Dear Members,
Something has come up which has prompted me to put ink to paper and to inform you as such.
The LCR committee does not and will not get involved with a sellers descriptions of any vehicle whether they be members or non-members.
Every seller has a right to sell their vehicle and can describe the vehicle however they wish. It is not the job of the LCR committee to police this on our own forum, the QB or when advertised on social media and even the old fashioned way of general advertisements in periodicals or dealer showrooms!
Many club members will voice their OWN opinions (and are entitled to do so) of vehicle parts or complete cars but this is not and will never be the views of the committee.
Just recently I was asked by a member to inspect a car to check its originality. I was not given any details of the car as the owner wished to protect his privacy and the identity of the car. This is typical of certain collectors so not unusual and we as a club will always respect their wish of privacy.
The vehicle will then be inspected and the details irrespective of our findings will be added to our database. This database is password protected and can only be viewed by 3 members of the committee and that database is never disclosed to anyone else so everyone's privacy is respected.
If an enquiry is then made regarding a car being advertised for sale, be that from the general public or a club member we are obliged to disclose information that we hold on that car. Obviously this will never include the current or previous owners details as we are duty bound by GDPR and any references would solely be regarding that car.
This has always been club policy so we are a little perturbed by certain individuals that keep harping on that we as a club are a "secret society" and all information is kept and held by an inner sanctum that will not divulge information, this simply is not true. How do we encourage new members if we do not tell them about a car they are interested in?
However if we receive an enquiry regarding a car that we have inspected and we have certain reservations regarding the cars originality then we will convey this to the enquirer during a private conversation as we will ask them to contact the committee to discuss further. At this stage because of the interest we will also put in the members section of the forum that anyone interested in purchasing this car to contact us for more information before purchase. We would not put this sentiment on the forum unless an enquiry has been made, as I have stated, we are not policing these cars it is the purchasers responsibility to do their own due diligence!. We will not come outright and publicly slight the car in any way.
In saying all this if we as a club or individually are incorrectly implemented publicly then we have a right to respond and hence the reason for this post!
Therefore I see it as my moral right and duty to inform you through the members area that a car being advertised for sale in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire is incorrect and has always been incorrect!
This is the car I refer to above owned by the private individual and was inspected by me in November last year 2020.
In the new sellers current write up of the vehicles condition etc it states and this is the quotation:-
The shell unfortunately remained unverified after a 2-hour ramp inspection by the Lotus Cars Register, possibly due to the restoration work undertaken. However, the main shell Lotus Cortina identifiers were/are present and the Register did confirm the quality of the restoration was a very high standard.
I can inform you that this car was not a genuine vehicle from 20 paces and I did indeed take a 2 hour inspection because I took over 100 pictures of all the incorrect parts! The vehicle was built to deceive and had many newly manufactured parts fitted that are now readily available on the internet!!
Pretty much everything was wrong about this car! There was no other person present upon my inspection regardless of what is published in the quote above.
My obligation was to the owner who had contracted me to do the inspection.
I contacted him on my return home to convey my findings. I was amazed that after my thorough inspection my knowledge and understanding of these cars was brought into question as the owner was not convinced of my findings because "certain armchair experts" had convinced him it was genuine and were all awaiting my report!!
These individuals "know who they are" and should be ashamed of themselves for misguiding this owner and convincing him to spend his money on what was and is pure folly!!
After several conversations and emails with the owner he finally agreed that I was indeed correct and he had been misled by these so called "experts". This eventually resulted in the owner selling the car to the restoration company at a huge financial loss.
It is this company who now are advertising the vehicle for sale on the "Car and Classic" website and they, as seen above, have insinuated that I was inconclusive in my findings when that is categorically not the case. Hence why I feel I had to defend myself and put the record straight in this post to you my peers!
Regards to all and stay safe
Andy M
PS I am happy to discuss this or any reservations you may have regarding future inspections just PM me or contact me direct I am readily available and approachable!
Something has come up which has prompted me to put ink to paper and to inform you as such.
The LCR committee does not and will not get involved with a sellers descriptions of any vehicle whether they be members or non-members.
Every seller has a right to sell their vehicle and can describe the vehicle however they wish. It is not the job of the LCR committee to police this on our own forum, the QB or when advertised on social media and even the old fashioned way of general advertisements in periodicals or dealer showrooms!
Many club members will voice their OWN opinions (and are entitled to do so) of vehicle parts or complete cars but this is not and will never be the views of the committee.
Just recently I was asked by a member to inspect a car to check its originality. I was not given any details of the car as the owner wished to protect his privacy and the identity of the car. This is typical of certain collectors so not unusual and we as a club will always respect their wish of privacy.
The vehicle will then be inspected and the details irrespective of our findings will be added to our database. This database is password protected and can only be viewed by 3 members of the committee and that database is never disclosed to anyone else so everyone's privacy is respected.
If an enquiry is then made regarding a car being advertised for sale, be that from the general public or a club member we are obliged to disclose information that we hold on that car. Obviously this will never include the current or previous owners details as we are duty bound by GDPR and any references would solely be regarding that car.
This has always been club policy so we are a little perturbed by certain individuals that keep harping on that we as a club are a "secret society" and all information is kept and held by an inner sanctum that will not divulge information, this simply is not true. How do we encourage new members if we do not tell them about a car they are interested in?
However if we receive an enquiry regarding a car that we have inspected and we have certain reservations regarding the cars originality then we will convey this to the enquirer during a private conversation as we will ask them to contact the committee to discuss further. At this stage because of the interest we will also put in the members section of the forum that anyone interested in purchasing this car to contact us for more information before purchase. We would not put this sentiment on the forum unless an enquiry has been made, as I have stated, we are not policing these cars it is the purchasers responsibility to do their own due diligence!. We will not come outright and publicly slight the car in any way.
In saying all this if we as a club or individually are incorrectly implemented publicly then we have a right to respond and hence the reason for this post!
Therefore I see it as my moral right and duty to inform you through the members area that a car being advertised for sale in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire is incorrect and has always been incorrect!
This is the car I refer to above owned by the private individual and was inspected by me in November last year 2020.
In the new sellers current write up of the vehicles condition etc it states and this is the quotation:-
The shell unfortunately remained unverified after a 2-hour ramp inspection by the Lotus Cars Register, possibly due to the restoration work undertaken. However, the main shell Lotus Cortina identifiers were/are present and the Register did confirm the quality of the restoration was a very high standard.
I can inform you that this car was not a genuine vehicle from 20 paces and I did indeed take a 2 hour inspection because I took over 100 pictures of all the incorrect parts! The vehicle was built to deceive and had many newly manufactured parts fitted that are now readily available on the internet!!
Pretty much everything was wrong about this car! There was no other person present upon my inspection regardless of what is published in the quote above.
My obligation was to the owner who had contracted me to do the inspection.
I contacted him on my return home to convey my findings. I was amazed that after my thorough inspection my knowledge and understanding of these cars was brought into question as the owner was not convinced of my findings because "certain armchair experts" had convinced him it was genuine and were all awaiting my report!!
These individuals "know who they are" and should be ashamed of themselves for misguiding this owner and convincing him to spend his money on what was and is pure folly!!
After several conversations and emails with the owner he finally agreed that I was indeed correct and he had been misled by these so called "experts". This eventually resulted in the owner selling the car to the restoration company at a huge financial loss.
It is this company who now are advertising the vehicle for sale on the "Car and Classic" website and they, as seen above, have insinuated that I was inconclusive in my findings when that is categorically not the case. Hence why I feel I had to defend myself and put the record straight in this post to you my peers!
Regards to all and stay safe
Andy M
PS I am happy to discuss this or any reservations you may have regarding future inspections just PM me or contact me direct I am readily available and approachable!