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Hi, I'm a new poster so go easy.
ive recently VTd my car with a reasonably hefty excess mileage and have taken much of ROB's advice on how to go about this.
when being issued with the invoics I used the template letter posted earlier in the thread, Mercedes then raised a 'complaint and I received this response:
Thank you for taking the time to raise your concerns with our De-Fleet department following the return of your vehicle.
I was disappointed to read you have been left feeling aggrieved by the end of contract charges raised. It is never our intention to cause any distress to our customers at any stage of their journey with us.
Whilst I appreciate your concerns; whether you are returning your car at the end of your agreement or upon use of the Voluntary Termination (VT) clause, as you have not exercised your right to purchase the car, an excess mileage charge will be raised should your return mileage exceed your total mileage allowance. This obligation is set out within the first page of your agreement, under key information. The provisions of the Consumer Credit Act that cover a customer’s right to VT their agreement do permit us to include any over mileage when determining what is 'not reasonable' upon the cars return. It is stated in your agreement under ‘Excess Distance’; ‘If the vehicle is returned to us (whether at the end of the period hire or an earlier termination), we will calculate the total distance travelled by the vehicle whilst in your possession (the “Total Distance”)’.
Your mileage allowance has therefore been re-calculated on a pro-rata basis in line with the length of time you have had the vehicle in your possession and I have attached a copy of the Voluntary Termination acceptance form signed by you confirming your agreement to be held liable for any damages or excess mileage following an inspection of your vehicle.
Please find below a breakdown of your excess mileage calculation for your reference:
Original Allowance: 40,000 miles
Original Miles: 37,000 miles
Total allowance: 77,000 miles (40,000 + 37,000)
Term of agreement: 48 months
Terminated early by: 15 months
Revised allowance: 64,521 miles (27,521 + 37,000)
Collection miles: 111,730 miles
Exceeded by: 47,209 miles
Pence per mile: 9 pence, plus VAT
Total: £5,098.57
I would also like to kindly refer you to S99 (2) Consumer Credit Act 1974 where it states:
‘Termination of an agreement under S (1) does not affect any liability under the agreement which has accrued before the termination.’
As your agreement was subject to a mileage allowance prior to termination and you have exceeded the allowance of 64,521 miles, the charge has been raised correctly and remains payable.
I understand this is an unexpected invoice and I am happy to assist you with clearing the outstanding balance by agreeing to an appropriate payment arrangement with you. I kindly ask you contact one of our advisors on 0370 240 1110 who would be happy to assist you with this.
Whilst this may not be the response you had hoped for, I trust the above has provided you with the reassurance that I have fully investigated your concerns. Please also be assured that your complaint has been investigated in line with our obligation to treat our customers fairly.
May I kindly ask you accept this as our final response, however, should you be at all unhappy with our handling of your complaint you have the right to refer your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service, free of charge – but you must do so within six months of the date of this response. If you do not refer your complaint in time, the Ombudsman will not have our permission to consider your complaint and so will only be able to do so in very limited circumstances. For example, if the Ombudsman believes that the delay was as a result of exceptional circumstances.
The form that I supposedly signed was altered by me and where it originally read:
'i be liable for any excess mileage'
i had scrubbed it out and wrote in:
'Anything not considered fair wear and tear'
BEAR WITH ME
I responded with this:
Hannah,
I would like to point out that at point of sale I was told that including a mileage of 10,000 was the only way to fit the vehicle into my budget and that the mileage is not really important however because I may terminate early due to my work situation. On close reading of the CCA it seems unlikely that your claim against me would be successful.
My reasoning is as follows:
Section 100 of the CCA says that my contractural liability is restricted to 50% of the total amount payable and so you would find it difficult enforce excess mileage charges under the contractual term. The relevant reasons are set out in section 173 CCA. The term in the agreement is conflicted with my limited liability and so the CCA prevails over the contractual term.
You said in your email:-
'I have attached a copy of the Voluntary Termination acceptance form signed by you confirming your agreement to be held liable for any damages or excess mileage following an inspection of your vehicle.'
And use this as evidence that I had accepted liability for excess mileage PRIOR to termination whereas if you actually look at the form you will see that I accepted no such liability. In fact it could be argued that this form should have made you aware that I was not accepting liability for the excess mileage.
Therefore where you said:-
‘Termination of an agreement under S (1) does not affect any liability under the agreement which has accrued before the termination.’
This clause would not extend to excess mileage because I was not invoiced PRIOR to termination of the agreement and in deed was only made aware of the invoice after it was terminated. This supposed liability does not form part of the monthly instalments and so for you to be entitled to recover this, you should only be entitled to do so if I were asked to pay for it BEFORE I terminated the agreement. Otherwise I may have chosen not to terminate.
There is no quid pro quo here and had I been under the mileage allowance I would not have been entitled to claim liabilities from you.
The CCA is quite clear in stating that ,subject to fair wear and tear, I may hand the car back with 'nothing more to pay' on the assumption that the car is kept in a reasonable condition and is kept in good repair.
The car has been regularly serviced by Mercedes and allowing for the odd small dent which is normal for a car of that age /mileage, it is in a good condition.
I look forward to you confirming closure on the matter.
i have since had no response since last Thursday (5 days ago)
ive had no acknowledgement of my email
i since sent again and asked for acknowledgement and didn't receive any
just now I sent an email asking for a signed copy of my agreement
anyone got any useful advice as to how I ought to proceed as it seems to me from what I've read on here that the ombudsman usually is little help!
thanks for being patient with me
ive recently VTd my car with a reasonably hefty excess mileage and have taken much of ROB's advice on how to go about this.
when being issued with the invoics I used the template letter posted earlier in the thread, Mercedes then raised a 'complaint and I received this response:
Thank you for taking the time to raise your concerns with our De-Fleet department following the return of your vehicle.
I was disappointed to read you have been left feeling aggrieved by the end of contract charges raised. It is never our intention to cause any distress to our customers at any stage of their journey with us.
Whilst I appreciate your concerns; whether you are returning your car at the end of your agreement or upon use of the Voluntary Termination (VT) clause, as you have not exercised your right to purchase the car, an excess mileage charge will be raised should your return mileage exceed your total mileage allowance. This obligation is set out within the first page of your agreement, under key information. The provisions of the Consumer Credit Act that cover a customer’s right to VT their agreement do permit us to include any over mileage when determining what is 'not reasonable' upon the cars return. It is stated in your agreement under ‘Excess Distance’; ‘If the vehicle is returned to us (whether at the end of the period hire or an earlier termination), we will calculate the total distance travelled by the vehicle whilst in your possession (the “Total Distance”)’.
Your mileage allowance has therefore been re-calculated on a pro-rata basis in line with the length of time you have had the vehicle in your possession and I have attached a copy of the Voluntary Termination acceptance form signed by you confirming your agreement to be held liable for any damages or excess mileage following an inspection of your vehicle.
Please find below a breakdown of your excess mileage calculation for your reference:
Original Allowance: 40,000 miles
Original Miles: 37,000 miles
Total allowance: 77,000 miles (40,000 + 37,000)
Term of agreement: 48 months
Terminated early by: 15 months
Revised allowance: 64,521 miles (27,521 + 37,000)
Collection miles: 111,730 miles
Exceeded by: 47,209 miles
Pence per mile: 9 pence, plus VAT
Total: £5,098.57
I would also like to kindly refer you to S99 (2) Consumer Credit Act 1974 where it states:
‘Termination of an agreement under S (1) does not affect any liability under the agreement which has accrued before the termination.’
As your agreement was subject to a mileage allowance prior to termination and you have exceeded the allowance of 64,521 miles, the charge has been raised correctly and remains payable.
I understand this is an unexpected invoice and I am happy to assist you with clearing the outstanding balance by agreeing to an appropriate payment arrangement with you. I kindly ask you contact one of our advisors on 0370 240 1110 who would be happy to assist you with this.
Whilst this may not be the response you had hoped for, I trust the above has provided you with the reassurance that I have fully investigated your concerns. Please also be assured that your complaint has been investigated in line with our obligation to treat our customers fairly.
May I kindly ask you accept this as our final response, however, should you be at all unhappy with our handling of your complaint you have the right to refer your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service, free of charge – but you must do so within six months of the date of this response. If you do not refer your complaint in time, the Ombudsman will not have our permission to consider your complaint and so will only be able to do so in very limited circumstances. For example, if the Ombudsman believes that the delay was as a result of exceptional circumstances.
The form that I supposedly signed was altered by me and where it originally read:
'i be liable for any excess mileage'
i had scrubbed it out and wrote in:
'Anything not considered fair wear and tear'
BEAR WITH ME
I responded with this:
Hannah,
I would like to point out that at point of sale I was told that including a mileage of 10,000 was the only way to fit the vehicle into my budget and that the mileage is not really important however because I may terminate early due to my work situation. On close reading of the CCA it seems unlikely that your claim against me would be successful.
My reasoning is as follows:
Section 100 of the CCA says that my contractural liability is restricted to 50% of the total amount payable and so you would find it difficult enforce excess mileage charges under the contractual term. The relevant reasons are set out in section 173 CCA. The term in the agreement is conflicted with my limited liability and so the CCA prevails over the contractual term.
You said in your email:-
'I have attached a copy of the Voluntary Termination acceptance form signed by you confirming your agreement to be held liable for any damages or excess mileage following an inspection of your vehicle.'
And use this as evidence that I had accepted liability for excess mileage PRIOR to termination whereas if you actually look at the form you will see that I accepted no such liability. In fact it could be argued that this form should have made you aware that I was not accepting liability for the excess mileage.
Therefore where you said:-
‘Termination of an agreement under S (1) does not affect any liability under the agreement which has accrued before the termination.’
This clause would not extend to excess mileage because I was not invoiced PRIOR to termination of the agreement and in deed was only made aware of the invoice after it was terminated. This supposed liability does not form part of the monthly instalments and so for you to be entitled to recover this, you should only be entitled to do so if I were asked to pay for it BEFORE I terminated the agreement. Otherwise I may have chosen not to terminate.
There is no quid pro quo here and had I been under the mileage allowance I would not have been entitled to claim liabilities from you.
The CCA is quite clear in stating that ,subject to fair wear and tear, I may hand the car back with 'nothing more to pay' on the assumption that the car is kept in a reasonable condition and is kept in good repair.
The car has been regularly serviced by Mercedes and allowing for the odd small dent which is normal for a car of that age /mileage, it is in a good condition.
I look forward to you confirming closure on the matter.
i have since had no response since last Thursday (5 days ago)
ive had no acknowledgement of my email
i since sent again and asked for acknowledgement and didn't receive any
just now I sent an email asking for a signed copy of my agreement
anyone got any useful advice as to how I ought to proceed as it seems to me from what I've read on here that the ombudsman usually is little help!
thanks for being patient with me
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