My Ashridge Vehicles Review
The low mileage one owner car I bought from Ashridge Vehicles Ltd of Little Gaddesden, Hertfordshire, HP4 1QP had suffered accident damage to both sides. Consequently, the repairs were carried out to a very poor standard. Scroll down for my full review of the car and the way in which Ashridge Vehicles handled all the problems with it…
This picture was taken the day I viewed and bought the car, it was well presented, looked great and....
... proudly displayed this sticker in the windscreen. I would love to know who did the inspecting?
Here's the car in the body shop shortly after I bought it because, sadly, it wasn't any where near as good as it looked.
I'm confident the car wasn't any were near as bad as you claim
Quote From Ashridge Vehicles
Quick Version
My Ashridge Vehicles Review in as few words as possible.
The car I bought from Ashridge Vehicles had covered just 9700 miles with one lady owner. As such I maybe naively expected it to be a good car. Within 30 minutes of collecting it I noticed that the inside driver’s door handle wasn’t fitted properly. I immediately wondered if this was an indication that the door panel had been removed, but why? Over the next few weeks I would find out ‘why’, and to my horror, discover many problems with the the car.
After contacting the first owner it was confirmed, the car had suffered accident damage to both sides. As you will see from the pictures that follow, the quality of the repairs was shocking. The list is long and includes poor application of stone chip, massive runs and debris in the paint and over spray to the underside of the car and inner wheel arches. I also found trim falling off, trim badly fitted and trim damaged due to careless removal. The first owner had moved overseas in a hurry and wanted to sell the car quickly so it was sold to ‘We Buy Any Car’.
Being passionate about cars I look after them to the absolute best of my ability. My last, a 1999 Beetle, served me well for over 20 years and 170,000 miles with virtually no problems. I was hoping this car, which may be my last, would do the same. One option would have been to sell the car on passing the problems on to someone else, but that just didn’t sit right with me. So, the only option was to have it repaired, and this time, do the job properly. So far the cost is in the region of £1600, and that doesn’t include the countless hours I have spent on it.
I asked Ashridge Vehicles to cover the cost of the repairs and after an initial positive response their view changed. They offered me nothing, reminding me that I had inspected the car and signed a form to say I was happy with it. A form was signed, and I kick myself every day for that. They did supply me with a new inner door handle, which took 23 months to arrive when a genuine VW one could have been bought for £17.95 on eBay with no delay. A new ‘foil’ (see detailed version) was also supplied which cost approx. £12.00 from VW. And finally, they re-attached a moulding on the rear quarter panel that was literally hanging off, and they didn’t do a particularly nice job of that, as you will see from the pictures below and in the gallery.
The whole experience has been awful from start to finish causing me much anxiety and expense. Please read on for a more detailed account, pictures, and a response from Ashridge Vehicles Ltd.
solely because we were not prepared to make your car like new which in truth isn't that bad at all
Quote From Ashridge Vehicles
Detailed Version
My Ashridge Vehicles Review in full detail, lots of words.
The car I bought from Ashridge Vehicles had covered just 9700 miles with one lady owner. As such, I maybe naively expected it to be a good car. I viewed it late on a Saturday afternoon in January and the light was fading, not ideal. While I was looking over it a guy appeared and asked me if I was going to buy it. I didn’t have a clue who he was, he then said that if I didn’t buy it, he would. That immediately put me under pressure. The car was an unusually high spec, it had a nice interior/exterior colour combination and with the very low mileage, I didn’t want to loose it. So, I went right ahead and bought it there and then.
A week later I collected the car and within 30 minutes noticed that the inside driver’s door handle wasn’t fitted properly. I immediately wondered if this was an indication that the door panel had been removed. But why would the door panel have been removed on such a low mileage car? I was quite surprised so I called Ashridge Vehicles and told them about it right away. Over the next few weeks I would find out ‘why’, and to my horror, find many problems with the bodywork all due to a shockingly bad accident repair. [Picture 1]
As well as the poorly fitting inside door handle I also discovered that a black plastic moulding on the right rear quarter panel was loose. [Picture 2] It is likely that it had been removed to repair accident damage and then refitted without replacing the (expensive) double sided tape. I also noticed that there was a foil missing from the left hand rear fender [Picture 3]. A foil is a clear plastic film stuck to the bodywork to protect areas that are prone to stone chips. The missing foil was a huge giveaway that there had been a repair and I can’t believe I didn’t spot it, I kick myself every day.
Just 16 days after collecting the car it was back at Ashridge Vehicles to have the loose moulding re-fitted. The inner door handle was also fitted properly and a new foil was ordered from VW. I agreed to fit the foil myself rather than taking the car back to Hertfordshire a third time. At this point I didn’t realise that the car had been in an accident, but I was beginning to wonder. I even wrote these exact words in one of the many emails exchanged with Ashridge Vehicles. “Interestingly I also noticed there is a foil at the rear of the moulding on the quarter. On the wobbly side (right) the foil is there but on the good side (left) it’s missing. There maybe a story to tell there!”
A few days later I made contact with the first owner who confirmed that the car had suffered accident damage to both sides. She also told me that due to a sudden change of circumstances she, and her family, had moved overseas. This meant they needed to sell the car quickly, which is why it was sold to ‘We Buy Any Car’. I suspected that due to the sudden move the quality of the repair was overlooked, which she did confirm.
Over the next few weeks I would find more and more problems with the car. Back with the left rear fender I found that as well as the missing foil the wheel arch liner hadn’t been fitted properly. Half way around the arch is a screw and tab that secures the liner to the arch. The screw was fitted, but had completely missed the hole in the liner so served no purpose at all. Maybe the job of fitting the liner was assigned to the apprentice, or perhaps that’s doing the apprentice a disservice? That wasn’t the only problem with the fitting of the liner. [Picture 4] More in gallery.
Poorly fitted interior door handle.
Rear quarter moulding falling off.
Massive paint run and missing foil.
Poorly fitted wheel arch liner.
Moving round to the other side, but still with the rear fender, I guess we should be thankful that the foil was actually there. It doesn’t look very pretty though, does is it? Maybe it was applied by someone who doesn’t know how to fit them, and with dirty hands. Or maybe this is the original foil, and it should have been replaced, but wasn’t. You can also see the awful application of stone chip, not only does the texture not match the adjacent panel, but the edge isn’t straight, or sharp. Debris in the paint is also visible here. [Picture 5] More in gallery.
Continuing around the car to the sill I found the biggest paint run of all. I didn’t measure it but it was easily 300 – 400mm long, maybe longer. In the same picture you can see white paint on the edge of the plastic threshold cover. The cover should have been removed before painting and then replaced with a new one instead of masking it up, badly. On a more positive note look at that stone chip edge, nice and sharp, exactly how it should be. [Picture 6]
A serious problem with the black plastic moulding on the drivers door wasn’t even visible until the weather got warmer. To my horror I noticed a gap appearing at both ends of the moulding when the sun was on it. Then, when it cooled, it returned to its correct position, I thought I was going mad! At around 5mm its a considerable gap. I couldn’t have spotted this when I viewed the car because it was freezing cold and it looked fine. It was only when the weather warmed up in May that it happened, and I noticed it. [Pictures 7 & 8]
This had me scratching my head for a while, but I soon worked out what had happened. As well as clips, grommets and double sided tape there are two hidden screws holding the moulding on from behind. Someone has removed the moulding without first removing the screws resulting in it breaking at both ends. I tried to repair it and bought new clips, grommets and the correct 3M tape at a cost of £130.00. All four mouldings are now fitted properly, but the repair didn’t work. I will have to buy a new moulding which will need to be painted. Estimated cost £300.00 plus the £130 already spent. More in gallery.
Horrible stone chip and debris in paint.
An even bigger run in the paint!
Damaged door moulding.
Gap between door and moulding.
A look underneath the car reveals yet another sign of the poor quality repair work. Overspray can be seen in all the areas that have been repaired all the way around the car. Shown here [Picture 9] is the underside just ahead of the left rear wheel. You can see that suspension components and cables have all been painted white. How difficult would it have been to mask these areas up? Please see the Gallery for more overspray pictures.
Here is a close up shot of the plastic cover in the door shut. Extremely bad masking resulted in its edges getting painted. To do this job properly the cover should be removed, the panel painted, and then a new cover fitted. I did remove the covers, and then fitted new ones after painting. [Picture 10]
[Picture 11] This hole is under the bonnet along the front edge. It should be home to a plastic buffer that was in place when I collected the car. When the buffer fell out, yes-fell out, it took a large lump of paint with it. This suggested to me that it may have been glued in place. Looking to the lower right of the hole I have touched it in with a VW paint touch up pen.
Additionally, two decals under the bonnet were not in the condition you would expect on a 9700 mile car. They look like they may have been removed, and then refitted when they should have been replaced. Please see the gallery for pictures of those. I don’t know if the front of the car had any repairs, but these signs may suggest it has. There were also signs that the under tray below the front bumper had been masked up, so maybe the front of the car had been painted.
In my experience a good way to assess the condition of a cars bodywork is to give it a good wash. With the popularity of hand car washes these days I often wonder how many people actually wash their own cars? I have a feeling that in many cases the staff at the hand car wash know more about a cars bodywork than the owner. There could be 1000’s of cars out there with sub-standard repairs and their owners will never know, because they never wash them!
[Picture 12] As can be seen in the screen grab, Ashridge Vehicles proudly advertise that “Vehicles are cleaned and maintained to the highest standards by our highly experienced valeting team”. With that in mind is it perhaps reasonable to expect that the ‘highly experienced valeting team’ might have noticed at least one or two of the problems I have listed? And, if they had, would it be reasonable to expect them to mention it to potential buyers? If I had known about the problems with this car I would not have bought it, saving myself 4 years of expense, stress and anxiety.
Overspray to underside of car.
Poor masking of threshold trim.
Missing buffer under bonnet.
Ashridge vehicles valeting team.
I asked Ashridge Vehicles to cover the cost of the repairs. Their initial response was a positive “I don’t have an open chequebook” and “do you know someone in the trade who can do the work”. However, it wasn’t long before positive changed to negative and I realised that actually they had no intention of offering any help at all. They reminded me that when I collected the car I inspected it and signed to say I was happy with it. That is correct, and I’m still kicking myself about it. I was excited to be collecting my new car and maybe naively expected that with only 9700 miles, and at what seemed to be a reputable dealer, it would be in good condition, or dare I say it, close to perfect. I hold my hands up, I made a big mistake!
Shortly after collecting the car I questioned a couple of features that I thought it should have. As it turned out I was completely wrong. Whilst discussing the bodywork issues Ashridge made a point of highlighting those points which I found patronising. They also reminded me that they had supplied a new foil (approx. £12), the inner door handle which took 23 months to arrive when a genuine VW handle could have been bought from eBay without any delay (£17.95) and re-attached the moulding on the rear quarter panel (badly) that was falling off, and even made a point that they had done this free of charge! New clips for the inner door handle, and the piece on the door panel that it attaches to, had also been agreed but I never received them, and my last emails regarding that were ignored.
All Volkswagen vehicles are covered by a 12-year anti corrosion warranty. Should I ever need to make use of that the car would have to be inspected by VW. The repairs that this car had would be blatantly obvious to them. I wouldn’t be surprised if the warranty is voided and I am shown the door!
I’m extremely disappointed with myself for buying a car with such poor bodywork. When I viewed it the light was fading and due to the other potential buyer I was pressured into making a decision there and then. That decision turned out to be the wrong one. The whole experience has caused me nothing but stress, worry and anxiety. There were days when I would dread calling Ashridge and just put it off. Financially its cost me around £1600 and that’s not including the 100’s of hours of my own time.
all of our pre-owned cars are put through a thorough inspection process before arriving on the forecourt
Quote From Ashridge Vehicles
Gallery
Pictures of all the bad bits, click each image to enlarge and read description.
Setting the standards for used cars in Beds, Herts & Bucks
Quote From Ashridge Vehicles
Making It Right
Pictures of the repairs, click each image to enlarge and read description.
it is completely conceivable in fact more likely than not that most vehicles of this age would have at some stage in their life had minor cosmetic repairs carried out to them
Quote From Ashridge Vehicles
MORE BAD NEWS
Updated in 2025 - A new discovery is made, and it's not good news.
It would be fair to say that I haven’t been very lucky with this car, its the unluckiest car I have ever owned.
While driving round the M25 one evening in 2024 an unidentified object hit the rear left side of the car. I don’t know what it was, it sounded like a brick going round in a washing machine for about a second, then the ‘check tyre’ warning appeared on the dashboard display.
After pulling off the motorway I discovered a 20mm split in the side wall of the tyre, which was completely flat, and a dent in the rear left fender.
Of course this has nothing to do with Ashridge vehicles, but it did reveal yet another bodywork horror story. The dent revealed an excessive amount of body filler from the previous repair.
If you have got this far you will know that the car had been repaired very badly before I bought it, but I had no idea it was full of filler.
Generally the use of body filler is not considered good practise. If the repair had been done properly a new fender would have been fitted. Instead more cost cutting corners were cut and they just slapped it up with a bucket load of filler.
In the words of the body shop I used “the fender is carved out of filler”
It is also disappointing to note your personal harassment of our manager via their personal social media accounts
(Untrue) Quote From Ashridge Vehicles
What Ashridge Vehicles had to say
Dear Julian,
Having taken some time to review your purchase of the vehicle back in January 2020, some 2 years of ownership before your posting, I must point out that you spent considerable time inspecting the car (as any prospective buyer would) and also as you pointed out in your review, that you completed paperwork to say that you were happy with the condition of the car and all other aspects of the transaction. Indeed, another customer who also viewed the car whilst you were in the process of buying it was also happy to go ahead with the purchase, so I’m confident the car wasn’t any were near as bad as you claim.
We also need to point out your extensive career experience within the motor trade and as such your confirmation of satisfaction brings to the table perhaps even more validity than someone without a working experience of motor vehicles. That said it is always our aim to help resolve any concerns a customer may have.
The vehicle that you purchased was approaching 4 years old when you took delivery and again given your years of experience, I am sure that you would agree that it is completely conceivable in fact more likely than not that most vehicles of this age would have at some stage in their life had minor cosmetic repairs carried out to them.
An approved body shop would charge around £800 per single panel just to re-paint. We would not consider being able to find £800 of imperfections across this whole car as anything more than commensurate with its age.
As a gesture of goodwill, we did supply you with some parts from the manufacturer (not eBay), that did suffer a major delay given the nationwide lockdown everybody experienced and it is a well known fact that parts supply are still being affected to this day.
We are sorry that our service did not meet with your expectations as we did not carry out any of the repairs you are complaining of and given your experience and highly critical eye it is rather unfair that our numerous conversations regarding this have led you to leave this poor review solely because we were not prepared to make your car like new which in truth isn’t that bad at all.
It is also disappointing to note your personal harassment of our manager via their personal social media accounts.
Ashridge Vehicles
Quote From Ashridge Vehicles
given your experience and highly critical eye it is rather unfair that our numerous conversations regarding this have led you to leave this poor review
Quote From Ashridge Vehicles