And the owners just walking away from their "restorer"? Must be mental, this has got court written all over it.
That is absolutely disgraceful, the owner should expose these people if only to prevent anybody else making the same mistake.
I try not to get too involved TBH so she could be doing anything. She asks my advice, but I'm not her dad/partner. What can I do? If I pushed her into taking them to court she'd reasonably expect my support and I've got a divorce to attend to already which is enough.
Not for one minute suggesting you get involved mate. Would be good to know who churns out this sort of work though if only to be able to warn others!
Whilst I realise/get "court action is the way to go " there is no legal aid for same, u /she would need an Expert experienced ,recognised by courts, welder to opinion on said welding ,also needed would be an independent bus "expert" again ,recognised by qualifications,( the court decides on who is "qualified ")decided by court , the court action is fraught with cross examination , most solicitors , from experience , advise against such cases ,unless you have seriously deep pockets and can afford to lose the money. Cop for moral high ground(as I did) , Karma,? or perhaps "send the boys to visit"<never ,on reflection, a good idea.
Small claims court avoids most of that so what you say is not strictly correct. Put to the restorer the right way, they'd settle out of court anyway.... Absolutely no moral high ground comes from being ripped off.
I think it would be very difficult to get anywhere in court with it anyway, there's no agreed standards of work on this sort of thing, it's relative. We all know it's Marmitee work, but how can you prove that?
I'd start by asking any of the garages other customers if they'd be happy with that standard of work.... If they have a reputation to protect, just the notification of intended court action would probably be enough anyway. Anyway, not my fight luckily.
I'd suggested to Zed that she obtained a vehicle report from the AA and then make a decision re claims/court depending on what the report said. At the end of the day it's her bus and her money.
Did she have any pics of it before it went to this other place - good quality ones where the filler was scraped back etc? What's stopping these guys saying that's how they found it - e.g. we scraped back the paint and found all these bodges. What paperwork did she have and when did she decide to pay the bill? What prompted her to take the bus away in the end? The small claims court is mostly online to begin with - and very few people there know what we know here - some of what looks obvious to us might not be that cut and dried in terms of quotable evidence. I agree with small claims being an option, and an independent inspector being a good idea - but - it might be hard for them to qualify when repairs were done unless there are good quality before pictures taken.
I think I need to up my prices that's pretty poor work. I tell people the expected cost upfront but am rarely believed until we near the end of it all and im pretty on the money , most people under price, cant do the work and add more money for the fact they can't be arsed with doing the work. £50 an hours pretty strong for a never ending resto
Very noble, but what you're suggesting is that everyone on here pick up the tab for someone's ignorance and stupidity. Anyone who hands over too much money without even checking must have too much money. I think the Z pointed out in his first post that he walked away based on what this would cost. No disrespect but anyone who walks into a place and hands over shed loads of cash without even bothering to check has no one else to blame but themselves.
Why would she scrape filler back and what filler? I don't think it'd had and body panel work previously and had bellypans. The fact they've billed her for the work. aid in installments - they do a bit and charge her. She ran out of money. Part of the problem would be they would say they hadn't finished and if they had been given the opportunity to complete the work it would have been long lasting and look great.
Strong words Joker, though I agree with the gist. However we know nothing of her life and she may well have had many far more important things to worry about at the time. The first thing they did was remove the belly pans and fix all the rot in there. This was done very nicely and had she made the 250 mile round trip she'd have been reassured of their professionalism. I'll post pics of this as well when I take some. Many of us would have let them get on with it on the strength of that. Perhaps they got to realise that she'd never visit and put the L-Plate wearer on it thinking they'd be fillering it up before anyone noticed. Perhaps the filler man would have bashed it into shape first. Who really knows?
There are nice people in the world who are not technical and want a lovely bus. They are so open to being hoodwinked by total shysters in the scene. Its a complete disgrace. If they were a hotel then trip-advisor would bust them. That said I totally understand why Zed wants to stay out of it and he is right to. This is a tragic tale as if you cant do the work yourself then the bill for a resto is likely to be eye watering. In some ways here pulling the plug through lack of funds sounds like it saved her pouring epic amounts into her dream bus. Thing is many of us don't have a rational relationship with our buses and spending too much or not wanting to hear the bad news is too easy. If you were to do a whip round then stick me down for £10
