The Engineer 614 Posted August 4, 2016 Report Share Posted August 4, 2016 My son bought a new(er) car and decided to sell the old one privately. That was three months ago. Dropped price a few times so getting a bit desperate to sell it now. Chap turns up yesterday evening and likes the car, makes an offer (below the asking price); son reluctantly agrees. Chummie says before agreeing the deal, is it OK to run an HPI check? (I know what that is though have never done it myself). He's struggling with data on phone so son even invites him in and gives him router password (that's an aside but just demonstrating son being open and honest; he will change the password of course). HPI check has a red flag saying the car had 87k miles on the clock end-March 2012 (that's around when son bought it with 27k on the clock; it now has around 45k). Son is shocked and gets all the paperwork out. He has service history from new until his purchase plus first MOT and an MOT at time of his purchase (it was about 3.5 years old so dealer MOT'd it again). Mileage on service history and MOTs are all credible and incremental numbers. Both check the VIN on the car; all OK. My son has no reason to believe there's anything untoward, says HPI must be wrong. Dealer was Millennium Motors, Mapperley Top (no longer trading so no way to enquire provenance of the car). Don't know where HPI get data from but I'd guess dealers would quite happily sell reg. numbers with odometer readings. Anyway, potential buyer is not convinced and walks away, saying he might get back to son today. I advise son to see what today brings. Any experience here with HPI errors? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
DAVIDW 1,683 Posted August 4, 2016 Report Share Posted August 4, 2016 How does the cars mileage check out here : https://www.gov.uk/check-mot-history Quote Link to post Share on other sites
catfan 14,793 Posted August 4, 2016 Report Share Posted August 4, 2016 DVLA have been known to get mileages mixed up before, esp on MOTs. If the mileage works out OK on service history etc, then I wouldn't be too worried. Mind you, was it Millinium Moter's where Melissa bought her first car from ? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Trickymicky 57 Posted August 4, 2016 Report Share Posted August 4, 2016 The above mot checker, and this tool- https://totalcarcheck.co.uk/ are useful,but the only way to be sure of the actual mileage is to ask a dealer to connect the vehicle to their diagnostic equipment. They can extract the actual mileage from the ECU (part of the electrical system), as this is very difficult to tamper with, unlike the odometer. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
The Engineer 614 Posted August 4, 2016 Author Report Share Posted August 4, 2016 It was Nottingham Auto Park, not Millennium. That place changes hands on a regular basis. Anyway, the gov site and totalcarcheck.co.uk show incremental steps in mileage since 2011 (though 2 test in 2012 only 300 miles apart - maybe that was when they re-did it on sale to son, I will ask). The worry is that it puts people off. Might be harder to sell and annoying if it is down to a typo somewhere. 16/3/11 20430 14/3/12 26743 10/4/12 27067 22/3/13 33828 21/3/14 38692 20/3/15 43082 28/3/16 49103 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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