Buying from a main dealer - how to check car history?

S

smarthinking

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I am about to buy second hand from a main dealer. Before I buy, how can I find out the name(s) of the previous owner, so that I can call them to verify things like mileage etc?
Also, should I get an independent mechanic to check the car out?
 
Yes, get someone independent to check it out. He will be able to tell from the wear on the engine if the mileage is roughly right, and whether the car has any bumps. How I wish I'd done this with mine!
 
Heard a company advertise car history checks:
cartel.com - not sure if the spelling is correct.

hth...
 
If you look at the logbook (or whatever the cert is called) of the car I believe it will have the name of at least the last owner (it does in the UK). THen try directory enquiries to get their telephone number. I have done this a coupe of times for UK cars and it has worked out mostly.

Not sure if it is easy to go back more than one owner.

Documented (ie with receipts) service history is often the best safeguard in my view for authenicating the car.
 
Is there not some sort of privacy issues here. If I traded my car into a garage, in my view that's the end of it. If you rang me I'd tell you where to go.

Most people here in Ireland are mobile now, alot of land lines are gone so the phone book won't carry that many numbers.
 
Mr2 said:
Is there not some sort of privacy issues here. If I traded my car into a garage, in my view that's the end of it. If you rang me I'd tell you where to go.
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Surely you wouldn't begredge someone a little bit of piece of mind when handing over chunks of cash for 'a' new car. Unless there was a good reason you got rid of it of course, but then again, I'd tell them that too, like, as you said, not your car any more, so why let someone else buy it if it was a bit crappy?
 
I'd hate that if I traded in my car and somebody bought it, you hear the other person and you know they won't mind the car like you did.

Sometimes your better not knowing what went wrong with a car before. We had a new car, customer had 6 minor faults (new model) in it in his first 6 months and traded it in as he thought it was a "Monday Car".

Sold it to another customer, has it nearly a year now and not one bit of bother. The first customer you ring will hate the car, the second lad says it's great. Same car!!!

If something goes wrong while you do have a car, that's what a warranty is for. Buy SIMI, main dealer and you be grand, buy cheap and dodgy, you get cheap and dodgy.
 
Mr2 said:
....Buy SIMI, main dealer and you be grand, buy cheap and dodgy, you get cheap and dodgy.
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If only life were that simple, people thinking of importing wouldn't bother, the sun would shine a lot, and we'd all live in happytown.
 
Import all you want, dealers don't mind. We won't trade them in, you don't get any warranty over here with them worth talking about and they have nearly all been clocked.

Again buy cheap and dodgy, you get cheap and dodgy.

You might save in the short term but you pay in the long.
 
AFAIK www.carcheck.ie will provide confirmation of previous ownership as well as a very thorough technical examination.

Used them before and found them very worthwhile (no connection)
 
Mr2 said:
Import all you want, dealers don't mind. We won't trade them in, you don't get any warranty over here with them worth talking about and they have nearly all been clocked.

Again buy cheap and dodgy, you get cheap and dodgy.

You might save in the short term but you pay in the long.
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I've never imported. Never needed to. I'm referring to others.

The trade take UK trade in all the time I understand. With a fsh and HPI check there's no fear of buying a dud, and a STG£10,000 warranty if you are plain unlucky.

Car clocking goes on wholesale. The mileage adjusters are very busy people, even in Ireland ;)
 
Mr2 said:
....and they have nearly all been clocked.
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Hello? Any evidence of that?

Is there anywhere here offering a guarentee on checking a car's history? Don't think so.

Buying a UK car with FSH and HPI is far, far less risky than buying ANY car in this country.

There are plenty of dodgy people bringing UK cars in, clocking them and selling them on, but if you import yourself and buy from a reliable source and do all the checks, you're much safer than buying here.
 
The trade do what they like and people who buy from them support them.

SIMI approved,Main dealers don't. We want nothing to do with it. We may take it off you but you'll get nothing for it.

People in Ireland may "adjust" there milage as a customer put it to me once, but it's not illegal. Approved dealers will have nothing to do with them.

Tried that carcheck.ie, there seems no way of finding out what milage the
car was at when coming into Ireland. Are you able to put up a link to excatly what they gave you back?

We have details of service records in the UK, Warranty work in the U.K, milage it was at when it entered the docks, the last time it was in a dealer in Ireland etc. The above seems fairly basic.
 
Mr2 said:
Tried that carcheck.ie, there seems no way of finding out what milage the
car was at when coming into Ireland. Are you able to put up a link to excatly what they gave you back?
.
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...not sure what you are getting at exactly. I'm not talking about imports and neither was the OP as far as I can see? Do you mean in the sense that all Irish cars are 'imported'?

I was just recommending Carcheck generally. When I used them they could confirm the names of the previous owners (Irish cars), date when car first registered...authenticating mileage never came up for me as I had no reason to be suspicious. For me my main reason for using them was the extensive mechanical check.

I'm not sure what other services carcheck can provide but you could ask - Bernard is very approachable. (Prefer not to publish or link to any of my own documents- sorry)
 
Caveat, that's cool, it was ment towards imported second hand cars.

Fair enought on searching Irish cars.
 
HPI will warranty a UK imports mileage. Up to STG£10,000 if they are mistaken.

Cartell nor Carcheck will not do the same for an Irish car.

Now which would you be happier buying? :D
 
Maybe I'm wrong but I didn't see anything about it saying what milage it had when it hit the docks. Nor did it say that it could, it was just saying it could see cars with warranty milage and claims, but the cars coming over here have huge milage and most would not be entitlied to warranty at there milage.

I also just ran a few numbers off the web site, and with all the faults they find in the cars they do check, it leaves around 7% of every 100 cars or so might be okay. That would leave it a risky business importing one so.

Has anyone used HPI and could show us the detail of the check list?
 
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