the same standards either. So tread carefully...
 
David Bisset said:
Because you don't cluelessly/innocently pull the EML to disguise a fault.
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the previous previous owner may have, and its no excuse for the buyer not to look

its all you hear nowadays, how everyones problems are everyone elses faults, do you all feel the OP should be awarded compo too?
 
EML not part of the MOT, have you had the emissions tested ? MOT station would have a copy of the emissions test, these must be kept for 3 months. If you want to have do an Inverted appeal, which in this case you would they would do a full MOT and give you a fair result, when they carry out the test they have to gauge if the faults were present at the time of test.
 
bobuk said:
EML not part of the MOT, have you had the emissions tested ? MOT station would have a copy of the emissions test, these must be kept for 3 months. If you want to have do an Inverted appeal, which in this case you would they would do a full MOT and give you a fair result, when they carry out the test they have to gauge if the faults were present at the time of test.
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News to me, how can something that's supposed to alert you of potentially fatal hazards with your car, not be checked by MOT?

I was under the impression of 'IF the car has them, they must be functional'.
 
Matt82 said:
do you all feel the OP should be awarded compo too?
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Yep, c'mon VW - step in and give the OP a shiny new one :p

Seriously, though, much as I feel for OP on some levels, it is very much Caveat Emptor when buying second-hand cars privately. Yes, such stunts as this really should not go on, and yes we would most likely all like to have some retribution against the scroat in question......but, the reality is that it is unlikely that anything will be gained by OP on this, except some wisdom and a bit of hot air expulsion IMHO.
 
I'd be very suprised if the engine management light has been pulled out, i'm pretty sure they are surface mount LEDs in the golf dash so cant be removed without careful soldering. Have you actually checked to see if it comes on at startup?
 
Matt82 said:
the previous previous owner may have, and its no excuse for the buyer not to look

its all you hear nowadays, how everyones problems are everyone elses faults, do you all feel the OP should be awarded compo too?
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If the previous previous owner did that then wouldn't it have been the obvious thing to deny all knowledge? Or to say that it has never worked rather than get "nasty"? It's within the bounds of possibility that Zaphan58's questioning made him feel his honour was impugned and he'd made a perfectly legitimate sale with no errors on his part but from the limited information given I'd have to suspect that he knew it wasn't ok and got annoyed at being questioned because of that very fact.

What would Zaphan58 be awarded compensation for? Beyond the value of the car he's not suffered any loss, nor injury. It looks like you're conflating two issues here.

Yes, the buyer should satisfy themselves that the car works to their satisfaction before purchase but equally it's not always easy to know precisely what you should be looking for on a car that is new to you.
 
GeX said:
They're very easy to remove with a pair of long nose pliers *snap*
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Yeah, very easy :)
What's harder is reinstalling them.. they're at the bottom of a plastic cylinder around 1cm in diameter and not less than 1" deep so epic soldering skillz are required!
 
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