MotoFix Moto Spares(also ebay seller) in Southampton. Stay away.

Help & Advice Praise or Shame
1

Well I know I am new on here but I just figured I’d share some thing with you guys. I am in the states and have a NC29. Problem with this is that I can not get parts for the bike because it was never sold here. Soooo I have to outsource to the UK for parts. Well when I got the bike I was excited because there are probably 20-30 of them in all of the states so I kinda thought I had something special. See because we are morons over here you can start on a Busa if you want but there are no small capacity bikes that are worth a crap. Well anyways, I needed a engine, so off to ebay I go in search of one. I happen upon this one http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=350318793122 http://www.motofix-spares.co.uk/ I contact the seller Chris who stated he would ship the engine to me as long as I covered all the shipping which I stated I would… Well a 48 days later the engine arrives. I get all excited and run down and pick it up, I started to open it while outside the Customs house but couldn’t so as soon as I got home this is what I found. The corrosion is not too too big of a deal, although I could not tell where the exhaust gasket began and the corrosion stopped. On the #3 cyl. the header bolt is snapped off which I could deal with because I could take it to a machine shop and get it drilled out and re-tapped. Well I bring it to one of the best engine/machine shops around here and they tell me I am basically screwed. It seems that somebody already tried to get it out and snapped a drill bit off in the hole. So now I need a new head because this one is shot. Not to mention a new head gasket, new pistons rings and the cyl re-honed for the new rings.

So I email Chris several times and tell him we have a big problem becaue this is not an engine that in his discription that is in “good condition and ready to fit”. What response do I get… None. I even made him aware that I will post up what took place and get… Nothing. Now I am not expecting to get a new engine but after paying over $1000 to get this one here it is nothing more than a paper weight, a heavy junked up nasty one.

I just thought that I would make you guys aware of the kind of business that they do over there. I was hoping to not get taken advantage of because of me being over here, and as it turns out I was 3 days too late on opening a claim through paypal so I’m screwed on that too. I am a racer and planned on racing the bike but that looks like again it has to be put on the back burner.

I’m not a newbie coming on here to bitch about a seller you can look at my posts and rep on the biggest racing message board in the states here…http://forums.13x.com/search.php?do=finduser&u=20355

Rant over.

2

That is bad!

How did you pay? Can you speak with the bank, credit card company to say the goods are not fit for purpose?

3

Feel very sorry for you… bad experience, hope you find some way of getting your money back :slight_smile:

4

bad bad bad man…

in future, if you find a motor over here thats near london give me a shout on here and ill look it over for you, send pics if needed…

it bugs me when someone with a passion gets ripped off by someone greedy…

adam

5

Paid 250 pounds. Which is cheap but I also was expecting a running engine not a spare parts one. Which if I’d have known it was a spare parts motor I would have just spent the extra money and never bought this one.

6

he meant how did you pay? if you used paypal you can stitch him up and het your money back and if he want the engine back he’ll have to pay costs.

7

Bad news…Hope you get some form of compensation :frowning:

8

if you paid by paypal you might be lucky. once, i purchased a set of honda 929 forks from canada. they were supposed to be spot on. 8 weeks later they arrive, both leaking, both scratched and gouged. wrote to ebay customer services, got all the money back and got to keep the forks.

9

The problem you have is that this is an international sale and I do not know where the law stands on that, on the other hand, it is unlikely that the dealer knows either. So you can take what is written below as what stands in this country and what the dealer likely knows is the law in this country.

Well in Law, if it helps, you had a contract and he stated a description of the goods, this would be considered a term of the contract, not merely a representation due to the nature of the description and your reasons for buying, and the lack of any ability you had to inspect the goods first. This entitles you to repudiate the contract and expect all of your money back, including any fees you encountered ancillary to the contract, such as shipping fees. This is difficult to achieve though, so be realistic.

What you need to do is find someone who can write you a letter, not an email, but a letter and have it delivered by recorded delivery to the dealer himself, and a copy to his home address to. You need not threaten legal action at this stage, in fact I would strongly advise against that because once you threaten legal action you usually have to follow through on that threat and you back people into a corner.

What you need to do is point out that you have taken legal advice and that you feel that it would be in both your interests to bring the matter to a speedy end. You have to do this, whether you want to or not, the courts do not look kindly upon people who just go to court without at least attempting to negotiate an agreement.

Point out that you are willing, at this stage, to accept a partial refund for the breach of the term of the contract that you had, that the engine be in suitable condition. Look at what it will cost you to put right and come to a reasonable amount you are willing to accept. Make an offer to him on that basis.

As I said earlier, be realistic, you don’t really want to be fighting this out for the next 4 months, even if in the end you might gain more money back, you want to end it and you want to end it quickly without expending any more money. So be realistic, don’t make an offer that he simply cannot accept, on the other hand, bear in mind that you have spent a lot of money on something that is useless. In my opinion without really looking at the costs I would say anything between 30-50% should generate an acceptance, if the guy has any sense. Higher then that you may have to fight it out a bit. Just my guidance on that though.

What you could also do is check the online listing from Companies House and see whether the business is recorded on there. This will have a massive affect on whether taking legal action will work, it will also give you a home address for the business owner. IF the business is listed it will mean that any court action will have a detrimental affect on the business that the owner will wish to avoid, so subtle threats to that effect will usually generate some reply. By subtle, I mean merely point out that you would like to settle the matter now between yourselves, come to an amicable arrangement at this stage, things like that, you need never mention Law or legal action, the implications are clear.

See if this generates any response from him, if it does not, it may well be worth taking legal advice and finding out what action you can take, remember you are technically entitled to not only 100% of your money and fees back, but also any costs should you win. The problem is what you are technically entitled to and what you can get out of a court and what you can actually get out of a person once the court has found in your favour are not always the same thing, remember just because the court decides in your favour does not mean that you automatically get the money, you still have to get it out of the person and that in itself can be a time consuming and costly business.

10

Sorry for the long post btw, that is just the way the law is, nothing is ever simple.