A KwaZulu-Natal man who took his car to a dealership to be serviced, has been left in distress after his Polo Vivo was stripped of its parts and left to gather dust at the dealer’s workshop.
Ayanda Shange, who works in Saudi Arabia as a teacher, said he took his car to Midbay Motors in Richards bay in 2020 for what he described as major engine service.
“I work overseas, so the car was not serviced for a while, I think it missed two services and when I came back I decided to book it in for services. I wanted them to do a major engine service, there was nothing wrong with the car except that it needed to be serviced,” he said.
The 38-year-old teacher said he was given a quotation and was told that there were new parts which had to be purchased.
“I didn’t have a problem, I paid the required amount in instalments so that they can buy the parts and work on the car,’’ he said.
Shange provided IOL with receipts showing that he paid over R15 000 for the parts.
He said he was not given a time frame on when the car would have been ready, however, he was told that it will take some time as some parts had to be ordered in Germany.
Shange said he flew back to Saudi Arabia and left his family to check on the car.
“Because of Covid-19 and lock down restrictions, they could not do constant follow ups but as soon as restrictions were eased, my twin brother and brother in-law tried to follow up but they were always met with different stories.
“Even though I was far away, I decided to follow up on my own and I would call them and they would keep me on hold for too long and I would eventually run out of airtime. This happened numerous times,” he said.
Upon his return this year, Shange said he went to the dealership in June and found his car in a dilapidated state.
“I asked what happened, they told me that some parts were stripped, they were not sure who did it and they had no further explanation.”
IOL called the dealership and spoke to Stanley Joseph who is the General Manager at Midbay Motors.
Joseph said he was aware of Shange’s car and blamed him for leaving his car for too long without checking on it.
When he was told that Shange’s relatives came to check on the car but were given excuses, Joseph said couldn’t answer that as he says he was not always at the workshop.
“See, there’s a lot of people coming in and out of the workshop, so it's unclear who stripped that car but we are working on fixing it, it will take some time because the wiring is also now an issue. He must be patient, we are still working on it,” he said.
When asked for a time frame, Joseph said he could not give one but gave an assurance that their mechanic was working on the car.
After three days, IOL reached out to Joseph to check the progress made on the car, however, when the line was transferred to his office, a person picked up and didn’t say anything.
This happened twice.
IOL NEWS