However, first I feel the need to give you a bit of background to my Audi history. I first drove an S4 Avant 4 years ago but with a young family and an imminent house move on the agenda the progression from my A4 1.8 t was not to be. In the past four years I have filled the gap with a 2.6 and a 2.8 Quattro avant.
In the summer I found myself in the lucky position to be looking for an S4, it had to be an Avant after finding them so easy and practical with a young family, recaro leather seats, low mileage, and Full service history. Like many of us, I trawled the internet and was on a well know Independent’s website everyday and found a 1 owner 2001 S4 Avant with FSH and just 48,000 miles in Nogaro blue and black leather recaro’s. The colour Nogaro blue is one of those colours that you either love or hate and once I saw the car gleaming in the showroom I immediately new that I had to have it. A deal was struck which included a cambelt change, full inspection oh and a REVO upgrade!
Once I had picked the car up and the grin from driving it home had worn off for another day, I felt the need to polish the car and familiarize myself with it! This is when I found a number of what looked to be “Rust Pimples” beneath the paintwork to the bottoms of all four doors and the two rear wings. My heart sank and i immediately turned to the Paintwork Warranty booklet that is issued with Audis at purchase.
Luckily I had the car booked in for an oil change (As advised by this Forum to regularly change at 5K miles)with an Audi dealership and took the opportunity for them to look at the car. The dealership was very helpful and arranged for an Independent Audi assessor to view the car at a later date.I was expecting a fight on my hands! However, the assessor viewed the car and stated the car had not had any bodywork in its five year life span and viewed the “pimples” and straight away stated that there was a manufacturing fault and that Audi would rectify the fault. I breathed a sigh of relief and also took the opportunity for the body shop to paint the passengers wing mirror as at some point a poor isolated paint touch up had been done.
My S4 was dropped off and the car had been in for a week and a half before I got the call that changed everything! I was told that my beloved car was complete and ready for collection so as I had missed it so much I promptly got myself down to collect.
The standard of works that I was presented with was appalling and in summary immediately found the following:
The Wing mirror had not been painted.
Blue over spray to both front inner wing wheel liners
Blue overspray on NSF headlight
The "lips" to all four wings have an orange peel effect.
There is overspray on the door shuts
Where the rear doors leading edge tuck behind the front doors there is poor finish and obvious signs of bodyworks.
The same applies where the rear wings flow into the rear door shuts.
The OSR wing where it was sprayed with the bumper in place and masked poorly is finished poorly where the bumper and wing meet.
Inside the petrol filler cap there is overspray on rubbers poor paint finishing is obvious.
Overspray to the S4 door runner strips within the door shuts
When I raised the issues I was not presented with any form of apology or justification but just that they had resprayed both sides in their entirety and that I basically should be happy!
I did not care how long my car was kept for just as long as it came back to me in pristine condition.
The standard that I was presented with was not the standard that I would expect from a Franchised dealership but that of some backstreet paint shop.
I did not accept the standard or drive the car away and instead insisted that they keep the car until it was up to my required standard.
I contacted the Dealer Principal and in fairness he took a vested interest in rectifying this long list of faults and put the issues down to the body shop undertaking a large amount of Insurance work where the same standards are not expected! Surely, the dealership should set the standard and have pride in the work that they deliver???
My S4 was there for a further 2 days. I received a further call to say that it was ready for collection. Based on the previous call I dreaded to think what state the car would be in the second time. I must say that a bit of attention to detail goes along way and the car was in a better condition but I have found that there are a couple of paint overspray marks to the headlight seals which are recessed between the light unit and wing and the front door shuts have overspray. The overall standard is extremely poor so have arranged to make a further visit to the franchise and that they have the original independant assessor there to view the current standard.
I am sure that I am not the only one that has saved up for there dream car and so to have it devalued by substandard work is not acceptable.
It would be interesting to hear back from anyone else that has had similar problems
I will let you know how I get on!
and look worse than it does now .....