My experience at Hendy Ford Eastleigh
We initially purchased our new vehicle on Saturday 26th January 2019. Prior to purchasing it we noticed a number of scratches to the external paintwork and damage to the plastic casing around the gearstick. We informed the salesman of these and were reassured that these issues would be rectified prior to collection should we purchase the car, with the internal damaged casing being replaced. We went ahead and purchased the vehicle on this premise. Upon payment, we were informed that the car would be ready for collection on 30th January 2018, however due to work commitments we were unable to collect the vehicle until Friday 1st February, thus allowing them longer to rectify the above issues. You can then imagine our dismay when we arrived the collect the car to find that not only had neither of these issues been resolved, but that another scuff had also been added to the car (a blue paint scuff presumably from another vehicle), however we had not been informed of this prior to our arrival. We were asked to return the car to Hendy on Friday 8th February at 09.30 for the work to be completed. We were not offered the use of a courtesy car during this time, however were informed that the work would only take 90 minutes and that we would be notified by telephone when the work had been completed. Again, however, we received no such communication and when we called at 12.30, we were informed that the work had not yet been completed and ‘it would take as long as it takes’. Due to having a twelve week old child and various commitments throughout the day, only having one car and having to travel over an hour from our home to the dealership and back, this made planning our day increasingly difficult. When we eventually returned to collect our purchased car, we were informed that only half of the interior casing had been repainted, not replaced as we were originally told it would be, and that we would have to return on yet another occasion for this to be completed. Furthermore, the external paint work had been re-sprayed and this had left residue over other parts of the vehicle which was not cleaned off. We then had to return on Wednesday 13th February for this additional work to be competed and when we arrived were handed the keys to the vehicle with no showroom representative accompanying us to the car to ensure that the work had been sufficiently completed. We do not feel that an apology was given for any of our experiences, rather that we were dealt with in a patronising manner when highlighting ongoing issues. The above may appear trivial to some, and we appreciate that a second hand vehicle will always come with some level of ‘wear and tear’, however the fact remains that the purchase of a car is a large financial outlay and being treated in a professional manner is, in our opinion, the basics of customer care.
?and the external scratches still haven’t been fully repaired / still scratches, poor paint job to fix the chips. I will not be returning the car to this store to get it repaired as it will still not be done properly so I will have to live with it and deal with spending £9000 on a great car that I bought as we needed a car and not due to it being well sold and I will not be returning to this store in the future
In August 2018 we purchased a car from Hendy Ford in Southampton Central and we were so well looked after by the salesman and the team, who were all knowledgeable, personable and caring that upon making the decision to purchase another Ford we felt that Hendy would be the best team to return to. However, we are saddened that this has not been the case and we have certainly been put off from returning in the future given our above experience.?
- Mr Josh Young, 14/02/2019
