Killing Mind

Oh this story gets a whole lot richer. When I went to pick the car up I mentioned that I thought the $66 gotcha fee was quite rude, particularly given I explicitly asked no work be done unless it was covered under warranty. "Warranty? What warranty?", asks the service dude. Oh beauty, here we go again I thought. Only this time the saga unfolded a little differently. Instead of trying to belittle me by explaining why the fuel sender is electronic and therefore not covered under my warranty, this bloke quickly determined that indeed the job is covered under that warranty. There was one problem though - none of the paperwork they had had any indication of a warranty.

I went through the story again, explaining that it was a Holden Certified Used Vehicle and had a 3 year extended warranty. Old bud was quite adamant that no such warranty was recorded against the vehicle. We even went out to the car and flicked through all the paperwork in the glove box. Service dude pointed to an empty, unmarked box on one of the sale papers. "See there, that's where your contract warranty number should be recorded. Sorry mate, we can't do anything about that here, you'll have to chase that up with the guys at the Gateshead store. Oh yeah, that'll be $66".

I was very quickly running out of time for the day, but knowing it would be some time before I could get to Gateshead, I hightailed straight to the shop from Cardiff. I explained my case to the store manager, who pointed to the unmarked box, questioning why I didn't check that the warranty was listed there. I explained to him that this was my first Holden and I wouldn't know what should appear there to miss it.

He made a few calls for me, checked some data out, and even managed to find the original sale documentation. Unfortunately there was nothing listed indicating any warranty of any kind. He even rang my salesperson, who calmed recalled that it was sold without a warranty. I quietly excused my rudeness, and asked whether this salesperson was known to be shady. He replied that he understands the reason for the question, but doesn't know. I waited at the counter for 15 minutes while he rang some head honchos. Then he came back with the doosy. They do not provide a warranty at all, not even the statutory warranty, for "commercial" vehicles. He then tied himself in knots trying to explain why it was a commercial vehicle. All the time I was thinking to myself I don't care if you class it as a space shuttle, the long and short is I've been screwed. Nonetheless, he rambled on for sometime before I urged him to get to the point. The point is, my Crewman has had absolutely no warranty from the moment I bought it. I was repeatedly assured that my "Holden Certified Used Vehicle" came with a 3 year warranty only to be sold a "commercial" vehicle with not a whisker of a warranty.

By this time I really had to go, so I thanked the fella for his enquires and discussion. I concluded that the fact is I have been pulled a swift one on a $33000 vehicle, been outright lied to and deceitfully talked into spending a considerable markup based on pretenses. Subsequently I've endured time-wasting and disappointment at the service centre, and most recently, have been cheated out of almost $1000 worth of repair. I told the Kelly Holden guy I will follow the matter up next week and definitely intend to do so. My method will be to explain the debacle, ask for compensation, and in the case of non-action do my upmost to ruin the goodwill of the Kelly Holden business. My beef is with the salesman, who I consider to be a despicable person, but as he was representing the company, the company will be my first avenue of pursuit.