A self-employed driving instructor in Eastbourne says Nissan’s failure to repair his leased dual-control car has put his livelihood at risk. The vehicle has been off the road for three months while awaiting a spare part, and he has now been told it will take at least another month to arrive.
To keep working, he has spent more than £2,500 hiring a dual-control vehicle and has also continued paying about £1,500 a month in PCP finance for a car he cannot use. He has borrowed more than £1,000 from relatives to extend the hire, and says that once that money runs out he will have to stop teaching and lose his customers and income.
CW, Eastbourne
What happened with the repair delay?
The driver contacted me in mid-March, when the latest estimated repair date had been postponed for the third time to the end of April. Because his hire contract was due for renewal on 15 April and he had no money left to extend it, time was of the essence.
There was, however, no sense of urgency at Nissan. He complained that the company had continuously kept him in the dark about timescales and reimbursements, and I had to repeatedly chase it for information.
Meanwhile, he was paying £490 a month in PCP payments and a monthly hire fee of £952.
Did Nissan agree to cover the hire costs?
I managed to get the company to agree to reimburse him for the hire car costs up to the, as yet unspecified, repair date, but agreeing and paying are different things. Days passed and no money came through.
Two weeks after I waded in, Nissan said the spare part had been sourced and the repair was planned for 15 April, the day his car hire contract ended.
It said the reimbursement for the hire should be paid within 10 days. That meant the money would not arrive in time to pay for renewing the hire if the repair was delayed again.
When I pointed this out, the company said it would fund any further hire contracts directly, then refused to put the promise in writing. In the event, the car was repaired in the nick of time.
What compensation was offered?
Next came the battle for compensation. He calculated that, apart from the hire charges, the delays and uncertainty had cost him nearly £900 in lost earnings and other expenses.
Nissan’s response was to offer two years of free servicing, then it ignored his protest that he had already paid in advance for a service plan and that he was due to replace the car in 12 months.
Back I went to Nissan, and this month it apologised for ignoring him and agreed to pay compensation, the value of which he has agreed not to disclose.
It says:
“We are sympathetic to the customer’s experience, which fell below the high standards Nissan and its dealer partners strive to deliver.”
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Key Facts
- The customer is a self-employed driving instructor in Eastbourne.
- His leased dual-control car has been off the road for three months.
- He has spent more than £2,500 on a replacement dual-control hire car.
- He has continued paying about £1,500 a month in PCP finance for the unusable car.
- Nissan eventually apologised and agreed to pay compensation, which has not been disclosed.
