The troubles with cars

Man I thought getting a car for our travels around the UK would be pretty straight forward, but I was dead wrong on that one. In the first week of our being here I have now driven 3 different cars. But I go too far let me back track a bit just so you can all learn from the fun.

Back at the beginning of Jan when we were lining up dates to move over here I looked into the purchase repurchase program that is run through Renault and Peugeot. Whereby a non EU citizen can "lease" a car for up to 183 days and at the end of that time turn the car back in for very reasonable prices. The car is brand new and can be driven anywhere in the greater European Community, even Italy which most rental car companies don't like you to do. The car I had found was a Peugeot 307. Which would be plenty big to take Tracey and Evan and I on our journeys with plenty of room for baggage and possibly guests from time to time. The monthly cost that I read on the websites and from calling different companies to run this program were about $1000/mo. If you haven't done any long term rental pricing you should know that this is a great deal. It is designed for people who are coming over for more than 2 weeks. They will even have a driver pick you up at Heathrow and take you to your new car.

So thinking I had it all in hand I was waiting until we knew the actual move date so I could schedule the pickup of the car. When I finally did call it was about 30 days before the move and to my dismay I learned that while I could get the car I wanted I could not get it in the right hand drive, RHD, that I need for the UK. Peugeot was happy to deliver a left hand drive to me. But then I thought of the sheer stupidity of getting a left hand drive car in a country designed for right hand drive. Can you imagine trying to pass on the lovely small roads out in the countryside from a left hand drive? What about going through toll booths? Obviously not a workable solution.

After pestering the companies I was talking to it turns out that apparently Renault and Peugeot are no longer going to support the RHD in this program. But yet they are willing to lease me a LHD. In my mind this means that they are no longer really supporting this program in the UK and Ireland. It looks to work fine if you want to go to the continent but not to the isles. Lunacy.

So upon telling my sob story to Shaun M he kindly offered to take on the task of finding me a car for while we are here. Silly man. He did some research and some price haggling and told us that he had lined something up for about 400 GBP per month. Sounded good to me, so began the next set of troubles.

If you have read earlier posts you have heard about the car issues. They began when the company that Shaun arranged with Wiltshire Car Hire, on Marlborough road in Old Towne Swindon, dropped off the Citroen C5 as arranged at our new place in Marlborough. It looked nice if dirty on the outside but reeked of cigarettes on the inside. But hey I have worked very closely with smokers for many years (Dave) I can handle the smell, and the price was right.

That evening I got my first taste of driving on the left side of the road as the Wiltshire Car agent left the car parked in a no parking zone and dropped me the keys with a lovely " 'ave a nice day deary". So I jumped in, before the Marlborough parking Nazis came around, and managed to find a parking spot about half a mile down the road. All seemed to be fine except for the hike back to the house.

The next morning (Sunday) as we headed about our day to get the house setup Tracey and I hiked out to the car to find that it would not start. Not even a click from the starter solenoid. Hmm... that means dead battery. I checked the completely foreign controls on the dash and found that in my haste of driving the previous afternoon I had tripped the parking lamps on. When I parked the car I did not notice any ding or beep that there were lights on. Oh well.

So we call David at Wiltshire Car Hire to get some help as there is supposed to be roadside assistance on this car. We get David on his mobile and tell him the story. He reports that he is "in the wild" today and won't be able to do anything about it until Monday. I ask for some kind of roadside assist program and he says that he has RAC (Royal Automobile Club) but doesn't have the account number. When asked if he could call and get them to come out he tells me that I should be able to just call the RAC and tell them it is with his account. I skeptically said ok and signed off to find a number for the RAC which David did not have either. Does his car never breakdown in the "wild"?

Surprisingly I did manage to find a number for the RAC and they even sent over a support van in about an hour. So if you ever need car service in the greater Swindon area just call RAC and tell them you have a rental through Wiltshire Car Hire and ask if they can look up the account number. Apparently that is good enough to get some help. AAA would be mortified by that I am sure.

The RAC bloke jumps the car. I grab Tracey and we head of for Swindon to run some errands. I stop and start the car 2 more times that day with no troubles. Drove it for about 50 miles or so with well over an hour of drive time to charge the battery. I even stopped and put in about 50 GBP in gas as it was pretty much empty when they dropped it off.

Monday starts nice and early as we want to head out to do more errands. We had managed to get a parking spot close to the house on the previous evening (which we were stoked about because I didn't have to take 17 passes at parallel parking over my left shoulder). We load up everyone in the car and it wont start. DAMN! No, I did not leave any lights on it just does not have enough power to turn the engine over.

We unload everyone from the car and call David at Wiltshire again. David says that he won't be able to get out to swap the car until the next day. I decide not to call RAC again for a jump but instead wait for a new car the next day. Which David said would be there by half 8, which is 8:30 for the rest of us.

Tuesday we wait for the new car. Call David at 8:45 he says the new one is on the way. At 9:10 the new car shows up a lovely little Rover with plush leather seats, a SatNav, and no gas in it. The lady who drops it off has a "mechanic" with her who speaks no English, she speaks no Polish by the way. He is Polish and is coming out to jump the Citroen with the Rover than take the Citroen back to Swindon. The lady ( I still don't know her name) and the mechanic bicker a little about how to get the Citroen jumped but manage to work it out. She hands me the keys to the Rover and off they go. No word about how to use the SatNav, about the 50 quid of gas I put in the Citroen, or even if we are getting the Citroen back or keeping the Rover.

We decide to go run the errands we were trying to do on Monday. After struggling with Evan's car seat for 30 minutes we come to the conclusion that there is no nice way to install a child's car seat in a Rover and buckle it in as best we can. Tracey is not amused by this and wants to get the Citroen back because the car seat fit beautifully in there. The Rover drives wonderfully this is a MUCH nicer car than the Citroen. Sunroof, indash SatNav, indash TV, plenty of power, it didn't smell like cigarettes and leather seats. I was happy to drive this one for a while. But Tracey is not and hounds me to find out when we are getting the Citroen back.

Wed goes by without much ado.

Thurs I drive into the office to help out with the setup and ring David again at Wiltshire to ask about swapping back to the Citroen. He says that they have put in a new battery to the car and it runs just fine. He would be happy to swing it by the office and make the switch. I tell them where the office is and where they can park at the office. Then about 2 hours later the same lady comes back with the Citroen which she parks across the street at the Co-op food store (grocery store). Which of course is private parking and they really don't like it when you park there and don't shop there. So I haul the car seat out of the Rover and hand over the keys. As the lady gives me the keys to the Citroen she has me sign a pickup form saying that we are exchanging the Citroen to the Rover and back to the Citroen. Why didn't she do that when she handed over the Rover? Then she asks if I have insurance for the Citroen. Um, no, isn't that part of the rental? Apparently not. I tell her that Shaun M arranged the hire and I would have call to clear it all up.

After telling Shaun this he gets a dour look on his face and says "that is complete Shite". Basically his arrangement with David was to include insurance otherwise he would never have rented the car through him. So Shaun calls David on Friday and tries to clear things up. Apparently it doesn't go so well. The short version is something like this:

Shaun: What do you mean there is no insurance on the car?! You said there would be at that price you quoted.
David: No, I didn't, and you are stupid for thinking so.
Shaun: This isn't working out and the car is really sub-standard
David: Your man driving it is a knob for running the battery down.
David then hangs up. I paraphrase here but you get the drift. Shaun then tells me not to drive the car any longer and that we will find another solution promptly.

Saturday Shaun drops by to pick me and the Citroen up and drive up into Swindon to drop off the car at our office. Shaun is personally insured so he can drive anything he wants so no worries about driving the Citroen. Shaun has to park in the back of beyond like I did on the first Saturday we were here as Marlborough is a very busy little town on Saturdays.

When we get in the Citroen to drive off, the car does not start. F#$@%@$#%@$K! Apparently there is an engine imobilisier on the car that pairs the key fob we have to the car so it will only start with this key. Now we are not sure what the exact problem is but we are 2 relatively smart guys here. We think the key fob battery is running a bit low and not actually communicating with the car imobilisier. So therefore we get the "Engine Imobilisier Fault" message on the dash when trying to start. Just Great.

So we hike up to Shaun's car. A lovely new Porsche Carrera S, damn that is nice. And haul donkey to Swindon to pickup a new car with a new rental company.

We make it just before the office is to close and start the necessary paperwork. At which point Shaun goes to fill up his car and leaves me to finish the paperwork. They chap behind the desk goes to run the payment and tells me it will be 950 GBP per month. After choking on my breath mint I tell him that doesn't sound right and that he should wait for Shaun to confirm as I, again, did not make the arrangements. We wait a few minutes for Shaun.

Shaun tells the guy we had a quote at 570 GBP per month. The guy can't see that price and can't apply any computer magic to make that price appear. So he calls for help. He explains the story with some facts coming from Shaun. No help forthcoming from the first call. So he goes up the ladder and explains the story again. Closing time has come and gone for this little one man office. Luckily he is very keen to stay and work this out for us. Eventually his persistence pays off and we get the rate locked in. After 2 hours of waiting I am now the new user of a Vauxhaull Astra.

All seems to be worked out now and I hope that we don't run into any more car issues. I think we have had enough. We took the new new car out for a drive to Stonehenge today and had a good time doing it.

My thanks to Shaun for continuing to find a car solution for us.