Jan S

Purchase of "basically new" pre-owned car involved in undisclosed previous accident.

I have deemed it necessary to bring the following incident to your attention. I bought a 2018 Suzuki Jimny with 14500 kilometres on the clock on a cash basis from a car dealership nl Payne & Schietekat in Cape Town during October 2019 after re-acting to an advert in Autotrader. The car was "supposed" to be basically new (considering it had only done 14500 km at that stage) and came with a 5 year or 200,000 kilometre warranty as well as a 60 000 kilometre motor plan in place. The relevant log book in the car was endorsed accordingly. Initially the car was fine and we (actually my wife, as it is her car) were very happy with it until 18 May 2021 when we drove over an un-even spot on the tar road close to our home in Fernglen, Port Elizabeth and the front wheels of the Jimny went into a serious wobble. It felt as if the whole front suspension was coming loose with the wheels falling off. Needless to say we got the fright of our lives (we were both in the car at the time) as this came totally unexpected. I then arranged immediately for it to go to the local Suzuki Dealer namely Tavcor Suzuki. Without boring you with all the nitty gritty detail of the matter we were informed by Tavcor that their technicians have inspected/tested the car and also experienced the wobble that we complained about. However, they further found that the vehicle was in an accident previously which was not recorded anywhere and they (Tavcor) were consequently "distancing" themselves from it. The existing warranty and motor plan as referred to in the third paragraph above, were then cancelled forthwith by Tavcor. Since my wife needed the car for daily transport purposes we had no other alternative than to arrange ourselves for the vehicle to be properly repaired. We thus took it to Revolution Steering Specialists ("RSI") in Port Elizabeth who did a sterling job in correcting it to be back on the road. I have subsequently approached Messers Payne & Schietekat about the matter, but they have flatly denied having any knowledge about this undisclosed accident without any offer for possibly investigating the matter or any other assistance in rectifying the matter. I have reported the matter to the Ombudsman for the Motor Industry in South Africa (MIOSA) but same could not make much progress as the said dealer (Payne & Schietekat) also did not respond to their enquiries. As this incident is a blatant disregard for any form of Consumer protection/satisfaction/co-operation from the relevant dealer's side, it will be appreciated if you can possibly inter-act in any way you see fit and publish this matter on all your platforms to inform the general public about this unscrupulous dealer.