Very sorry to hear about the situation, Coffeeman. I wish you the best of luck, and I feel your pain. Well, at least some of it. I had to sell a car in order to buy my MINI, an I was advised to go to Carmax to sell my 2 year old Subaru, as they (Carmax) pay the highest prices. My Subie had some minor front end body work done, and while the appraiser didn't make a huge deal about it, they only offered me about 75% of Kelley trade-in value. I was shocked until I looked around the showroom and saw that every car there was selling BELOW book value. So that means Carmax bought them below book value.

So what I'm suggesting to anyone who needs to sell a car is that Coffeeman and I were low-balled on the value of our cars by Carmax. Not illegal, but very disappointing. Strangely enough, as a trade-in my dealer allowed me $2.5k MORE than Carmax offered me! And of course it was less than I could have retailed it if I had the patience. Sometimes it's worth taking a financial hit to avoid some hassle.

My point is not to trust Carmax for the best price. If they truly want your car, they'll likely pay a fair price for it. If their lot is full, well, there may be better places. Caveat Emptor.

 

amen. These days, Carmax and most dealers offer Manheim Auction value which is far below KBB and Edmunds 'blue book' trade values. Carmax also doesn't do their '99 million point inspection' before putting them on the lot either....pure marketing BS. they figured out it was cheaper to fix cars if there were issues past the warranty that it was to go over every single one with a fine toothed comb. That's a discussion for a whole other thread however...

 

I understand your point and it is quite valid, however the dealer is a "professional" and based on their expertise they should have known and should have been able to detect this defect / repair in the "pre-delivery" process.

In my humble opinion this was probably repaired at the factory, as the port has a duty to report and repair any damage done during the transportation process. And they too (the port) should have been able to detect a defect and / or repair.

The manufacturer and / or the dealer share in the responsibility

 

man, it's just sad when something like this happens.....

 

Just playing devil's advocate here. There is one other way this happened. He wrecked it, had it fixed, and then when he got called on it he decided to play the, "not my fault, must be Mini's fault" card.

First thing a lawyer is going to tell you is you should not have come here and posted this in a public venue.

You related to Birdman, by any chance?

Before I get flamed, I am just playing devil's advocate here. I am not trying to sound accusatory. I just find some aspects of this curious. Could all be a heck of a coincidence.

 

I'm trying to figure out how many coats of paint would add up to 9mm?????

Wonder if that is really 0.9mm?

Sorry about your troubles.

 

The situation sucks, but advising all of us to not buy MINIs because of your crappy luck seems a little over the top. Its not like this situation is mutually exclusive to MINI/BMW.

 

This all seems pretty silly to me just because of a rear panel repaint that no one noticed for 8K miles. I mean, c'mon, logic tells me that a repainted rear panel should not be the basis for telling everybody not to buy from MINI or the dealer. It happens; such is the nature of the beast. I understand why the OP is pissed but, really, life is to short to spend so much time/money/stress/sleep over this. Maybe if you spend just the fraction of the effort to try and resell it on the market and disclose the repaint to any prospective purchaser you might get a similar amount of $$ than any other similar MINI for resale. Just MHO, of course.

 

I cannot imagine anyone using the OP's post as a basis for not buying a Mini. If someone is not going to buy a car based on that post, then they might as well never buy any car from anyone.

 

Give 'em hell Coffeeman!
When you pay extra for a new car it is reasonable to expect it has not been repainted without full disclosure.
Frankly, your incliniation to give any punitive damages to charity is quite... well... charitable
In the discovery process, you might find out when it was painted and who know about that. I expect the industry does this sort of thing more than we know and it's only when a customer stands up and doesn't take it that the industry has some motivation to behave in a reasonable and fair manner.
Fair disclosure is not too much to expect when buying a new car.
Go get 'em big dog !

 

This will be my last post on this subject.

For clarification, this has nothing to do with money. It does, however, have everything to do with Honesty, Integrity, and Trust. Brand equity is built on these attributes, and when that trust is violated, brand equity is eroded.

For the record, this vehicle is garage kept, and has never been involved in an accident. I have never had any paintwork performed on this vehicle. For the time that I have owned it, it has never been out of my custody, and no one (except the dealer & myself) has driven it.

If I can prevent this from happening to another purchaser of this manufacturer's product, then I have accomplished my goal. If this turns out to be an isolated incident, or an honest error on the part of the manufacturer, then I expect them to admit their culpability.

 

Don't kid yourself, this has everything to do with money. If Carmax would've given you a fair estimate you wouldn't have given a rats *** whether there was paint work done without your knowledge.

 

To say not to buy from them because your quarter panel was repainted is unfair. I've always received top notch service from them and will continue to do so.

 

not everything. I could live with out $4000 any day. However, I would be pissed as much as Coffeeman is.

 

Bull freaking ****. If the CarFax appraiser gave you a number that you were pleased with, you would have gladly overlooked the painted bumper. Sure, you would be disappointed that such a problem would occur but the only reason to take so much effort and kick up so much dust is money. Don't kid yourself.

Also, I can not believe that because of this "experience" you are seriously recommending that NO ONE buy a MINI. Are you that delusional to think that these problems are unique to MINI? I guess your one "bad" experience overrules the thousands of positive experiences that have been recorded both here and on the road.

Your overreaction is comical. I really got a good laugh at your domain name because, you know, EVERYONE is at fault here and EVERY MINI lies!

 

Agreed. My sister purchased a new Nissan Versa last year, and noticed that the rear hatch had a couple of odd looking dents. They told her that the rear of the Versa was supposed to look like that, and purchased it anyway. When I first saw her Versa I mentioned the dents, and she explained to me that they were supposed to be there, as the dealer had told her. They were symmetrical, though a little odd looking. The last time she was down for a visit she mentioned that she has since seen many other Versas which do NOT have the dents. I took a closer look, and on closer examination it is quite obvious that they are NOT supposed to be there and the car received some damage to the rear either in transit or at the dealer. They are surprisingly large, basketball-sized dents with no associated scratches on both sides about midway down the hatch. Unfortunately, since it has now been a year, she feels the dealer will just claim she backed into something. Sure, it may be her fault for buying the car without taking a closer look, but nevertheless the dealer must have known darn well those dents weren't normal when they sold her the car.

 

I've stayed out of the discussion so far, and tho I see coffeman's point, I'm afraid I have to side with the folks who feel this is much ado about nothing. No one has said the repair was not done properly, and a little time spent with some polishing compound and some 1500 grit sandpaper and the "problem" would disappear forever.

I just don't see where he was harmed enough to warrant this kind of reaction, especially since he's bought upteen many cars from the same dealer and MFR over the years and never knew if he had this problem or not - maybe that's what's bugging him? That he never knew before?

At any rate, I hope it's not his last post on the subject, I'd like to know what happens and who knew what, when and so on........

 

doesn't the bmw distribution center or whatever at port hueneme have a paint shop that repaints/repairs damage during shipping? do they report every minor repair that they've done from shipping damage? how? on the sticker? never seen anything like that before

 

Why do you think that the manufacturer, who has already had to pay big dollars for failing to disclose the damage on previous cars, would risk that again.

The 3% threshold that BMW has on damage disclosure would equate to less than 1000 dollars on your car. From experience with my previous MINI I know that a door repaint and blend after a dent exceeds 1000 by a relatively wide margin meaning they would have 1) a record of the work done at the VDC and 2) they would have had to disclose that to you.

 

I'm not sure whose side I'm on. The lawsuit coffeeman cites is one that has been cited many times in the media as an example of civil justice run amok, ie. frivolous lawsuits, excessive awards, etc.

My car had a small dent on the rear bumper. I didn't know it, but it sat at the VDC for about 3 weeks. The dealer hunted down the problem and it was disclosed to me that the VDC did not repair, but totally replaced the bumper. I was fine with that and accepted the car, not questions asked.

I got full disclosure, the part was replaced per factory spec, I went through it with a fine tooth comb and could find no other hint of damage or repair and all was good.

I guess I feel I side with coffeeman about not having any disclosure of the issue. He was entitled to be told of the issue. His reaction, may be over the top however. I don't think telling everyone not to buy mini or deal with a particular dealer is appropriate at this point, given nobody really knows who is at fault here. A carefully crafted letter to MINI and the dealer by the himself first, politely explaining the concern and desire for reimbursement, followed by a slightly less polite letter from the attorney, then if required, a small claims court action. Warning everyone not to buy mini, and jumping to full civil jury trial may be over the top in terms of a first response.

 

I suspect that my MCS was repainted at the VDC or factory. The color of the scoop did not match the color of the bonnet. When I took it in to have the scoop repainted (under warranty) I also had to have the rear bumper repaired (I backed into a BMW in a parking lot). So, the shop had two things to paint, the scoop and a new back bumper. Turns out, the color for the scoop (that matched the bonnet) did not match the rear quarter panels. A different color had to be mixed for the bumper.

The owner of the body shop (highly recommended and used by MINI of Mountain View) said it appeared that part of the car had been repainted. He guessed that it might have been scratched during assembly and painted at the factory. It could also have been a transport problem and done at the VDC. I was not notified of any damage or repair when I took delivery.

I believe I read somewhere that the cost of the damage during transport has to exceed some small % of the car's value for notification to be a requirement. I'm not sure if there is any such requirement for damaged caused in the factory.

My conclusion is that repainting may be a fairly common occurrence with MINIs. I think the argument I would give the Carmax guy is that it is pre-delivery repainting and was not significant enough to warrant notification.

 

So are you just going to hold on to it forever?

 

It seems to me that the fair way to have handled a situation like this would be to take a quick digital picture of the damage before it was repaired and email it to the buyer and ask him if he wants a discount or a different car. Or better yet, deliver the car to the dealer as is, so the buyer can make an even more informed decision. It's not the accident that's the problem, its the cover up. The tactic here seems to have been spray and pray that no one notices. I could understand if they just needed to buff out some fine scratches in the clear coat or smomething like that... but an entirely repainted panel does affect resale value. The likely reason for a choice not to disclose is because it affects the value of the car. Heck, some of my ebay purchases of used stuff from strangers have involved better disclosure than what was described here...

 

He's got his units mixed up. It's 9 Mils. Typically MINI paint as well as most BMW's range in the 5 to 6 Mil. If you find the paint is substantially higher--9 to 12 Mil, you know that somebody added paint on top of the existing paint.

The proper way to fix it would have been to sand it down to metal, then resprayed it--that thickness change wouldn't be seen. But even beyond that, it sounds like when the repair was done, the orange peel wasn't properly matched to the rest of the car. Sometimes that means there is no orange peel in the fixed area making it stand out from the rest of the orange peel on the MINI, and sometimes that means the orange peel is excessive. Either way, a good detail shop can wetsand the paint, and even out the orange peel after the fact. Most body shops don't go this extra mile because few customers will ever notice the difference.

Richard

 

I wish the OP luck - I personally know of 2 expensive new BMWs that were delivered with prior non disclosed paint work and it seems that at the dealer level the sales people opt to remain ignorant of any PDC work or whatnot vs inquire or voluntarily disclose anything that would deter a sale. Pre delivery checks by the dealers also seem to be by and large very lax and they do not seem to take responsibility for anything missed at the level either - bottom line is that in spite of any prior lawsuits the MO seems to be based on betting that most customers will not notice or question defects and that avoiding the issue is best for them (this also goes for damage that happens when a car is in service).

Issues regarding loss of value are valid when you consider that you pay a premium for a brand new car, it should be up to the buyer to determine if they want a car with post production repairs. Ideally a car repaired in such a way would have proof of that for general purposes and in the event there is resale to show that the repairs were not a result of a collision and that it is covered under the manufacturer's warranty (which can be important as an accident can, so to speak, impact warranty coverage or, as in the case when the 5 series bumper started peeling, the paint needs correction).

As for this dealer, well something is not right here considering the car was clearly repaired. Whether they were responsible for the repair, missed evidence of it in pre-delivery inspection, or simply did not get the info about any VPC repairs as part of the sales prcess, the least they could have done was offered a loaner and to have the work improved on and detailed professionally.