Advice on buying a nearly new van private

Yes Dennis , Elddis were excellent and gave me a direct line to the factory and a specific case handler.

            David  who asked the original question, please remember that many of the major component suppliers such as Whale, Truma etc warranty their products for 3 years if professionaly fitted as such in a manufacturers van  and if A/s are wanting cash to 'change name on  warranty ' you can always claim direct from manufacturer. I have done this with Whale who were excellent with my claim for a  faulty product.
          The claim re warranty  ,  if true, and Paul seems to quote from the document, that a premier manufacturer of a product costing over 50, 000 pounds will walk away from a customer and owner suffering water ingress  just because they bought the van after say  6 months as the second owner is frankly shocking. What does this say for the management and how they regard customers?  If I was a prospective buyer of a nearly new van of our marque I would be thinking very deeply at this moment as the only  route seems to be via a dealer who will throw some form of aftermarket warranty in with the van to cover what is probably no.1 fear - damp! ( and charge you  for it)     Or look elsewhere....

Kaspian, agree totally. I believe buying a newish van privately, without the ability to transfer the most important element of the warranty, is unthinkable. It’s a real shame that what I believe is a great product is let down so badly by this. 

H

Harry to me this warning should be just below the header on the home page of the forum . I just would not buy a nearly new A/s knowing that I have just kissed goodbye to the most important part of the manufacturers warranty.
          I have  often said A/s warranty duration lags far behind what the other main players offer. Only 4 years ago our warranty on a van conversion was a miserable 2 years. The coachbuilt that we exchanged from , a so called budget brand,  had 10 years !  Our van leak became apparent at 3 weeks out of 2 year warranty . Repair costs estimated at £3k +. It had obviously been leaking from new and A/s offered no goodwill. Our previous coachbuilt had a small leak at a roof joint at 6 and a half years old and was repaired under warranty , no fuss , no drama and no cost to us within a week.
          Perhaps if made a sticky and people start questioning the wisdom of their actions then they would be forced to change. Its a pity the magazines who suck  up so much in their reviews to get advertising revenue dont do an article highlighting exactly this issue. I'll bet it has opened a few eyes on here.......

As a newcomer, it has certainly opened my eyes. As mentioned above, I too feel this is shocking from a company that is meant to be a cut above others.
Thanks to everyone who has replied to my original question, I am certainly just a tad bit wiser than this time yesterday morning!

Let's ask the question - has anyone here had a damp issue on a van that they bought secondhand with a period of unexpired warranty and dealt with Auto-sleeper to repair and what was AS response?

Paul, does it matter..someone at A/S deliberately included that clause in black and white when making up the t/c of their warranty as you thankfully pointed out. You may have saved someone a lot of grief in the future!

I can't believe what I am reading. All this uncertainty with the warranty.

We purchased privately our one year old van for a greatly reduced price (£10,000) less  than new and transferred the warranty into our name within the 14 day period. As far as I'm concerned this includes the water ingress part up until the vans main warranty of 3 years expires. Yes we loose the further 3 years water ingress part. ( Is it all word play?)
Having had the van a few month water started to ingress via one of the windows. We contacted a couple of Marquis dealers until we found one local who would help but they just transferred us on to AS at Willersey who acted fabulously and remedied the leak quickly.
The Peugeot base also comes with (Peugeot Assist) which can be extended for a further 2 years, worth extending but at a cost.

So am I wrong????

Regards Windy

PS          Paul 
           " Has anyone had an issue"      Water through a window drain and A/S cleared the matter up very quickly and while at the service centre also replace and rectified some recall issues that we knew nothing about. Having not bought through dealer we are very happy with the way our warranty issues have been handled so far. Small issues, as you know it's sometimes best to deal with yourself.

Thanks Windychippy. Have gone back to the warranty and had another careful read. Clearly you’re right, in that water ingress is covered under the 3 year warranty (which is transferable), and there is a separate Water Ingress Warranty covering years 4, 5 and 6.(the bit not transferable). 

This makes it better, but still room for improvement.

H

harrysp wrote:Thanks Windychippy. Have gone back to the warranty and had another careful read. Clearly you’re right, in that water ingress is covered under the 3 year warranty (which is transferable), and there is a separate Water Ingress Warranty covering years 4, 5 and 6.(the bit not transferable). 

This makes it better, but still room for improvement.

H

Thanks H,
 Just waiting for others to agree before we all start jumping up and down 
Would it not be possible if Someone on this site (with authority) to ask the question of A/S and then print a definitive  answer.   I'm thinking of ringing them myself but then who am I for people to believe the answer?

Cheers Windy  or Mr Chippy to some 

Study the terms of any warranty offered on a nearly new van as I failed to do when I bought my 21 month old broadway from Marquis in 2014. It was arranged through a third party insurance company and it was headed in large letters 'unlimited warranty' but cunningly later pointed out that this was for the first twelve months only and reduced to £1000 max for the second and £500 for the third years. Luckily (or not depending how you look at it ) I had to rely on it extensively in year one but not at all subsequently. AS at Willersey always dealt with them direct, quickly and efficiently. Had I read the policy thoroughly at the outset I would have probably still bought the van but there is an element of legalised 'con' there.  I do not know if the terms and conditions remain the same, but check.

Buy privately by all means and transfer the warranty as defined under AS terms. The shortfall of 3 years of the water ingress warranty will apply wether you buy privately or through a dealer, so in this respect, as an argument for not buying privately, it is irrelevant.

With some of the money you save by buying privately, could you not buy and insurance based warranty for a on-off price for years 4,5 and 6?

Maybe AS can be persuaded to match their warranty terms with other manufacturers. The place for this sort of persuasion would be at the Owners Club (ASOC) AGM where Auto-Sleepers senior managers attend an open forum to listen to members concerns and share the Company's plans for the coming year. Open to all members, the next AGM is the 30th anniversary of the club formation and has been actively promoted and supported by Auto-Sleepers since it started.

Dennis