JUST ONE WORD FOR IT : THEFT After almost EIGHT months of stonewalling, inaction and time wasting I’m still waiting to get all of my money back from these people. Having refused to let it drop, I finally had an email on the 7th of May at 8.20 telling me that my warranty claim had been approved. 6 hours later I had another email telling me it was in fact just a partial refund (for the pump, due anyway) and the rest (legally due fitting and dismantling costs) was still “under consideration”. In the first instance, I was just offered a website credit, obviously refused by me. On the 18th of June I had an email telling me I was in effect only getting £65.88 paid back out of a total of £227.62 due for the garage costs, a figure which has been known since the 29th of October 2019, claimed with full supporting documentation and accepted by the company. These people are liars and totally dishonest. The payment I have received does not comply with either German or European law, a fact I have pointed out. They are just keeping my money, which in my book is theft, pure and simple. If, incredibly, you are still minded to do business with this company, do yourself a favour: (1) Read all the negative reviews on this site and others – there is a good chance that they at least will be true; (2) Pay with something which will allow you to get your money back such as PayPal or a credit card; (3) Be aware that Paypal have a six month limit to make a claim – I was strung along for more than that and went past the limit, however the credit card backing Paypal may have a far longer period in which to claim; (4) Resist all unreasonable attempts to make you pay postage to send things back; (5) Be aware that if you are intending to obtain money back from a “pledge” part, you will have to pay the postage and in many cases it could be very largely cost ineffective; (6) Remember this company has absolutely no idea what Customer Services are (or just doesn’t care) so you can expect mindless, uncoordinated, automated responses; (7) If something goes wrong you can expect to spend months attempting to get resolution and they will be hoping you’re just going to drop it - don’t, take it public, tell others; (8) Be aware that when making a claim there is a whole performance to go through concerning the provision of stamped invoices (even though this is not normally accepted UK practice), proof of hours worked fitting parts etc; (9) It is telling that this company refuses to participate in the legal arbitration procedures normally available in Germany (assuming you even wanted to do that), and it also does not participate in the Trusted Shops initiative in Germany, where you would have some protection. MY ADVICE : GO ELSEWHERE, IN THE UK, PAY MORE AND GET PROPER, HONEST SERVICE. SAVE YOURSELF THE HASSLE OF DEALING WITH THIS COMPANY – YOU WILL REGRET IT, BELIEVE ME. 23/6/20 ANOTHER DOLLUP OF GUFF FROM AUTODOC… This is just utter nonsense. YOU are responsible for meeting claims, not the manufacturer. Why? Because : (1) you don’t state in your T & C’s that you are acting as an agent for the manufacturer (don’t bother correcting it, we’ve got copies of what they were); (2) the legal contract taken out was between us and not myself and the manufacturer; (3) your staff deal with the claims, not the manufacturer’s ; (4) all the claims paperwork is on your headed paper; (5) you refused point blank to facilitate any contact between me and the manufacturer; and (6) under German law it is the seller who is responsible for warranties to the consumer, not the producer - you are of course free as the supplier to take your own actions in respect of the manufacturer independently. Consequently your constant references to seeking approval from the manufacturer are entirely false and misleading. Even if you were correct, it is not up to the manufacturer (General Ricambi in my case) to “make a decision” as though they had freedom of choice in the matter. The manufacturer is bound to obey the European legislation in force, under which they are obliged to refund all of the costs that were claimed. Just to start with, I have reported you to the European Consumer Centre in the UK and am handing them a full file on my case. This will catch up with you in Germany where you will inevitably be contacted by the German Consumer Centre . This will have the benefit of drawing the German authorities’ attention to your activities and the manner in which you conduct business, although I suspect they have already had a substantial volume of local complaints.