My garage cannot find a intermittent car fault, what can I do?
An intermittent car fault is frustrating because it won’t be possible to repair the vehicle, either under warranty or at your cost, unless a fault is diagnosed.
Modern vehicles are more reliable than ever but are increasingly technologically complex, and diagnostics is not an exact science. It may take a few attempts to get to the bottom of a problem so we would advise to always seek the support of the dealership or garage in finding the root cause of your issue.
If no fault codes are recorded in your vehicle, then the dealership or garage may resort to physical and visual checks. They may also ask you to demonstrate the fault so it can be replicated or keep the car for an extended period of time to test-drive it and/or observe it, depending on the nature of the problem.
If no fault is located, you may also wish to speak to the manufacturer to see if they have any insight into the problem. As a last resort, you can obtain an independent technical inspection to try and confirm the fault and possible causes but, because independent inspections are usually visual, this may not be helpful and it would be worth having a discussion with the independent engineer to find out if they’re able to help.
How to submit a dispute to The Motor Ombudsman
The Motor Ombudsman is a certified Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) provider who can assist with disputes that arise between consumers and Code-accredited businesses.
Before you submit a dispute to us, firstly please ensure you have taken a look at the information about our process on the resolve a dispute page.
Have an article suggestion?
If you would like to see a question answered on our Knowledge Base, please email us at: media@tmo-uk.org.
