Hi all,

I took my car for a MOT last week. While it was in the care of the garage a mechanic of theirs tried to open the panoramic sunroof when it was -2 outside. As expected the sunroof has broken.

To make matters worse they have covered the interior of the car with oil when they shut it.

The sunroof was working fine before they touched it.

The garage owner has tried to say that the sunroof was already broken & that the car is only worth about £700.00, regardless as to whether the sunroof works or not.

The car is in generally excellent condition. It has done 58,000 miles & has the 1.9 JTD turbo diesel engine. it is a late 2006 model on a "56" plate.

So my questions are; What is the rough actual value of the car? is the mechanic right, or is he trying to push me down?

Does a damaged sunroof actually affect the value?

Would the mechanic be right in saying that the sunroof was already broken, when it was working perfectly fine before they touched it?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks & regards, Anne.

Ok, no its not worth £700, on a 56 its worth at least double that, just look on Autotrader or eBay for one that's similar to yours and use that as a price, best if you can find 2-3 for sale, don't really know much about the roof apart from they are problematic things lol.


Find 3 cars similar to yours for sale and print them off, take them to the garage and say you want these issues sorted for free or your going to seek legal advice, also I think trading standards should be mentioned at some point and that will scare them into at least getting the seats cleaned and maybe sorting the roof.


My question is, if it went in for an MOT, why the hell were they playing with the roof??? its not an item tested on the MOT so they should not have been opening it as its not a fail if it doesn't work. that's the mark of some-one messing around while doing the test because they have never seen one before.


Please Name and shame this company so no other Fiat owners take their pride and joys there!

Hi, Thanks for the reply.

I am still negotiating with the garage for a best outcome. I will have to see what they come up with.

If they don't come to a satisfactory agreement, then I will take pleasure in naming & shaming them.

If I can recall from past posts, a new sunroof from a dealer will cost you about 4k. There are secondhand ones around for 10% of that price, just check classifieds and eBay out.
Are you sure it is broken? What exactly happened and how is it broken?
It can be repaired but it does take a lot of work.
Living in Austria, I have learnt my lesson, never open the sunroof when it is -15°C outside because it will not close until the heat is turned up full for a long time to melt the ice that is jamming it.

Before winter comes, a tub of vaseline is great, just fully open the sunroof and dab vaseline into all the rubber and runners.
There are guides somewhere on this forum.

My sunroof was open for 2 days in the snow until the sun came out. Lessons learnt.

Your MOT garage should be ashamed of themselves.

I just realized after re-reading the post that your are a lady and might I add that a lady with a Stilo has my respect. They taking the P##S out of you and come hell or highwater don't give up.

You could take the money, keep the car and bid for this one
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/FIAT-STILO-Estate-/151582945318?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item234b0c3026

Spare parts are always good to have

Thanks for your reply i have had numerous stilos and love them, numerous fiats actually i think they are fantastic cars .i think a word with solicitor may be in order Anne.Oh it is broken allright they had to cut cables to close it

They ruined it by cutting the cables. Even a hair dryer might have worked to dispose of the ice or to expand the runners. Idiots, they broke it, they fix it.
Tell them to buy the replacement car from eBay if they don't want to pay you the fair price and then they have most of the car for spares and can fix it for no cost to you and even make some money.

Why did they need to cut wires???? That's just stupid!!!!

It's ruined now end of, guys, is there a manual over ride on these like normal electric sunroofs??? They are cowboys and have ruined your car!!!

well, what a load of BS, your car is worth around £1800 i reckon, probably more, i recently sold my 2003 stilo multiwagon JTD as a mot failure, the roof did not work, it needed glow plugs too and i got £600 for that as a mot failure!!!! oh and it had 123k on the clock

Get them to fix your car!

Tell them that if they are not capable of fixing what they broke, you will have Fiat fix the car, and they will be billed for it.
You don't care how much it costs, it's not your problem.

They want my insurance details now so they can explain and get the car written off.Telling me i am being unreasonable.Anne

Name and shame!
Send their email addy as well.

annemt said:

They want my insurance details now so they can explain and get the car written off.Telling me i am being unreasonable.Anne

Click to expand...

WHY?
You were not in an accident. At best it was vandalized, that is a different matter altogether that would require at least some police involvement.

I don't know how insurance works in the UK, but if it gets written off wouldn't that mean you will pay more in the future (a claim on your insurance, premiums and other stuff) for something that is clearly not your fault?

Reasonable is for them to get the car back to the original state it was when you took it in... (that is ..if the sun roof was indeed working ..and i would say it was.. because they got it open..so it was at least 50% there)

they should have there own insurance, and that should cover you for your car whilst in there care. this should be a open and shut case, they give you a grand and your car, all done, or they give you full market value of the car which is roughly around 2k or they find you the exact car for you, or repair yours....

I think you need to go seek legal advice, they are trying to wriggle out of it, I suspect because they don't have insurance, your next phone call should be to trading standards and the national mechanics association, I believe there is one, that regulates car mechanics and makes sure they work to a certain standard which these cowboys clearly aren't!

Name and Shame!

http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/advice/problemswithvehicles-sum2.cfm

Copy and paste this link, it's to the trading standards website, if it's an MOT tester they wil be registered on the dvla and vosa data bases so I would contact them too.

The Garage bought my car .heartbroken still got it they dont really want it .at the mo driving a ford focus estate I HATE IT. i am going to try and find a sunroof for my car and see what happens Anne .my beautifull baby ruined

The garage will have or should have pi insurance for these sort of issues go legal with them