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How do I complain about a rusty car?

There are a number of ways, in which you can complain about a rusty car. If your car suffers from corrosion, you may be able to make a complaint under your manufacturer’s warranty or under your consumer rights.

Warranty

If the corrosion is due to poor workmanship or parts used during the manufacturing process, you may be able to make a claim under your standard manufacturer’s warranty.

Some manufacturers offer corrosion or anti-perforation warranty, which is in addition to the standard warranty. These types of warranties cover you in instances where a main dealer has diagnosed the rust to have developed by through corrosion. An anti-perforation warranty will usually only cover corrosion, which begins from the inside of the metal, moving to the outside of the metal and is not caused by any external influences.

Therefore, if your vehicle only suffers from surface corrosion then this will usually not be covered by you anti-perforation warranty.

You should follow the warranty process as set out in the terms and conditions of your warranty.

Your consumer rights

If the corrosion is an inherent fault, which was present at the point of sale you may be able to make a claim against your seller. Please note that if a reasonable person would have noticed the corrosion at the point of sale but you failed to do so, then it will be seen as though you accepted this vehicle with the corrosion, at point of sale.

If you wish to make a complaint about the corrosion on your vehicle then you should contact the seller to raise this fault.

Follow their in-house complaints procedure in order to provide the business with a reasonable opportunity to resolve the issue.

If you are unhappy with the final response of the business or more than 8 weeks has passed since raising the complaint with the business then you may escalate the complaint to The Motor Ombudsman for further investigation.

 

 


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.

Submit a dispute

 

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