Intermittent starting problem

If there is nothing wrong with car what are they charging her for ? Other than starting car , which they say is o.k and no faults found , what work have they done to justify costs other than a nominal charge for checking ? Did they carry out a diagnostic scan ? Why would a 2004 car be under warranty ?

They want to charge her labour for time spent trying to diagnose the car, they're basically claiming there's nothing whatsoever wrong with it which is a load of rubbish.

She took out an extended warranty with them when she bought the car, when I said it sounded like a fuelling fault she checekd all the small print etc. and found it should be covered by the warranty, so took it in.

Now they're basically saying if they find a fault and it's covered by warranty that pays for it, if they don't find a fault then it's £££ for the labour, so basically a charge for their inability to find the cause of the genuine problem the car has :(

Sorry I forgot to add all they've done is started it repeatedly (when the fault gets worse the longer it's left it probably won't happen if they keep startign it all day) and they've plugged in the computer and looked for fault codes... when the fault probably won't be throwing up a code.

Playing the devil's advocate here , but the garage are perfectly entitled to charge for the time spent checking out car and the diagnostic scan carried out .If there was a fault found and covered by warranty ,as opposed to routine servicing / maintenance there would be no charge .Perfectly normal practice .No disrespect but your unqualified opinion that it was a fuel problem goes for nothing unless you can back it up .To assume after reading small print that this checking would be free and covered by warranty , after no fault found is wishful thinking .I agree with you the car should be left for a longer period before trying to start .I have left cars with similar complaints outside rather than in workshop for a few days to aggravate any faults , before trying to start .But if they start o.k after that period , what do you do ? One possible suggestion would be the engine coolant temp sensor which lets the ECU know the engine is cold and needs more fuel , like operating the choke on older cars .Hope this helps you .

Thanks, I understand what you are saying...

We haven't assumed that checking it would be free, we've simply made some effort to establish if what it LOOKS like is under the warranty, to decide where to take it. She's then taken it to the garage she bought it from, but they're not the best or most cost effective place to take it if you know you're paying, hence making a best guess on the warranty situation first.

The issue is the fault remains undiagnosed, so neither we or the garage know if the as yet unidentified faulty part is covered by warranty. The garage seem reluctant to make further diagnostic efforts, instead they seem happy to quite literally say there ISN'T anything wrong with the car, and expect her to collect it and part with some money, end of. I am fully aware that the garage are within their rights to charge for time spent on diagnostics but I'm sure you agree people don't reasonably expect to pay money to have their broken car back when they were expecting it to be fixed, most likely under warranty!

So moving forward from here, if we eventually get the garage to diagnose and fix the fault and it is warranty, presumably they'll owe her a refund of the initial charge?

Dependant on how long you've had the car for and the mileage covered , if you had bought the car from my garage I would normally have carried out a basic check for bad starting FOC. After that , if no fault found ,I would have left the car for a few days and then got the owner to come in and try to start it and see if they could replicate fault . Some of the warranties are not worth the paper they are written on . You say there is a fault with car , garage says no fault .Can you not take car to another garage authorised by the warranty company to carry out repairs , for examination of your complaint ?

Yeah that sounds very reasonable, shame she didn't buy it from a garage like yours!

Unfortunately the garage in question is a main dealer who are a right bunch of charlatans, I knew this but she wasn't with me at the time or I would have advised her as such.

The warranty is from the dealer themselves and only valid there, this of course doesn't stop her from going to another garage anyway and arguing the toss anyway to get them to pay the bill, but we'll see.

Thanks for all your advice :)