Rogue Traders for the Irish Motor Industry...

Darragh29

I don't know if folks on the forum remember a fly on the wall teleseries that ITV did over the last few years called "Rogue Traders". Basically it involved a hotline that consumers who felt they had been scammed by a builder, plumber, electrician, could report it to an ITV hotline, and from here, ITV had a whole team who would set up a scenario whereby the contractor who had been identified as a potential rogue, would be given a simple problem to resolve, usually a blocked drain or a toilet cistern that needed to be adjusted and the whole thing was overseen by a recognised expert or team of experts in the relevant trade/field. These guys who were being filmed, on every occasion ended up inventing work that completely unnecessary and charging usually thousands for doing it.

I was thinking, with all the horror stories I keep hearing about the motor trade on this forum and also what I see with my own eyes, having been working in the trade for years, what we would expect to see if we tried this with the motor trade in Ireland???

Mylow

The Motor Industry would blame it on 'imports'. Everyone knows imports are the cause of all problems, including the one's dealers create themselves.

Darragh29

Mylow wrote: »

The Motor Industry would blame it on 'imports'. Everyone knows imports are the cause of all problems, including the one's dealers create themselves.

Yeah but say in the case of aftersales, servicing, maintenance. Main dealers charging an hours labour for a 5 minute job of programming a key, charging 2 hours labour for a 30 minute oil & filter change. Marketing a service as including "Authorised dealer engine diagnosis check up", when we all know that means checking to see if your engine fault light is on at the dash when the car is being driven onto the lift. Things like this...

crosstownk

Like any trade there will always be a 'rogue' element. Every trade has it. When I worked in a main dealer service dept., I had a minimum charge of half an hours labour which would apply in the case of reprogramming a key. Essentially, this was to cover admin functions - sourcing the security code, printing the jobcard, invoicing, etc. However, the minimum charge was clearly advertised on the service counter for all to see and generally I quoted for most jobs before commencing the repair.

But I do agree, there are rip-off merchants out there that 'invent' repairs when in reality all that was required was a software download or erasing the fault memory. These are the muppets that give the motor industry a bad name. But it's hard to stamp it out especially as the customer who knows zilch about car repairs has no option but to trust the repairer, whether it's a main dealer or an indy. Basically, some so-called professionals prey on people's vulnerability and ignorance which is disgraceful. But how can this be monitored? It would be great if it could but unfortunately it's not practically possible. So the bad reputation will continue as long as these 'professionals' decide they can make a quick buck by being dishonest.

Anan1

The internet is actually a big help in this regard - word gets around a lot faster than it could before.

Damien360

Our libel laws would never allow the naming of any of these companies. For example, there was a programme on RTE about 2 years ago that lasted one show doing something similar on aluminium windows. They showed the poor work done by one company in Newbridge industrial estate when installing the windows. The company threatened to sue and an apology appeared on RTE about one week later and the show was no more. Cannot name the company but they are still in buisness.

taz30

damian360 is right!we had serious issues with a very popular nationwide car dealer-dodgy car-definately wasnt what it seemed.but when it came to writing in to a paper to fully describe our terrible experience it was pointed out that it would never be printed.the reason being that the dodgyest dealers take out huge ads on newspapers just so no bad publicity ever gets out there.