Just hope to share my 2 cents worth regarding my recent experience with second hand car dealers. I am a first time car owner and I hope my experience could spare others from the same excruciating torture I had been through.
To summarize, the deals left a bad, bad after-taste.
My journey started off with looking for a second hand car to fit my current situation. Mind you, COE was pretty low (< $30k, Cat A) but I thought I could be the lucky few to score a good second hand car.
I chanced upon Lake View Credit Pte Ltd. I found a model I liked and tThe drive was smooth, it has reasonable mileage and the whole car was well maintained. I sent it over to STA for evaluation and was graded B. Everything was good and I bought over the car. That’s where the nightmare began.
2 weeks into the drive, the check engine light turned on. I called the Sales person and was told to go to Rui Chuan Car Repairing. Without thoroughly checking my car, he said it’s nothing and used the OBD scanner to erase the error message. He asked me to change fuel to Esso. The light went on again for 2 more times and he told me there is problem with the catalytic converter. I called Lake View and all I got was to spilt the cost. It was a few hundred and I thought that was the end of it.
2 months into the drive, my gears started slipping and knowing the severity, I immediately went to their designated workshop. Again, only after much pleading, they reluctantly tried out the car and confirmed it’s gearbox issue. I called Lake View and gave them a piece of my mind. I reckoned they knew it was faulty car. Since gearbox and engine is covered under Lemon Law for 6 months, I asked them to pay for the full repair. But according to Lemon Law, it’s phrased vaguely, so as long as they pay their “fair”, they’ll be fine. I was told to replaced with a second hand gearbox and pay half of the cost. I was quoted $800.
This is where it got dodgy real fast!
To be continued...
To summarize, the deals left a bad, bad after-taste.
My journey started off with looking for a second hand car to fit my current situation. Mind you, COE was pretty low (< $30k, Cat A) but I thought I could be the lucky few to score a good second hand car.
I chanced upon Lake View Credit Pte Ltd. I found a model I liked and tThe drive was smooth, it has reasonable mileage and the whole car was well maintained. I sent it over to STA for evaluation and was graded B. Everything was good and I bought over the car. That’s where the nightmare began.
2 weeks into the drive, the check engine light turned on. I called the Sales person and was told to go to Rui Chuan Car Repairing. Without thoroughly checking my car, he said it’s nothing and used the OBD scanner to erase the error message. He asked me to change fuel to Esso. The light went on again for 2 more times and he told me there is problem with the catalytic converter. I called Lake View and all I got was to spilt the cost. It was a few hundred and I thought that was the end of it.
2 months into the drive, my gears started slipping and knowing the severity, I immediately went to their designated workshop. Again, only after much pleading, they reluctantly tried out the car and confirmed it’s gearbox issue. I called Lake View and gave them a piece of my mind. I reckoned they knew it was faulty car. Since gearbox and engine is covered under Lemon Law for 6 months, I asked them to pay for the full repair. But according to Lemon Law, it’s phrased vaguely, so as long as they pay their “fair”, they’ll be fine. I was told to replaced with a second hand gearbox and pay half of the cost. I was quoted $800.
This is where it got dodgy real fast!
To be continued...
