Will be returning 10 year old vehicle on HP Volutary Termination. Condition queries

[Zinfandel]

Hi all,

First off my thanks to the website for all the useful advice on here. I've registered as I have some very specific queries about my situation.

I'll try to keep it brief. I'm in a situation at present where I am one payment from meeting the halfway point. A finance company provided a sub prime loan for me to purchase the vehicle from a used car dealer which I did at an APR of 47.9%.

Now I'm half way through the term and have almost paid off the cost of the vehicle and still have another £3500 or so to go on a car where the current trade in value is circa £1000. It seems to me unquestionably the best thing for me to voluntary terminate the lease.

Now, the car had several cosmetic issues when I bought it. Particularly scuffed allows, scratches to front and rear bumpers and smaller scratches on roof. I have taken reasonable care of the care but I'm worried that the finance company will try to get me to pay for the repair of those.

Would it best to get them returned before the car is sent back as I'm sure they would try to charge ridiculous amount for the repair of these when in my opinion the car is in reasonable condition for a ten year old car and is certainly in reasonable condition relative to what it was like when I purchased it.

Would very much appreciated any advice.

Kind regards

Ash

[R0b]

Re: Will be returning 10 year old vehicle on HP Volutary Termination. Condition queri

Suppose the question is how far do you want to go on this, you take any photos of the car at the time you purchased or did the finance company come out and do a pre-inspection of the car? If not then it will be your word against theirs. That being said, a car which is 10 years old is inevitably going to have some kind of damage/scratches to it and the finance company cannot expect it to be in pristine condition as if it was new or nearly new.

the law states that the car should be returned in a reasonable condition, when you purchased the vehicle was it from a reputable dealer and did they have a website which advertised the car with pictures, or any documentation you have which might describe the vehicle before handing over will certainly be useful. From what I know so far, charges for particular damage can range from £35-£55 for scratches, £45 for minor dents, £35 for restoration of scratched alloys.

I am in a sort of similar position to you with another company where I have recently VT'd my car, although they are not wanting a huge amount I am still disputing this as there are additional charges I did not agree to albeit they have threatened to pass onto their solicitors which of course I am happy for them to do. The Consumer Credit Act enables you to hand back the car after 50% has been paid, and there is a good argument that your liability is only restricted to 50% and nothing above this based on the wording of the Act itself - possibly why many finance companies do not want to go to court over this as the cost of doing so and potentially losing setting some kind of precedent could be fatal.

Therefore, you could wait until they send you a list of charges and decide from there whether you want to pay or dispute it.

[Zinfandel]

Re: Will be returning 10 year old vehicle on HP Volutary Termination. Condition queri

Suppose the question is how far do you want to go on this, you take any photos of the car at the time you purchased or did the finance company come out and do a pre-inspection of the car? If not then it will be your word against theirs. That being said, a car which is 10 years old is inevitably going to have some kind of damage/scratches to it and the finance company cannot expect it to be in pristine condition as if it was new or nearly new.

the law states that the car should be returned in a reasonable condition, when you purchased the vehicle was it from a reputable dealer and did they have a website which advertised the car with pictures, or any documentation you have which might describe the vehicle before handing over will certainly be useful. From what I know so far, charges for particular damage can range from £35-£55 for scratches, £45 for minor dents, £35 for restoration of scratched alloys.

I am in a sort of similar position to you with another company where I have recently VT'd my car, although they are not wanting a huge amount I am still disputing this as there are additional charges I did not agree to albeit they have threatened to pass onto their solicitors which of course I am happy for them to do. The Consumer Credit Act enables you to hand back the car after 50% has been paid, and there is a good argument that your liability is only restricted to 50% and nothing above this based on the wording of the Act itself - possibly why many finance companies do not want to go to court over this as the cost of doing so and potentially losing setting some kind of precedent could be fatal.

Therefore, you could wait until they send you a list of charges and decide from there whether you want to pay or dispute it.

Thanks for the reply dude, much appreciated!

I'm happy to go as far as it takes but unfortunately I don't have any pictures of the car from when I bought it.

Basically there are some light scratches on the front and rear, a couple of rust spots on some scratches on the roof that were there when I bought the car.

There's a pretty significant scuff on the near side rear quarter which I'll have fixed but to me honest my worry was that they'd come back and say "It's £2,000 for the repairs" and then I'd be like "Oh god kill me".

[R0b]

Re: Will be returning 10 year old vehicle on HP Volutary Termination. Condition queri

If you purchased with all of these scratches, rust spots etc did the selling price of the car reflect this? Another line of argument could be to do a free valuation of the car based on the original mileage and condition and compare that with the price that you paid for the car, less any interest from finance company etc. If the price sold was much less than the value it would have been if it was in a good condition then that could also help your case.