Mileage discrepancy by main dealer?!

RNUK · July 15, 2017

Afternoon. Just went to look at a private sale IS 250 And after HPI'ing it. It's come back with a mileage discrepancy and a big one of 30,000 miles!!! However, it's been recorded by the manufacturer according to the HPI check.

It has full dealer history in the service book but three consecutive services (by ththe same dealer) has had the mileage tip-ex'd out.

I have called the dealer in question but the service dept is now closed so I have to wait til Monday to speak to them and see if they can explain it.

Any thoughts?

madasahatter · July 15, 2017

Yes just walk away from it. One mistake ok but 3 can not believe it. Have you done a check on gov.com??

RNUK · July 15, 2017

Hpicheck.com. It's the one I always use.

The discrepancy only appears the once on the same date (34k then 62k) the next service is in line with the average 8k per year the car has done.

Its just the fact that it has a dealer stamp on it. Same dealer 4 services in a row and 3 of the 4 have been clearly tip-ex'd.

My inital reaction was walk and if they stamps would have been indies, you wouldn't see the door close behind me, but I thought I'd get some thoughts on here first as it's apparently dealer mileage.

madasahatter · July 15, 2017

Well i would not give it a second look. Dealer stamp means absolutely nothing, they miss more than they do. And going by that dealers mechanic his glasses

do not work very well. Does the interior look like the mileage shown in the book?? Does it look like the extra 30,000 mile interior. Steering wheel is a good

sign of mileage. Seat condition carpet condition gear lever condition.

RNUK · July 15, 2017

Yeah interior is pretty straight, to be fair the removable bits look pretty new to me. Seats look about on the money but the centre armrest is worn more than mine and mine has done double the mileage!

Think I'll trust you and my gut here. Bugger, was hoping to get a find there.

madasahatter · July 15, 2017

Is there a link to the car.

Linas.P · July 15, 2017

I would not only leave the car alone, but report the dealership to DVLA.

peachy · July 15, 2017

Sounds dodgy to me and best to walk away.

There are plenty of is250's out there for sale with genuine milage.

Linas.P · July 15, 2017

Furthermore, it is not no like car where low mileage would be important, it is just wrong that somebody tries to fake it. Automatically, raises the question - if mileage is fake what else is wrong with it.

Malc · July 15, 2017

why not do the DVLA MOT history check on line too ............... see if that tallies with anything and makes sense of it all

Malc

RNUK · July 15, 2017

Did the DVLA check before I went to see it. Mileage tallies, but then again it will.

I went to see it as it's the fully loaded SE-L like mine (Most of the SE-L's I see don't have parking sensors). It wasn't low mileage 😏 and great money.

olliesgrandad · July 15, 2017

I was always told when buying a used car if you have any doubts walk away. It has always stood me in good stead . I can give you two examples of how hard it can be to spot a 'bad un'. I once knew a car dealer who was moving around 500 cars a month. He would buy at one auction and clean the vehicles etc and resell at auction elsewhere. I was in the police then. One day he brought me an Audi that he was unhappy with. After a lot of checking the various hidden locations for vin numbers it appeared on the surface to be okay. When we started checking date codes on components things weren't quite right. This LED to lifting carpets and we then realised that it was in fact 2 cars from 2 consecutive model years welded together. This just shows that even an experienced trader can get burnt fingers.

The second example was that I had a friend who was the MD of a company that was a dealership for Isuzu and Subarctic. He always ran new vehicles. One evening he picked me up in a slightly older Trooper. I commented on this and he explained he was going trunk it for a while as it had been bought into stock before it was found to be a 'ringer'. He had bought it for a second time from the insurance company so couldn't retail it because of its HPI status.

If the history is questionable best walk away. There will always be another one.

Linas.P · July 15, 2017

1 hour ago, RNUK said:

Most of the SE-L's I see don't have parking sensors

Parking sensors were standard on all SE-L's. If it doesn't have parking sensors it is not SE-L.

Malc · July 15, 2017

......... and never buy unseen nor in the rain nor in the dark ............... we had an Audi TT on our forecourt for sale for a customer ( about 15 years ago now ) and I saw exactly that car, everything the same, number plates etc, driving past me one afternoon visiting family about 35 miles from the forecourt ! Phoned my business partner to ask why " our " car was out in Herne Bay and he confirmed it was still on the forecourt ! Needless to say that car went immediately back to the owner to sort out .... it had probably been ringed or whatever at some stage ............ and I didn't want it to be our problem

You can never be too careful when buying secondhand cars.

Malc

RNUK · July 15, 2017

7 minutes ago, Linas.P said:

Parking sensors were standard on all SE-L's. If it doesn't have parking sensors it is not SE-L.

That's what I thought. But there is a lot on the trader marked as SE-L but without parking sensors. I thought the SE-L was fully loaded

Linas.P · July 15, 2017

29 minutes ago, RNUK said:

That's what I thought. But there is a lot on the trader marked as SE-L but without parking sensors. I thought the SE-L was fully loaded

Options were 4:

ML
Sunroof
ACC/PCS
and Sat-Nav (including reverse camera) in later models it is bundled with ML

The rest standard... 18 inch wheels can be considered optional, but is something anyone can easily change and probably already has changed considering the age of the car.

PhilipK · July 15, 2017

41 minutes ago, RNUK said:

That's what I thought. But there is a lot on the trader marked as SE-L but without parking sensors. I thought the SE-L was fully loaded

When I bought my SE-L (which does have front and rear parking sensors), there were a lot of cars listed as "SE-L" that were actually "SE-I" or lower spec. I found that the best clue was the presence or absence of the Electric Rear Sunblind switch, if the photos in the advert showed that part of the interior.

As far as mileage recording goes, both the listings for my IS250 on MyLexus and for my GT86 on MyToyota differ in mileage for some entries from the documented paperwork that I have from the dealers. I've also had the mileage written incorrectly on the service history for my M3 by a BMW dealership (got them to provide and stamp up a whole new book for me), so it's not totally impossible that there's a genuine explanation for the OP's situation.

Linas.P · July 15, 2017

Wood in accents is another good give away of proper SE-L..

is200 Newbie · July 15, 2017

also consider when you eventually come to sell it (if you did buy it) how do you explain the mileage to interested buyers.

Also - Its easy to check the model of the car as there is a label stuck on the inner door but again, I guess this can be forged or removed.

RNUK · July 15, 2017

1 hour ago, PhilipK said:

When I bought my SE-L (which does have front and rear parking sensors), there were a lot of cars listed as "SE-L" that were actually "SE-I" or lower spec.

Therein may be the answer. Uppercase I looking the same as lower case L.

Linas.P · July 15, 2017

That is only true for later models i.e. 2009+ when SE-i was introduced. I have seen quite a few sellers incorrectly listing SE-i as SE-L, but that again doesn't explain parking sensor issue - SE-i had parking sensors as standard. In fact the only model which doesn't have parking sensors as standard is SE and there is no way to interpret SE as anything else but SE...

madasahatter · July 16, 2017

7 hours ago, Linas.P said:

That is only true for later models i.e. 2009+ when SE-i was introduced. I have seen quite a few sellers incorrectly listing SE-i as SE-L, but that again doesn't explain parking sensor issue - SE-i had parking sensors as standard. In fact the only model which doesn't have parking sensors as standard is SE and there is no way to interpret SE as anything else but SE...

Mine has sensors front and rear. Also heated and cooled seats, so imagine it was specked from new.

In america all sel have sunroof but not all do in uk. { se model }

Linas.P · July 16, 2017

Indeed, some SE has parking sensors, it is just that it was optional not standard equipment. The reason why there are some many SE-L in pre-facelift compared to so few post-facelift is that pre-facelift it made more sense to buy SE-L, than add optional equipment to SE. You right - sunroof is quite rare in UK... No as rare as ACC/PCS though, at the moment there are no single car with it on autotrader...

RNUK · July 17, 2017

Forgive my ignorance. What is ACC/PCS?

J Henderson · July 17, 2017

No idea on what the official acronym stands for but basically, it's radar cruise control. If your car "sees" another car up ahead, it will reduce speed accordingly to avoid a collision. And return to the desired speed again when the road is clear.

Quite a nice feature actually. It was on the IS300h loaner I had whilst my car was being serviced.