Who does Case get most complaints about? Not Sim Lim retailers but second-hand car dealers

Errant tech retailers at Sim Lim Square aside, who does the Consumers Association of Singapore (Case) tend to receive complaints about?

Well, the motorcar industry is actually the top culprit.

The industry has been at the center of the most number of complaints received by Case since 2012.

In fact, an overwhelming 9 in 10 of the cases seen involve used car dealers.

_______________________________________________

Here are the number of complaints Case received against the motorcar industry since 2012:

2012: 340
2013: 469
Jan-Sep 2014: 273

The top three types of complaints are:

1. Defective goods

2. Failure to honour

​3. Misrepresentation

_______________________________________________

Mr A. Ng, 30, is one such victim.

He wanted to buy a Kia car after seeing an online advertisement in June this year. 

When he went down to dealer Auto 7, he discovered the company was selling a different model, a Kia Cerato Forte EX​. But he went ahead and bought the car they offered for about $46,000.

As is customary for second-hand cars, he would get an evaluation report to show if any major repairs were made to the vehicle.

Mr Ng said: "The sales manager at Auto 7 said that he would go down to (evaluator) Vicom himself. I thought it was a sign of good service."

When he eventually received the report, the last page looked like this:

The signed report from Vicom stated there were no major faults or repairs. The used car only had paint work as a touch-up.

But as Mr Ng was out the next day, he noticed that something "was off" with the gear of the manual car.

"It just wouldn't latch properly," he recalled.

So he brought the car to distributor Cycle & Carriage.

Staff there confirmed his suspicions. There was indeed "something wrong" with the car and it needed repairs.

Mr Ng then went to Vicom and saw the actual report (below):

The actual report showed there were at least eight major repairs done to the car.

He claimed the manager at Auto 7 said the sales colleague forged the report. 

Mr Ng tried to contact Auto 7 but did not get any reply.

So he went to Case, which contacted Auto 7.

It turned out the sales manager had left the company soon after the incident.

Auto 7's owner had to compensate Mr Ng by giving him $2,000 for the necessary reports. Auto 7 has since closed down.

Read the full report in The New Paper on Tuesday (Nov 11).