Hello folks,
Just wondering if anyone has had to go through an independent inspection process regarding a warranty / non-warranty claim and had any advice or recommendations.
Long story short, the other half's 2009 Mini One which she bought from new has just suffered engine failure requiring an entire new block / pistons / head due to a part of a valve breaking off whilst on the motorway. The car has done just under 60k miles and has full BMW Mini service history, however, it is out of warranty and we chose not to take out an extended warranty.
The bill for the repairs came to £10.5k, which Mini (as a goodwill gesture) agreed to pay a percentage of, leaving us with nearly £2k to make up on our own. This was repaired under duress, and Mini are well aware of this. Going by my reading of consumer rights act and having spoken with CAB, they agreed that it sounds as if the car has failed within an unreasonable length of time (they quoted 6 years as being reasonable) and believe we have a string case. In an ideal world, Mini would inspect it and produce a report to say it was a manufacturing defect, however, they are not willing to do this. They have said we can get an independent inspection to find the root cause, and prove that we, as owners, have done everything in our power to avoid this type of failure from occuring (FSH is about all we could have done in my eyes).
Has anyone had one of these done, knows someone who can, or have anyone they could recommend in the West Midlands area? And any idea of what something like this costs?
Advice would be much appreciated before we start handing out lots more money.
Just wondering if anyone has had to go through an independent inspection process regarding a warranty / non-warranty claim and had any advice or recommendations.
Long story short, the other half's 2009 Mini One which she bought from new has just suffered engine failure requiring an entire new block / pistons / head due to a part of a valve breaking off whilst on the motorway. The car has done just under 60k miles and has full BMW Mini service history, however, it is out of warranty and we chose not to take out an extended warranty.
The bill for the repairs came to £10.5k, which Mini (as a goodwill gesture) agreed to pay a percentage of, leaving us with nearly £2k to make up on our own. This was repaired under duress, and Mini are well aware of this. Going by my reading of consumer rights act and having spoken with CAB, they agreed that it sounds as if the car has failed within an unreasonable length of time (they quoted 6 years as being reasonable) and believe we have a string case. In an ideal world, Mini would inspect it and produce a report to say it was a manufacturing defect, however, they are not willing to do this. They have said we can get an independent inspection to find the root cause, and prove that we, as owners, have done everything in our power to avoid this type of failure from occuring (FSH is about all we could have done in my eyes).
Has anyone had one of these done, knows someone who can, or have anyone they could recommend in the West Midlands area? And any idea of what something like this costs?
Advice would be much appreciated before we start handing out lots more money.