Fords Of Winsford, Cheshire www.fow.co.uk

Where to begin, if Fords didnt have the exact colour and spec of car I wanted I would of walked many times

I made an appt to view a car and trade in my car, I gave all details and within the week leading up to the viewing 4 people from FoW called to confirm our appt. One gave a valuation for my vehcile which I was happy with.

On the day we turned up our appt was "not on the system", he had gotten a babysitter and driven 2 hours for an appt that had been confirmed at a minimum 4 times.

We were then sat down with a woman after almost an hour of waiting. She clearly had no interest in discussing the car with us, several times while trying to get information she got up and walked away from us to talk to another customer in the waiting area without so much as an excuse me, she offered no info about the car or paperwork to see and stated "you have obviously checked the listing online and all of the info is there". She then went to check my vehcile and came back with a valuation almost £2000 less than what I had been given over the phone, when I mentioned this she said there was no log of that valuation in the system and refused to talk to the man who had given me this valuation.

Over the next week or so after dealing with another member of the FoW team I decided to purchase the vehicle. In the week following me buying the vehcile fords called to tell me the tyres needed changing, I didnt forsee this as a problem but asked several times if the new tyres would match the performance tyres on the vehcile, eventually I was informed 3 budget tyres had been fitted to a £30,000 car so i cancelled the purchase.

A manager then contacted me and agreed that a "prestige" vehicle should not be given with budget tyres and assured me that brand new performance tyres would be fitted to the vehicle so the purchase was back on. everything went smoothly until we collected the car.

We soon discovered that the rear tyres were not new as he had told us, they were clearly used and sun bleached like they had been sat out for a long time. Pictures were sent to fords to have this rectified, it was then that a "manager" wrote in an email "those tyres are brand new, they clearly have 5-6mm of tread" (new tyres have 8mm of tread).

The big issue is that after a few weeks of owning the car we discovered it was modified, nothing on the autotrader or fords website mentioned the mods. I stopped using the vehicle immediatly and contacted fords, I had to chase them up alot for any response and kept getting passed between members of staff, i had the vehicle inspected by a local manufacturer garage (FoW offered to pay for this and have yet to despite me sending a receipt) and they confirmed the mods and how they were negatively impacting the vehcile, evidence of this was forwarded to Fow. We then discovered a folded receipt in with the service paperwork for the mods, FoW knew the vehicle was modified and did not advertise it. That paperwork was not given to us until after we had purchased the car.

Its been 2 months, i still have not actually received a response regarding the unadvertised mods to the vehcile, not so much as an apology. FoW will not comment on the tyres other than claiming they are brand new. I constantly have to chase FoW for a reply to emails and have been informed today that my case is being passed to yet another "manager" still with no resolution.

I would certainly never deal with FoW again, the reputation they once had seems like it is now being milked. It looks like I will have to take legal action to even have FoW take this serioulsly. Fortunatley I took copies of all adverts and will be sending these to trading standards and the motoring ombudsman.

Bought leaf in December decided to go back and trade for bigger car 7 weeks later FOW told me that the car was now worth 8k less than what we paid !

Couldn’t believe it we had done only 500 miles in it since purchase .

We think that the cat must have been way overpriced to loose that much in such a short time we have had 3 other cars from FOW over the years and always thought they were fair but never again .

I can only rate the service 5 stars as I can't do 10 stars...I have always been a main dealer buyer, but saw this car about 300 miles from me...paid a deposit and then spoke to agent, who answered all the questions I had honestly.

I then drove up to Winsford and collected the car and was well pleased.

Car developed a minor fault a little while after, I contacted After-sales and spoke to another agent, who authorized the repair at the local main dealer without any faffing .....

While the car was at the main dealer, another fault that could not be noticed was identified, agent was contacted again, and the repairs authorized without any faffing again ..

I don't know about other customers, but with the experience I have had, I would happily recommend this company and their customer service...

You guys are a credit to customer services worldwide !

Spent £18,700 on a relatively new car (9 month old) only to find a problem with the gearbox 30 seconds after leaving the forecourt. Exchanged for a similar model and on the way home, discovered a fault with the radio and then subsequently the clutch and the windscreen.

Won’t take a gamble on trying a third car and wasting more time. Refund requested

I had a good experience before sale and during the sale of the car. The car we got was great, however, make sure you go through the specifications we were told it had Bluetooth but sadly is does not even though all the buttons etc are on the dash, the sales manager is not willing to admit fault even though his sales person admits he was "flabbergasted" that it does not come with Bluetooth, instead we were offered the chance to pay £150 to get it installed! - not an option for us. Just be mindful when purchasing a car that you get all the facts. Thanks

One star is one too many! Awful company to deal with. Top tip buy elsewhere but if you insist on buying from Fords of Winsford follow our tips:

1) Take a photo of the mileage when viewing & paying the deposit on your new car, then check the mileage when you collect it. FoW drove our vehicle 319 miles between paying the deposit and us collecting our new vehicle.

2) Ask to see the HPI Check, although FoW advertise all their vehicles are HPI clear they don't always do a HPI check prior to selling it. When we asked for a copy of the HPI check done prior to sale they sent us a copy dated the day we asked for it with us listed as the new keepers.

3) They only do a basic HPI check and do not enter the current mileage to be checked against the National Mileage Register (NMR) to verify the mileage.

4) If FoW tell you anything verbally regarding the vehicle, ask for it in writing. We were told our purchase was previously a Mercedes demonstrator vehicle to later find out that it was actually an employee of Mercedes company vehicle.

5) If you are told you cannot view the Service History as it's held online by the manufacturer ask for this in writing. As when you later discover your new purchase has no service history they will deny telling you that it did! Despite advertising that they check the service history this too is a story as apparently they cannot check the online service history as the V5 isn't in their name!

6) If you need to make a complaint make sure it is in writing to FoW and that they reply to you in writing. FoW prefer to deal with issues over the phone so there is no paper trail.

7) Make sure you know your consumer rights as FoW will exploit them. If you have any issues with the company contact Citizens Advice so your issues can be passed to Trading Standards. It will help other people in a similar position as Trading Standards have further examples of their Consumer Law breaches.

8) Be prepared for appalling, rude, unprofessional, flippant, intimidating, and vexatious customer service. This is no exaggeration- We're happy to show you the emails if you contact us.

As you can guess from our review we did not have a great experience with FoW. We only had our 3.5 year old vehicle 6 weeks before it developed a major fault which left us driving around in a tiny Hyundai courtesy car for 12 weeks until common sense prevailed and we finally got to return our lemon for a full refund and all costs incurred in resolving the matter.

Would we buy from Fords of Winsford again - no way, we'd rather walk!

Tried to line up to see a car which had arrived and calling the call centre they done just about everything to make viewing / purchase a car near impossible.phoned Motorpoint and they were twice as efficient and a no quibble over the deposit like Fords of windsford who ensured me if I travel to see the car and don’t like it you will not get your 250 deposit back!!!. I purchased a car from Motorpoint who clearly have sewn it up as far as car supermarkets go.i would not go near this place because I would not like to think what you would occur if you had problems with your purchase if you bought one.c glover

Very happy we have bought cars from them years ago and returned to find the whole experience even better with excellent sales team and although we had a slight problem with our car the after sales team sorted it out for us the next day.

Won't hesitate going back thanks from one very happy customer

Fords of Winsford was a name I trusted. Not anymore.

We were mis-sold a Vauxhall Insignia which gave us nothing but problems. Not least of these issues was the DPF, Which became the bane of our lives. Given that the salesman knew that we rarely drive on the motorway we should never have been sold the car.

The customer service we received after complaining was shocking. Fords Of Winsford were not interested in rectifying the complaint. After months of promises (often broken) of phone calls, emails, and great inconvenience we cut our losses and sold the car and bought a new one. The car we bought is older and lower spec than the Insignia but because we lost money on the Vauxhall we had no choice but to accept it. We do now however have a reliable car, which is more than we received from Fords Of Winsford.

I would never go back to this dealership and if you are thinking of doing so I would advise you to proceed with caution.

MY EMAIL TO THE GENERAL MANAGER-

Dear, 

As per our discussion on Saturday please forward this email to the general manager On Monday morning regarding the refund and complaint of the Nissan Juke purchased, registration CV63YXU. We would like a response to our email on Monday before more of our time is wasted on this issue, please can you copy us in to the forward email so we know this has been dealt with. If we don't have any confirmation of this by 11am we will contact you.

I would first of all like to express our disappointment in the entire experience we have had with Fords of Winsford.

We originally decided to use your company to purchase our new car as it has such a good reputation for high customer service and we believed we would be well looked after should there be and problems with the car after purchase.

During the decision period of which car to choose and trying to find the right deal for us we found the salesman was extremely helpful and offered us a great customer service.

The first issue we had arose when we found a large mark on one of the alloy wheels on the car. He reassured us this wheel would be fully refurbished and finished in time for us to pick up the car on Saturday. We were very pleased with fact we would be able to pick up the car within a reasonable time frame and crucially before Monday when I was due to drive down to Bournemouth for work. Naturally we were eager to pick the car up as soon as possible and so decided to ring up on Friday on the off chance that the car might be ready a day early. We were told several different things by different people and lack of organisation within the company became apparent as nobody had the ability to answer us to when exactly the car would be ready for collection. Unfortunately we were eventually told that the car would in fact not be ready for collection until the Monday. Understandably we weren't happy with the fact it wouldn't be ready until after the date we had already confirmed. We rang the reception on multiple occasions in an attempt to speak with him and eventually the sales manager.

He came across not in the professional manner you would expect of a somebody in such a position within such a reputable company but in a way which I found extremely patronising and rude. It took many phone calls and arguments before he actually seemed willing to help us and our situation at all. It was only when we asked for the contact detail of the company carrying out the repair that the issue was actually rectified. Eventually he managed to get the wheel returned from the company carrying out the repairs on the Friday and the car ready for the Saturday as planned. But all of this was not done without an inconvenience to us and an entire Saturday spent on the phone trying to get the car sorted for the date planned (a responsibility which was not ours).

After collecting the car on the Saturday everything seemed fine. It wasn't until the Sunday afternoon that the next series of problems began. Whilst driving the car, suddenly the red engine management came on the dashboard along with the ESP light. My partner rang Fords of Winsford immediately and explained the problem to the receptionist who initially said there was nothing that could be done until Monday when the after sales department were back in. This would leave me in a situation where I would not of been able to get to an important work meeting at the other end of the country.

Considering the car had done less than 50 miles since purchasing it I was very concerned and it seemed likely that Fords of Winsford must of been aware of the issue before selling the car. This concern was backed up as I calculated the car had driven approximately 100 miles whilst in your possession. By the time I had driven 80 miles and returned to FOW the lights had appeared 4 times. I struggle to see how FOW staff could of missed such an issue with car and have reason to believe they must of been aware of the problem prior to selling it.

We took the decision to drive directly to Fords of Winsford to try and rectify the issue, which meant that we missed a rare opportunity to see family who where visiting from up North. We met him, who told us that the light being on 'wasn't a big issue'. He also told us that we able to have a courtesy car but the only cars available were low spec cars with Ford of Winsford advertising written all over it. After once again having to argue and express that this wasn't a feasible option due to the nature of my job he eventually agreed to issue us with a different car. The car was still not usable for the meeting on Monday as I was required to turn up in a respectable looking car. I also did not feel comfortable driving such a large car on the motorway for such a long journey but due to his attitude towards me I had no choice but to accept the car offered. Due to these reasons I could not drive it to Bournemouth and so had to take my partners car instead. His car is not very economic and the 500 mile round trip cost me over £100 as opposed to the £40 that was planned as I should of been driving a car capable of over 70 mpg. I also had to get myself insured on my partners car which cost an additional £72.58. My partner had to drive on Monday morning back to Fords of Winsford to collect the replacement courtesy car.

I hoped the issue would be rectified as soon as possible and needed the car back promptly. I was assured this would happen only to find I was messed around once again by the FOW staff as to when exactly it would be fixed and ready for collection. This included being informed that Nissan were not able to look at the car until the end of March. A statement which I later found out of Nissan themselves to be false. We where informed that the vehicle would be ready for collection on Wednesday at 6:30pm, at 4:45pm when I was on my way to collect the vehicle i had a phone call to inform me the the repair still had not been fixed,yet again another waste of my fuel & time ( as i had to leave work early to be in Winsford for 6:30pm) Eventually the car was returned to me at my place of work on Thursday and the courtesy car picked up, this was not really as a good will gesture but was in fact because it was needed in order to be viewed by a potential customer.

After driving the vehicle for one day the same lights appeared on the dashboard, we drove the vehicle back to Fords of Winsford ( more time wasted) after another heated discussion on the phone with after sales, we informed him we would be at Fords of Winsford at 1:30pm. We arrived at 1:30pm to only be told to wait in the waiting area, by 1:45pm we still hadn't been attended to, at 1:55pm he finally asked us in to his office where the sales manager accompanied him. We started to explain all of the problems we have experienced and asked if we could discuss a refund & compensation.... to which he bluntly informed us that " we don't do compensation". Considering he has no information as to what inconvenience this whole situation has caused, i find this a very poor, inconsiderate and rude response. After much discussion he provided us another courtesy car ( which had only 40 miles of fuel in), which is only averaging 39mpg and therefore costing me double the amount of fuel it should be) they  informed us to email the general manger to resolve our refund and compensation, hence this email.

The above only slightly demonstrates the poor customer service, customer experience & lack of capability of the staff at Fords of Winsford, I have never known a company to have such argumentative, rude and unhelpful staff, if you would like further details on some of comments made to us by your staff please do not hesitate to contact us. I would like to add at this point that to date we have still not had an apology. There has been 2 weekends where we have had to cancel our plans due to due the issues above, along with time off work ( costing additional money), numerous phone calls & extra expenses which you would not budget for when purchasing a new vehicle. Some of which are outlined in the above however this does not include any further costs that are yet to come due to changing my vehicle again, such as insurance administration fees. Nor does it compensate for the amount of time wasted and stress caused.

One of the major concerns I have, as outlined above is that Fords of Winsford staff knew about these faults before selling me the car. As per the consumer rights, it is up to Fords of Winsford to prove this fault was NOT there when we purchased the vehicle, this aside it is now apparent that the Fords of Winsford mechanics team are unable to fix the fault. Along with the many lies and angry behaviour it leads to believe that members of the Fords of Winsford staff knew about this fault prior to selling me the vehicle- i now believe that reason this car was reduced by £700 was because of this known problem, and by marketing the vehicle below standard price you hoped to get rid of the vehicle with the low chance that these lights would appear on the dash within your poor 30 day warranty.

For all the reasons above I will not be buying another car from Fords of Winsford and I will share my experience with as many people as possible in order to warn them of the issues we have faced. I have found the whole experience very stressful and quite frankly upsetting that a company could treat a customer like this.

Further more i request a full refund of the car and compensation for all costs & time wasted during this process. Please also state a time frame for the refund and compensation process. I need clear clarification of this as i still need to purchase another vehicle, please note that if the courtesy car I currently have needs to be returned before i have purchased another car to my original specification you need to add the hire costs for a another vehicle within your compensation figure.

I hope this issue can rectified in a professional and fair manner from this email, if not i will left with no choice but to take this issue further.

I await your response.