What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? California
Firstly, this is likely mostly my fault. I am not a car person: I take the car to the dealer for its maintenance. I don't want to give too many specifics here for privacy.
Recently our car developed an oil leak. It was sporadic enough that dealer #2 couldn't work out where it was from, so put dye in it, cleaned it up, and told us to come back after 500 miles. This we did and the news wasn't good: they would have to get me to authorize dismantling of the transmission to get to where they thought the leak was. But the vehicle was under warranty, including for seals and gaskets. So I authorized the tear down, knowing that the cash price could be $2,500 because of the amount of labor involved, and somewhat reassured that it was most likely covered.
A couple of days later an inspector from the insurance company came out and inspected the dismantled transmission. He reported sludge in the oil which is likely user error - in other words, unlikely to be covered by insurance. So by now I have a car in pieces and a potential $2,500 bill that I wasn't expecting.
The lady at the dealership, very helpful, asks for the maintenance records - specifically oil changes so she can fight it if need be. We moved house recently and the older records are in storage. But I found the most recent two records, one from dealer #2, one from the original dealer #1 (from whom we bought the car 3 years ago, certified pre-owned, 2 years old at that point). To my horror the dealer #1 record says "major sludge in engine may cause engine failure" which, while sludge was mentioned verbally and "you might want to clean it out next time it's serviced", how significant the failure could be was not mentioned. But that's only my word against what I signed for. Doh. Dealer #2 doesn't even show an oil change as having taken place, and of course no mention of sludge (because they probably didn't look). So I'm now wondering whether the previous regular maintenance (the "packages" for X thousand miles) did not include an oil change at all unless I specifically asked for it.
So now I'm in damage limitation mode. While I fully accept it is my responsibility to check the servicing is done, shouldn't a major dealer have noticed from their own maintenance records if an oil change hadn't been undertaken for a while, if only for advisory customer service seeing as they're the experts and I'm not?
Let's take the worst case scenario and say the oil wasn't changed for 3 years (it HAS been changed in that time, just don't know exactly how many times right now), is that really enough to cause engine failure?
If the insurance and the dealer say "sorry, cough up", can I reduce the cost somehow?
I can't afford $2,500 or even half of that right now. The car is used for my handicapped son (with hanging handicap placard rather than license plate) and it's been several days already. If they hold on to the car until I can pay, that would be a major problem.
I think I'm screwed but thanks for any advice you can give on any aspect of the above.
Firstly, this is likely mostly my fault. I am not a car person: I take the car to the dealer for its maintenance. I don't want to give too many specifics here for privacy.
Recently our car developed an oil leak. It was sporadic enough that dealer #2 couldn't work out where it was from, so put dye in it, cleaned it up, and told us to come back after 500 miles. This we did and the news wasn't good: they would have to get me to authorize dismantling of the transmission to get to where they thought the leak was. But the vehicle was under warranty, including for seals and gaskets. So I authorized the tear down, knowing that the cash price could be $2,500 because of the amount of labor involved, and somewhat reassured that it was most likely covered.
A couple of days later an inspector from the insurance company came out and inspected the dismantled transmission. He reported sludge in the oil which is likely user error - in other words, unlikely to be covered by insurance. So by now I have a car in pieces and a potential $2,500 bill that I wasn't expecting.
The lady at the dealership, very helpful, asks for the maintenance records - specifically oil changes so she can fight it if need be. We moved house recently and the older records are in storage. But I found the most recent two records, one from dealer #2, one from the original dealer #1 (from whom we bought the car 3 years ago, certified pre-owned, 2 years old at that point). To my horror the dealer #1 record says "major sludge in engine may cause engine failure" which, while sludge was mentioned verbally and "you might want to clean it out next time it's serviced", how significant the failure could be was not mentioned. But that's only my word against what I signed for. Doh. Dealer #2 doesn't even show an oil change as having taken place, and of course no mention of sludge (because they probably didn't look). So I'm now wondering whether the previous regular maintenance (the "packages" for X thousand miles) did not include an oil change at all unless I specifically asked for it.
So now I'm in damage limitation mode. While I fully accept it is my responsibility to check the servicing is done, shouldn't a major dealer have noticed from their own maintenance records if an oil change hadn't been undertaken for a while, if only for advisory customer service seeing as they're the experts and I'm not?
Let's take the worst case scenario and say the oil wasn't changed for 3 years (it HAS been changed in that time, just don't know exactly how many times right now), is that really enough to cause engine failure?
If the insurance and the dealer say "sorry, cough up", can I reduce the cost somehow?
I can't afford $2,500 or even half of that right now. The car is used for my handicapped son (with hanging handicap placard rather than license plate) and it's been several days already. If they hold on to the car until I can pay, that would be a major problem.
I think I'm screwed but thanks for any advice you can give on any aspect of the above.
