UKC

Just after a bit of advice on the best course of action on this.

Bought a warranty policy for a used car from a dealership. I had to claim on it a while back. It took a fair few weeks but eventually after many phone calls they authorised the required repair work to be carried out at a local garage, sending an email stating this.

The garage did the work but asked if I could pay and claim it back as they (understandably) didn't want to have to chase the warranty company for payment. I paid and submitted the garage invoice to the warranty company.

I heard nothing back, gave it a few weeks then phoned up to see what was going on. They said they'd look into it and call back, but didn't. I went through the same cycle a couple more times.

I then emailed stating I'd apply for a court claim (i.e. go to small claims court) and set out some timescales for this. I had no response.

I phoned a couple of days prior to my stated deadline and they asked to resend my emails to a different address - I'd previously sent them to the payment team or something and they wanted me to send them to customer services. I did so but no response.

I phoned again a few days later on the day which I'd previously given as a deadline for filing a court claim, eventually spoke to someone who took my account details (I'd already provided them with the invoice) and they said payment would arrive with a day or two.

No payment made, so I phoned again, they said they'd get back to me. I questioned this as they say that every time and never call back, they promised to call back that day.

This may come as a surprise, but they did not call. Phoned again a couple of days later, they said they'll call back. I once again questioned this and said that given I've previously stated my intention to go through small claims court, I'll do so if they don't pay within the next few days. Sent a follow up email detailing calls made since my last email and giving a revised date on which I'd apply for a court claim.

Just wanting to check if a court claim is indeed a sensible option at this point? Given what I've said I don't really feel like I can back down easily. I'd prefer not to have to resort to this but not seeing much choice as they said they would pay and just consistently don't. It's been about 10 weeks since I submitted the invoice, am I escalating too quickly? Not sure what else I can do as they just won't engage.

Correcte if I'm wrong but I believe the service they offer would be classed a a type of insurance. Wouldn't speaking to the insurance ombudsman be the next logical step? 

It wasn't Warranty Wise was it?

Go ahead with the money claim service. It costs very little and it might stir them into some action. The cost of dealing with a court claim will be more expensive in time and admin than just paying out your claim.

You can back down at any point, caring what they think about you making a threat and backing down can lead you to taking steps that are not actually worth the hassle.

If you want to go down the complaint route, call them up and ask to file a formal complaint, or ask for the complaint address and write to them. Lay out why you're unhappy and give them 30 days to respond before you follow a complaint with the Financial Ombudsman Service. 

After 30 days, file your complaint with FOS and then wait. It'll likely take a few months for them to start working on your complaint, but once they do they will find on your side (assuming what you've said is accurate) and issue a legally binding decision within something like 90 days. They will also charge the company a fee for processing the complaint so it's in the company's interest to resolve your complaint to your satisfaction through their internal complaints department.

I had something similar some years back. (gearbox failure) After 2 months of no replies to phone calls or emails. Went ahead with small claims action after free legal clinic advice.

24 hours before the court date and they called to say they would make full payment including costs & interest.

It appears to be a game of bluff, with some warranty companies. I would re-check your policy wording carefully & if its correct then go for it.

That's all true, but let me finish the story:

After some weeks the company will sill not have paid.  You'll go back to the court and ask about enforcement.  They will direct you to County Court bailiffs.

The bailiffs will explain that you need to pay them upfront, but it gets added to the debt.  They will also explain that they have no power of entry unless the debt is owed for Council or income tax.  Oh, and they have to give the debtor 7 days' notice of their intention to attend the premises on any of their three visits.

The debtor will laugh at this, and at you.  You can then go back to the court and try to get an order that puts a claim on any premises they own (so you'd get paid if and when they sell).  Probably you'll find the premises are rented.  

If you do manage to get any sort of leverage on the scummy bastards, they will put their limited company into voluntary liquidation and pay £12 to register a new one with a similar name and carry on exactly where they left off.  Most likely the sleeper company already exists.

Thanks all.

Spoke to the financial ombudsman, they don't cover car warranty companies and directed me to the motoring ombudsman. I'd already checked this, it's voluntary and the warranty company isn't signed up so they can't do anything but offered some advice. They said proof of having contacted them is useful too.

Interesting point about the sleeper company. Checked companies house and there's at least two limited companies with the same people involved so that's perhaps not a good sign. 

The motor ombudsman gave some advice about escalating but ultimately as they don't seem to be signed up to any regulatory body the court is probably my next option after a few more strongly worded emails. I guess I can pay the initial fee of £80 to make a claim and hope that's enough to get some movement on it.

Nope, they seem to have traded under a few names but this isn't one. Obviously not keen on naming at the moment 

Well, just checked my bank and they finally paid up this afternoon, I guess the last snotty email did the trick 

I was going to say speak to the garage who sold the cover and see if they have any influence.

Why? In your shoes I'd have started the thread with their name all over! 

(Tbh I think your big mistake was paying the garage directly.)

Haha well they've paid now, so it was Warranties 2000. Avoid them like the plague.

Perhaps. They'd already been very patient with the warranty company, it's a good garage and basically I didn't want to p*ss them off and have to find somewhere else for future work. They asked nicely but I think if I'd said no they wouldn't have done the job and then I'd have been waited to get it booked in somewhere else. When the warranty company sent authorization it did say it was ok to do this, but maybe it did cause some confusion.

also the dealer is responsible for the first 6 months for any problem with a car that was bought in full working order and if the problem wasn't highlighted at time of sale.. You don't need a warrenty for that its just the law https://www.theaa.com/car-buying/legal-rights#:~:text=Between%2030%20days%2.... Its probably why so many of them want you to buy a warrenty to abolve themselves of responsibility to some extent. I've actually pushed this very issue with a big dealer and despite them trying to fob me off in the end they coughed up.

Its fairly well known most of these secondhand car warrentys are not worth the paper they are written on. I have bought them in the past myself a couple of times though.

Will do, thanks.

But you bought an insurance policy, just so you didn't have to shell out large amounts for a repair up front. 

Yep, and it turned out to be rubbish. I kinda see it as my problem to deal with rather than coopting the local garage into chasing up a crappy warranty company when they have no obligation to do so. As I said, I think they'd have refused the job if I didn't agree to pay them directly.

At least the work cost more than the policy did so I'm sort of slightly better off than if I hadn't got it, aside from all the phone calls etc

Almost all state: "excludes wear and tear".

So once the car has been started, engine problems are a result of wear and tear.

Almost all warranties for anything exclude normal wear and tear.  But you are right that less scrupulous warranty companies will bring out this excuse as step 1 in their trying-to-avoid-paying-out process.

This is something I was going to mention. When you are playing the non-payment game, you need to do what the pros do - after it's overdue, send a letter saying that as they have agreed to pay and simply have not paid that every phone call you require to make will cost them £30, the whole total owing will accrue interest at X% above the bank of england base rate, calculated on a daily basis. Then once you've racked up a load of bullroar charges and interest, you can put in a bigger claim at the small claims court and probably make bank. Besides having basically no reasonable defnese for their actions, a lawyer for the warranty company is going to cost them minimum £200 an hour so it's pretty hard to see them ever going to court over it.

Though of course they will only make the settlement offer the day before the court date to make sure you waste the maximum possible time preparing all your evidence. It might be possible to counnteract this by telling them that you will be unavailable for 7 days before the court date for [insert reason] so they need to make their decision about payment or getting a CCJ issued against them at least 7 days before the court date. I know every time I do anything as either an individual or a company, one of the standard questions is if there are any CCJs against me/company so I'm always pretty motivated to avoid them but I don't know how bigger companies who are specialists in terrible customer relations view these kind of things.

I would have no trouble believing this. They look at the amount you are trying to claim and have a sort of in-office bet about whether it's enough that you'll actually take time out of your day to submit the small claims paperwork.

This all day, we get asked to carry out warranty work on compressors, if we have sold it then no problem but if we havnt sold it I will only take the work on from certain suppliers. Some of them have so many hoops you have to jump through then you have to wait 60 to 90 days to get paid, sod that just refuse the work.