Reasons to Avoid Carrs of Exeter

Thanks for dropping by. My name is Penn and for the past 20 years I have been confined to a wheelchair following an accident in which I suffered a spinal cord injury to my neck. There are two items that I just could not do without. The first is my electric wheelchair, and the second is my specially adapted motor vehicle. Without either of these mobility aids, I am confined to my house.

I decided to put together this web page which describes the experiences I have recently had with a local Chrysler dealer here in the South West of England.

The company in question is called Carrs of Exeter. They have various outlets in the Southwest of England including Helston garages in Cornwall.

In 2006 I took my Chrysler Voyager to them because the ABS warning light would not go out. To cut a long story short the car had been fitted with a faulty ABS system when it was manufactured. This was a known fault in the USA and all Chrysler Voyager owners had received a recall in 1993 to have the problem rectified completely free of charge. Because I was a UK customer I never received the recall, although the recall was worldwide and not just assigned to the USA. When I informed Carrs of Exeter of my findings they dismissed this totally.If I wanted my vehicle back I had no choice but to given the go-ahead to carry out the recall and probably bill me for it. They obviously did a bit of homework and then admitted that there was indeed a recall and offered to undertake the work. This was where all my troubles started.

It turned out that the ABS hydraulic assembly needed to be replaced. When I asked how long it would be before my car was going to be fixed and ready for collection, the only answer I received was, six days, six weeks or six months. I was now virtually housebound without transport. As the weeks passed by, there was still no sign of my vehicle being returned to me.

You can understand that after three months without a car I was getting extremely desperate. All I would get in response to my inquiries about when the part was going to be available was "it is on backorder, we don't know when it's going to be available"

I then started researching this matter myself using the Internet. With the help of some American friends I managed to locate more than one outlet in the United States that could provide me with the exact part needed to complete the recall on my vehicle. In the meantime, I was still being told that the part would not be available until the end of April. This is when I got the local media involved. After a phone call from consumer journalist Natalie Cornah who works for Spotlight television, a hydraulic assembly mysteriously appeared and was fitted to my car within two days. Somewhat sooner than they had been telling me for weeks on end. We can only guess why.

My car was now finished with all faulty parts replaced. I was then given the bombshell. Two of the components that had been replaced, one of which was the one I'd waited for, were not part of a recall. I knew for a fact that the Hydraulic Assembly was part of the recall and I should not be paying for it. They would not have it, if I wanted my car back, I was going to have to hand over £3000. I could have taken legal action there and then but that would have meant my car being impounded at Carrs of Exeter for many months. I needed my car, so under duress, I reluctantly paid the £3000.

I was then forced to take legal action against Carrs of Exeter to claim back what I had paid them. They backed down before anything went to court and repaid me the money they had taken off me unlawfully.

My mate picked up my vehicle from Carrs of Exeter and wait for it, it broke down on the way home from Exeter, I didn't even get the chance to drive it myself.

After all the heartache, inconvenience and enormous expense, my car was actually worse off than before Carrs of Exeter got their hands on it. After doing more research on the Internet, it turned out that they had fitted the new ABS assembly incorrectly. After waiting months for them to fix it, it was still in an undrivable condition. They completely washed their hands of it and wouldn't accept responsibility whatsoever. It would have cost me thousands in legal costs to fight my battle, I just didn't have the money so regrettably I scrapped the vehicle.

Maybe I should have learned my lesson the first time Carrs of Exeter tried to fix the vehicle a couple of years earlier. They replaced the gearbox unnecessarily and charged me £2500 for the privilege. Even then, it still packed up within 12 months and they used the 12 month guarantee as an excuse to try and make me pay again.

They also need to ask themselves whether or not they have the skills to carry out some of this work. They obviously lack a lot of knowledge about Chrysler automatic transmissions and know even less about the ABS system of some of these cars. They may well argue this point but my Chrysler Voyager certainly stands testament to everything I have said. I am certainly not the only person who has had problems with Carrs of Exeter. it does rather seem that they make a habit of treating their customers badly.

From my experience, the guys at Carrs Of Exeter may be very good at selling vehicles, but when it comes to fixing them, they are useless.

In 2007 I purchased a Mercedes Sprinter Van which has been a real joy to own. There is no way on God's Earth that I would ever purchase another Chrysler. Not because I think the vehicles themselves are rubbish, purely because if anything went wrong, I would have to take it to my nearest dealer which is Carrs Of Exeter. I've been stung twice by them now, it ain't going to happen a third time.