Dealers deliver repainted or damaged cars as 'new', owners say

What owners keep reporting

Team-BHP's dealer and technical forums carry a recurring complaint: a car bought and paid for as new turns up with a panel someone has already repainted, or with a dent and a paint chip picked up inside the showroom itself. We found this pattern across at least ten separate threads going back more than a decade, the oldest from 2010 and the newest posted this year.

In one thread a Kia Seltos buyer refused delivery after the dealer tried to hand over a car that had been damaged and refurbished, a dispute the thread's own title says was eventually "solved". In another, an owner doing a second pre delivery inspection just before registration found fresh paint and a scratch on a Seltos that had passed a first, cleaner inspection, and asked the forum whether to accept it anyway. A Tata Punch owner photographed white marks on the roof and panel gaps and asked if he had been cheated, a question the forum itself could not settle: other members argued the marks were Teflon coating residue, not real paint damage.

Owners of a Hyundai i20, and in an older thread a Hyundai sold through the Universal Hyundai dealership, reported discovering a repainted rear door only after taking delivery, one noticing paint bubbles and a slightly different shine within two weeks. This year a Tata Harrier buyer in Andhra Pradesh posted that his car arrived repainted and with defects, drawing comments from long time members who said panel mismatches are common on the model. Search results show a Bengaluru lawyer who refused delivery of a Toyota Innova Hycross after spotting a dent and a paint chip at handover, and who said a dealership staff member objected when she tried to film the car for her own record, before she filed a complaint against the showroom and the maker.

We could not open all of these Team-BHP pages directly, several returned an access error, so for those we rely only on what the search results themselves show, and have not added any reply counts, page numbers or dates beyond what those results displayed.

What dealers and the law say

None of the makers named in these threads, Tata Motors, Hyundai, Kia or Toyota, appear in our searches to have issued a public statement answering these specific complaints. One Team-BHP discussion was started by someone describing themselves as a dealer, asking other dealers how they should legally and practically handle a new car that gets damaged and repainted before it is sold, which suggests the practice is a live question inside the trade itself.

The law is clearer than the makers' silence. The Supreme Court held in Rajiv Shukla vs Gold Crush Sales and Services that once a buyer pays the full price of a new car, the dealer must hand over a new car, and failing that amounts to an unfair trade practice. In a separate case against a Tata dealer, Mahaveer Stone Crushing Co vs Tata Motors, the court found the vehicle was eighty per cent repainted, ruled this was transport damage rather than a manufacturing defect, and awarded compensation instead of ordering a replacement car.

This year the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission went further, ordering a Tata dealership to refund a buyer more than nine lakh rupees for selling a test drive Manza Elan as a new car, holding the dealer, not Tata Motors, liable for unfair trade practice and deficiency in service.

What an owner can do

Do the pre delivery inspection yourself, in daylight, before signing anything, and repeat it just before registration if time has passed since the first look. Check panel gaps, the paint finish under direct sunlight, and tyre date codes. If anything looks repaired, refuse delivery in writing and ask for a different car from the same allotment, do not accept a discount in place of a new car. Keep every photograph and message with the dealer. If the dealer will not cooperate, write to the maker's customer care with the chassis number, then escalate to the National Consumer Helpline on 1915 or its web portal, which takes complaints about damaged vehicles and misleading sale practices before an owner needs to go to a consumer court.

Sources

• Legal case on repainted car sold as new, Consumer Voice
• Consumer court orders dealer to refund over Rs 9 lakh for selling demo car as new, Trak.in
• Universal Hyundai sold a repainted car as new, Team-BHP
• Anguish! Shreenath Vehicles & Kia Motors forcing me to take delivery of damaged Seltos, Team-BHP
• Dent in new car before delivery: Bengaluru advocate files complaint against showroom, maker, Team-BHP
• Nightmare first-car experience with Tata Motors, Team-BHP
• National Consumer Helpline