VCDS autoscans perhaps falsified by garage - looking for help confirming

[Grey Area]

Hi T6 people.

You'll perhaps recall that we bought a van with faults. It's now going to court. Incredibly, the defending garage has uploaded to court VCDS autoscans of a different Transporter with a different VIN but with my numberplate, mileage and date added. This is their evidence my van was fault-free.

I don't have access to my VCDS at the moment to test this and there is a tight deadline (midnight) for me to respond. So I thought I might ask you!

As I recall, when autoscans are made the user manually types in the reg number and mileage, but the VIN and date are automatic?

I expect that the garage will claim that they accidentally entered the wrong reg and mileage (mine) when scanning a different van (they also sold the van in the scan at around the same time.... but it has a very different mileage and is a different colour. Seems unlikely. )

How easy is it to take a stored scan and change the date, reg and mileage to produce a new file? (other than just editing the text directly in Word)
How likely do we think it is that they have done this intentionally? (It does seem a bit dim to not change the VIN if you're doing it on purpose).
Can you think of a way I can find a smoking gun here? I figure I can bring an actual scan to court and if they're unable to also bring a scan with the correct IDs for the various components then it's a given?

Thanks folks.

 

[Sasquatch]

I know nob all about VCDS, but I've been in court literally hundreds of times.

Whether its by accident or design the fact that the evidence they are presenting to support their position shows the VIN for a different van completely kneecaps its value.

All you need to do is present your V5 for the district judge to examine and highlight the difrerent VINs and they're borked. They can give any excuse they like - that VIN isnt yours.

Personally (that's what I would do, you should take your own legal advice from someone qualified to give it), Id keep my powder dry and not tell them, let them use it as rope to hang themselves

 

[Sasquatch]

Meant to say, let us know how it goes. Whether by error or malice (lets be generous and say error) they've completely blown the credibility of their evidence with that faux pas.

Theyve chosen to go down the route of using a VCDS scan to show a vehicle was not faulty, when it shows no such thing - it shows the scan was clear at the moment it was run, nothing more. Once you've brought it to the district judges attention that the VIN on the report indicates that it applies to a different vehicle, and have produced your V5 to corroborate that, you've kicked the crutch out from under them and, unless they have some evidence they have not disclosed (which would be an abuse of process) they're completely borked. Indeed, depending on what excuses they come up with the Judge may even choose to believe this was an attempt at perjury. Either way, it has no credibility with such a glaring and fundamental error.

With the information presented in your post im pretty hopeful theyve just f****d themselves, and im keen to see how it plays out so please do let us know.

In addition, even if they had a genuine scan it's kinda irrelevant. The legal presumption under the consumer rights act 2015 is that any fault within 6 months is deemed under law to have been either present or developing at the time of sale, and the resolution falls squarely with them. The only exception to that is if you didn't pay reasonable market value, ie, you got it so cheap that any reasonable person would expect to find issues, and that isn't the case here.

 

[Grey Area]

Meant to say, let us know how it goes. Whether by error or malice (lets be generous and say error) they've completely blown the credibility of their evidence with that faux pas.

Theyve chosen to go down the route of using a VCDS scan to show a vehicle was not faulty, when it shows no such thing - it shows the scan was clear at the moment it was run, nothing more. Once you've brought it to the district judges attention that the VIN on the report indicates that it applies to a different vehicle, and have produced your V5 to corroborate that, you've kicked the crutch out from under them and, unless they have some evidence they have not disclosed (which would be an abuse of process) they're completely borked. Indeed, depending on what excuses they come up with the Judge may even choose to believe this was an attempt at perjury. Either way, it has no credibility with such a glaring and fundamental error.

With the information presented in your post im pretty hopeful theyve just f****d themselves, and im keen to see how it plays out so please do let us know.

In addition, even if they had a genuine scan it's kinda irrelevant. The legal presumption under the consumer rights act 2015 is that any fault within 6 months is deemed under law to have been either present or developing at the time of sale, and the resolution falls squarely with them. The only exception to that is if you didn't pay reasonable market value, ie, you got it so cheap that any reasonable person would expect to find issues, and that isn't the case here.

Thanks - I'll keep you posted!

I do wish I'd seen your dry powder advice before submitting my witness statement. As this'll be the first time I have been to court I wasn't clear that this was allowed. Ah well, we'll just have to see what happens.

I have the opportunity to upload a separate doc with citations of relevant case law. I'd be looking for precedent that goods which are faulty immediately after purchase were deemed so at the time of sale. I can't really tell if this is appropriate for such a low-value case. If you've been thousands of times, do you have an opinion?

The whole thing is a bit on the left of batshit. The faults manifested seven miles from the forecourt. The cost of the vehicle was actually a little above market value. Unfortunately for us, this was B2B and therefore the CRA 2015 does not help us. Even under SoGA 1979 though, the goods need to be satisfactory and fit for purpose; van was rejected within a few days. Diagnostic scans on headed paper from the following morning show faults. Our local mech told us to return it - estimated £1k - £2k to fix. EGR "blocked solid", other issues. Further scans by main dealer and two other garages back this up.
Sellers offered a forced DPF regen, then claimed it was only a minor problem he could fix in 30 minutes. Said our mechanic was wrong. At this point we knew any 'repair' would be a patch at best. Sellers refused to provide a refund despite requested in writing seven times. In their rebuttal they wrote, "it still fulfils its core purpose as a van"! In the end we just had it repaired (and serviced, as although it was advertised as being serviced, it was not). Final bill was around £2k. New EGR and cooler, new oil pressure switches, new high pressure oil valve, full service, Sellers claim they could have done this for £250 and have insisted on a physical hearing rather than paper-based.

We are aware of three other court cases like ours. They just lost one in Plymouth last week. Ours is in a couple more, then there's Chesterfield and Leicestershire. It's just odd.... none of these are particularly high value. The cost of travel alone and damage to reputation should have surely guided them elsewhere.

 

[John A]

You have to enter the reg to save the autoscan.
Mileage - can't remember - I'm pretty sure it also reads the mileage off the ECU anyway, and displays in both KM and M.

When you open the Autoscan, it opens in the notes app - you could theoretically overwrite any of that data with whatever you wanted and click save.
As has been said, you can demonstrate the different VIN with your registration document. It would be handy to have your own Autoscan to highlight the key differences, but I don't think it's essential, unless you want to demonstrate the faults.

 

[John A]

 

[Grey Area]

Thanks guys - this is a really good point and one that I will be using if it comes to that.. VCDS is a diagnostic tool, not a certification tool.