On the motorway one night my car (MR2) developed a huge coolant leak. The engine overheated badly and had to be replaced.
I purchased an engine from a UK ebay seller called 'prestige_partzs', which is run by a gentleman called Khaled. The engine was advertised as refurbished, under 30 000 miles, with a warranty and a tracking number.
The engine arrived at the garage I was using and the garage installed the engine (with difficulty because the engine wasn't quite right as it was not an MR2 version of the engine - the listing said the engine was for an MR2, which it simply wasn't). The engine was £925 and the cost of the fitting £1800. This was pretty much all the money I had.
Following installation, the garage said that the engine was faulty. While the engine ran, at 3000 rpm the engine was 'knocking' and was clearly knackered. I contacted Khaled or 'Karl' as he likes to be known. I asked that he speak to the garage I was using and to sort out the replacement of the engine and the refitting.
After a lot of prompting to do something about it, Karl said that there was a 3.5% failure rate (not mentioned in the listing, of course) and that he would not pay to refit a replacement engine. After lengthy discussion, he offered £300 but there was no guarantee that the replacement engine would be fault free. I asked Karl how many times I would have to pay for HIS error in providing an engine which was not fit for purpose. Problem was, that I couldn't afford to have the faulty engine taken out of the car, so I couldn't send it back for replacement, or my money back. Even if I had returned the engine for a refund (assuming that Karl would have actually paid up) I would have had to pay the garage £1800 for fitting the original engine! Then if Karl did send a good engine, I would have to pay another £1800 to have it fitted! Karl couldn't give a s**t about my predicament and for weeks consistently evaded taking any responsibility for the dodgy engine.
Interestingly, the ebay advert insists that buyers return their old engine. I suspect that these engines are sprayed to look nice and then resold as refurbished is by prestige_partzs. The reason I think this, is because the tracking number was not provided by Karl, so he could not prove the engine was as described.
The engine was not fit for purpose. The seller would not accept responsibility for selling me an engine which was not fit for purpose. The tracking number was not issued. The Karl relied on a 'complaints procedure' he would not send to me and was not available anywhere. I had to make a compliant to PayPal just to get an address for prestige_partzs (the address supplied wasn't the business address for prestige_partzs, just the address of the company Karl bought the engine from, called Jap Auto Parts of Birmingham). Karl relied on the no labour section of the listing not to pay for the engine refit. this means that I am out of pocket by almost £3000 due to using prestige_partzs.
After I raised the PayPal complaint, Karl instigated an unpaid dispute against me via PayPal - which I consider to be a fraudulent attempt to obtain money by deception.
I implore anyone thinking about using prestige_partzs to think again. You could loose money on the prestige_partzs roulette game - I did and lost. I have paid almost £3000 and my car is in exactly the state it was in originally. Essentially I paid £3000 to be treated appallingly by this crooked, unethical and loathsome merchant and have nothing to show for it.
I now have no choice but sell the car. Because the car still needs a replacement engine, it's value is two or three thousands of pounds what it should be. Thereby, I have lost not only the £3000 paid to prestige_partzs and the garage but had lost just as much in the depreciation in the value of the car.
I am considering legal action and will be speaking to my company Barrister. However, the only address I have for Karl is the company he bought the engine from, so it will be difficult to serve the papers. So, wish me luck!
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