I recently bought an 03 plate Ford Fiesta from a private seller for £2200
I saw the car on autotrader and arranged the viewing. Myself and my partner went to view the car and it seemed fine. The owner took us for a test drive around his estate - no problems.
We purchased the car there and then and the owner asked us to sign a piece of paper which declared we had paid the £2200 for the car, registration was included on the paper, the date and time and that we bought it 'sold as seen' (I checked with trading standards and apparently this does not mean I have waived all rights and the seller is not responsible for faults). Both parties signed and took a copy each.
A friend suggested we complete a car registration check which I did out of curiousity (at that point there was no reason to suspect the car). The check revealed the car was a category D write off - the car had been involved in an accident. There was no mechanical damage, just cosmetic although the insurance company would not repair it.
I was annoyed that this was not included in the ads or explained to us by the seller although I was willing to overlook look this as a lesson learnt. However as these past 2 weeks since I bought the car have gone by, things have started to go wrong. The car had clearly not been serviced in a long time - there was hardly any oil, the water was very low and there was no screenwash. Today the engine warning light came on and the car was shaking violently. I pulled over, left it for a minute and then tried again. The car had stopped shaking but the light was still on. I have now booked it in for a service and check.
If there is something, which will be costly, wrong with the car - a fault of some sort - what are my rights? It has only been 2 weeks so the fault is likely to be the from when the seller owned the car. The owner did not tell me about the write off what else did he not mention?!
Has anyone else had a similar experience? Any advice? Does anyone know how I could go about claiming compensation or getting my money back?
I saw the car on autotrader and arranged the viewing. Myself and my partner went to view the car and it seemed fine. The owner took us for a test drive around his estate - no problems.
We purchased the car there and then and the owner asked us to sign a piece of paper which declared we had paid the £2200 for the car, registration was included on the paper, the date and time and that we bought it 'sold as seen' (I checked with trading standards and apparently this does not mean I have waived all rights and the seller is not responsible for faults). Both parties signed and took a copy each.
A friend suggested we complete a car registration check which I did out of curiousity (at that point there was no reason to suspect the car). The check revealed the car was a category D write off - the car had been involved in an accident. There was no mechanical damage, just cosmetic although the insurance company would not repair it.
I was annoyed that this was not included in the ads or explained to us by the seller although I was willing to overlook look this as a lesson learnt. However as these past 2 weeks since I bought the car have gone by, things have started to go wrong. The car had clearly not been serviced in a long time - there was hardly any oil, the water was very low and there was no screenwash. Today the engine warning light came on and the car was shaking violently. I pulled over, left it for a minute and then tried again. The car had stopped shaking but the light was still on. I have now booked it in for a service and check.
If there is something, which will be costly, wrong with the car - a fault of some sort - what are my rights? It has only been 2 weeks so the fault is likely to be the from when the seller owned the car. The owner did not tell me about the write off what else did he not mention?!
Has anyone else had a similar experience? Any advice? Does anyone know how I could go about claiming compensation or getting my money back?