The Car Saga...

OK...

Since returning from Turkey, the car had shown a disturbing reluctance to start from cold, this coupled with a month or so of 'rough running' on tickover, and the fact that the [Service] light was comming on intermittently persuaded me to book it in for it's 1st service. The car has only done 15,000 miles in it's 18 months, so it was still some 3000 miles or 6 months away from a service, but 'what the heck' I thought... it has to go in for the door mirror repair, so I may as well do both at the same time.

On Saturday 26th of August, I had to go to the dealers to pre-pay for the mirror, and booked the car in for both jobs to be done on Friday 1st September (I had a days leave on that day, to be able to deal with it easily.)

On Monday 28th we took a trip to Lofty's house in Cambridge for his daughters birthday party, and were a little concerned when it took 5 attempts to get it started for the return journey. Once going, however, the car was fine and made light work of the high speed (70mph) journey back (A14 & M6).

On Tuesday 29th, Amanda tried to start the car to take Amy to Merry Hill (A Hot date with Harry !!) but it did not want to know. She then called the AA, who also failed to start the vehicle. The car was then towed away by the AA to the Dealers in Birmingham. (Amy got the bus and still met up with Harry, so that was OK) On the downside, there was no dealership courtesy car available, and as the vehicle was over 12 months old Renault would not cover the cost of a hire car.

On Thursday, the garage called to say that they still could not start the car, and that it would not be ready for collection on Friday as they needed to remove the cylinder head for more investigation - No compression in one cylinder!

On Tuesday 5th September I was called by the dealers, Renault had agreed to a complete replacement unit I.E. A new engine!! This would have to be ordered and fitted, and as such would take about a week. At this point we were offered the use of a hire car, which would be covered by Renault. On Thursday I collected the Nasan Micra 1.4 from Enterprise in Birmingham.

On Friday 6th, upon returning home at 17:30 I found a message on the answering machine asking me to contact the dealers re the hire car. I called back, but was unable to talk to the person I needed to, so a message was left for him to call me back.

On Monday 11th, Tony returned my call... it seems that Renault only cover the Car Hire whilst the components are ON ORDER, but as the engine arrived on Friday, I needed to return the car ASAP and that I was liable for thr weekend hire!! After some discussion, it wsa agreed that the dealers would cover the additionanal charges, so I spoke to Enterprise and took private hire of the same vehicle for an additional two days (at the Dealerships corperate rate of £15 per day)

On Tuesday 12th at about 16:00, I was informed that the car was ready for collection, and agreed to pick it up on Wednesday at about lunchtime. Unfortunately, I have an appointment on Wednesday AM for British Gas to come and fix a problem with my boiler... so I can't leave the house till after that has been done, and may well have to pay for an addition days car hire on the Micra, as that was due back at 11:00!! And to add insult to injury, I still have to pay for (most of) a service to maintain the warrantee (Air con. pollen fillters, brakes etc.) some £230

UPDATE #1: The very nice people at Enterprise didn't charge me extra, even tho' I was almost 2 hours late returning the car, and they gave me a lift back to the dealers - which was good of them.

UPDATE #2: Seems that Renault Birmingham have 'missplaced' the door mirror that I have paid for, and as such have not been able to fit it to the vehicle. I am now awaiting a call back from them to let me know when I can take the car back to have it fitted!! I don't think I will be taking my custom back to that dealership again...