Yes, we can see a mug a mile away! (Yes Car Credit)

Member Name: BioJournalist

Product:	Yes Car Credit
Date:	23/02/03 (3779 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: BBC Watchdog are on the Case!

Disadvantages: How may I Rip you off Sir/Madam.

This is a copy of my complaint to Direct Auto Finance Limited - Trading as: Yes Car Credit.

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Letter sent on the 3rd Dec 02.

I am writing with reference to a car loan that my partner and I recently took out with your Luton deport on Saturday 23 November. We are completely dissatisfied with the majority of aspects concerning this sale. When arriving we were told to ask for Nigel but was met by a man called John who informed us that Nigel was on holiday.

From the start we were left standing around waiting to be met by John. When John finally came to meet us we were taken into a room where we passed over numerous amounts of identification we were asked to bring with us. We also discussed that we had been offered an APR of 19.9%. At this stage he commented that there may be a change in the APR before checking our paperwork (suspect!), but the change of APR was not discussed or agreed. John left the room with our identification as he said that he had to fax it to his head office. He shortly returned and informed us that my partner, Eddie Perry, would not be able to be put on the policy due to him having no proof of income, we appreciated this. Although there is only a small gap which is not usual for the self-employed. Subsequently, my partner was added regardless.

John then informed us to have a look in the yard at the cars to see if any caught our eye. At this stage he again confirmed to us that the APR would be 19.9% (confirmed). We made our way out to the yard and John said that he would meet us with a list of cars that fitted into our budget of £180 per month. He informed us that the whole process would take approximately one and a half hours.

We looked around the depot and saw a number of cars that fitted into what we were looking for. After a little while we decided to go back into the reception area as John still had not returned and we were getting very cold. He eventually came down to me
et us, with no list of cars, and asked if we had seen any cars. We stated that we were very keen on a Fiat Bravo, but added we were having a few problems due to 75% of the cars in the yard being automatic and we were looking for a manual drive only.

At this stage John disappeared again but never confirmed if the car we had spotted was in our criteria. We waited for a long time before John returned and he said that he was finding it difficult to find a car to fit into the budget we had been offered. We found this very strange as my partner had previously had a car on finance worth £7,500 and he only had to pay £144.15 a month on 26% APR.


He disappeared again and later returned and said that he may have found a Rover that fitted into our budget. I was not overly thrilled about this as I am only 23 and Rover?s in my opinion are for the mature person. When seeing the Rover, which was out the back this confirmed my reservations. John told us to go and wait once more in the reception area. Nothing seemed to be up for discussion and none of our questions were getting answered at any point.

He later returned and said that there may be a Citroen Xsara. We were quite impressed with this as only two weeks previous had one on hire. John seemed relieved at this. The Citroen was out the back with the Rover. We were unable to properly view the car due to it being wedged between other two cars. John said that if we did decide to take the car, it would be cleaned inside and out and we would be able to have a proper look at it. On this we decided that we were quite happy with this and he whisked us back into a room and said that a financial man would be down to see us to talk about the financial part of the deal, before inspection of the Xsara. It was getting late at this point as we had been there for a long time and John stated that he was supposed to have finished 40 minutes previous and was supposed to be going out and implied it was our fault, but
we were the ones kept waiting for hours. It all felt intimidating and unprofessional. Trotters Independent Traders.

Once in the room John asked us to hand over the £500 cash deposit. We were also trading in a Renault Clio, which the Manager had valued at £700. We had been told previously that our car was of interest to ?Yes? it would be taken as full deposit. We did not want to pass the deposit over until we had talked over the financial part of the sale. He said that this was fine but commented that we had to get the car insured and requested that we did that now. We were very hesitant on this and decided to wait. John shortly returned and said that they requested a further £200 deposit off us, and to be honest I am really struggling this month now. But he debited my Switch card and we paid this, total paid £1400. He was actually looking for an extra £300 but we could not afford the extra £100 over the £200, he said that he would have to take away the 12 months tax offered to us upon applying to ?Yes?. We were not happy about this and managed to still keep 6 months. Mr Jeffries reluctantly agreed as we were in stalemate. At this point John left. In your literature an example on just under £5,000 requires a deposit of only £400, we experienced penny-pinching pressure throughout our deal. Also, this was the opposite to all your advertised deals as it was agreed that if our car was valued at £500 or over this would be accepted as full deposit.

After sat in the room for a while Mr Jeffries walked back in with his greasy hair and filthy black teeth and stated that he would be discussing the financial stuff with us further, we only comment on his appearance purely from a customers point of view on hygiene and appearance as we was in an enclosed space with no air conditioning.

To be honest with you we are very naive and very trusting, but my partner kept on asking him questions and he just brushed them off and saying ?and as I was saying?. We d
o not fully believe that he went through things in detail with us and to be honest at this stage we were so exhausted after being kept waiting around for over 3 hours we just wanted to get out of there. But I can honestly say at no time was the optional extras, optional.

My partner asked him some questions on how it came to £192.77 a month and he just commented quite harshly ?in my opinion you are quite lucky you are getting any car today with your background?. Which I thought was not professional at all. Bearing in mind that we only qualified for up to £180 per month. In addition, we were unaware at this point that the optional extras had been added without us taking the choice or option. In the first place you cannot add additional costs at your discretion without it first being agreed with the customer under any circumstances. The rushed through the pace of this sale/purchase and all our unanswered questions only revelled the answers once we both had the chance to inspect the paperwork at home to discover the suspect amount of £192.77. This was very insulting as your offer is for individuals with a previous tarnished credit history. Your advertisements set this in concrete.

He then rushed us through all the signing of the paperwork and commented that it was past his home time. We did not feel relaxed at all. He never explained fully what we were signing and what it referred to. After signing John returned to give us back some of the identification and said that the rest would be forwarded to us in the post. We have not received this to date or the AA Cover given to us, peace of mind?

The finance man (R.Jeffries) returned and handed us the contract of sale and other paperwork. At this stage he told us to wait in the reception area when another gentleman met us and handed us the car. The gent produced a form, which we had to sign which we were told was a ?release of ownership document?. Also, this turned out to be a customer satisfaction
survey and the car condition agreement, is it practice to mislead customers? John passed us in the car park and just smiled, no handshake or anything, which I thought was unprofessional. And that was the end.

When driving away, it had been 3 hours 45 minutes since arriving. The car fuel light was flashing at us so we had to stop immediately at a garage the car was on empty. I could not believe this and it just added further insult, just after handing over £700 in deposit and £700 in a vehicle trade in. Also, the emergency air bag light was flashing permanently. In the car manual this suggested that the air bag system was faulty.

Late Saturday evening my partner and I could not rest so we decided to get up, this is when we had noticed extras totally £1,010.40 had been added and an APR of 26%. To be honest with you we do not want the extras, which were supposed to be optional. One of the main things that were confusing us was that we handed the Luton depot £500 cash and £200 switch plus a car worth £700, which totals £1,400. It only actually states on the form that we gave £900, so where is the other £500cash. We also noticed that we had been handed a 26% APR deal instead of 19.9% APR as originally agreed.

On Monday my partner was in touch with ?What Car? and they stated that the Dealer Price of the car was £4,523, so why is there a difference of £801, to what the Luton depot sold us the car at? (The mark-up cost is not the issue, the principle matters)

We feel very ripped off and just to top it of the car is struggling to start in the mornings and chugging. Which we reported and we was just told to call the AA. May I just add this is just roadside recovery; repair costs would be an expense to us. Is this peace of mind? We have entered in to this deal for a reliable vehicle not a Dud. The Sale of Goods Act springs to mind. The gear stick cover and drivers back seat is also ripped and the centre compartment cover is missing. The vehi
cle coughs out extensive smoke, consumes more than normal fuel consumption and the airbag system is faulty. I understand that the vehicle is meant to undergo a full service and yet the service manual has not even been signed off. Was this vehicle correctly serviced, checked and valet ready for sale, we was told that vehicles in the back yard where waiting servicing by another sales consultant on duty that day. I wonder what ?What Car? would make of this if made privy to all the details this sale. Hearsay.

On the whole we are quite satisfied with the car but we are not happy about the 26% APR and we do not want to pay the optional extras, and the difference in the worth of the car, £801.

I had previously applied to ?Yes? in my sole name and got accepted on 19.9%, so why 26% this time. My circumstances have not changed at all as it was only about a year ago.

We do not like to complain but this is not satisfactory. We are also not happy to deal with Luton depot as we have been trying to sort this situation out with them and they will not help us. We really feel that if our experiences are out of the ordinary for your company?s policies then should they not be reviewed?

I would also be wondering what happened to the missing £500. It might be of interest to you that on our paperwork it states that we have been given only £200 for the Clio we have traded in which is short of the £500 of the £700 trade in value.

You will see from your own records our attempts to arrive at a fair and honest conclusion to this situation within satisfactory rights period. We have your promotional video and many other articles of literature, which state the ?options?, and peace of mind guarantees, none of them have been adhered too. We have phoned numerous times to resolve this matter starting from the very next day. We feel left lured and sold short on what seemed like a professional company on the surface yet underneath fails the Sales of Goods
Act and legal resolve.

Our aim is to have the vehicle corrected or exchanged. The agreement amended and the extras removed, further to this why this happened including why we did not receive all that attracted us to ?Yes?.

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* Since this letter was written it took 'Yes' 2 months to reply, after many telephone calls asking for a responce. I am currently writing my responce. Also, we had an accident in the car when the ABS failed to work in wet weather and the Air Bag did not even release. The garage we used for the vehicle repair told us that they found a list of faults with the car which were not caused by the accident itself, this is being investigated.

Anyone who has not yet done it! go to the "BBC Watchdog" website where customers are being asked to make their complaints, Watchdog would love to hear from you!

What else can I say?

All the Best to you all,

Eddie.

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