Ann - the mother of one of my wife's (Libby's) sons in law had a road accident last month which wrote off her 4 year old Honda Civic.
The incident shook her up quite badly and she rushed into buying a replacement car. She is a widow and a good driver but hasn't a clue what goes on under the bonnet.
Libby recommended she look at the Hyundai range at our local dealership - Motorfair - located in East Birmingham. Libby offered to take her there because we have a bought 5 cars from there in the past 6 years and have enjoyed excellent service. However - Ann didn't wait until we were back home from holiday and went there alone - looked at new models and their stock of used cars - and bought a 15 month old i20 1.2 petrol with 12,000 miles on the clock.
Fast forward three weeks, we are back from holiday and Ann mentions that she hates her new car. Amongst a long list of gripes was the boot is too small, the 1.2 petrol engine is feeble, it only has 5 gears whereas her Civic had 6 speeds, there was no arm rest, a small glove box, nowhere for her to have a bottle of water to hand and the car just didn't suit. She was really upset that she had rushed into the deal without really thinking it through and was an unhappy bunny.
Libby took Ann back to Motorfair today and explained to the dealer principal the circumstances. Ann had bought the wrong car and was most unhappy with it.
To cut a long story short they took the i20 back at the price she paid 4 weeks ago and spent 2 hours with her road testing the various models. She needed a petrol car because she does not drive long distances regularly and they encouraged her to test drive three used i30's which had a 6 speed box, bigger engine, bigger boot and more bells and whistles.
The bottom line is that she bought a 12 month old i30 Active 1.4 petrol with 10,800 miles on the clock in pristine condition, in exchange for the 2 year old i20 for the price she paid plus £3.400.
To say that she is over-joyed is no exaggeration and the dealership are to be commended.
