Ask The Complainer: What to do when a garage holds your car hostage?

Katie Goss avatarKatie Goss
3 min read
October 20, 2025

Last month, we launched Ask The Complainer, allowing you to send a legal question to Jasper Griegson, aka The Complainer. 

Each month, Jasper reviews your submissions and picks one to respond to. So if you could do with some expert advice on a tricky situation, send him your issue now. 

 Ask The Complainer now

 

This month, Jasper responds to Ian, who took his car in for repairs and hasn’t heard from the garage since.

This is Ian’s question…

Dear Complainer, 
I need your help regarding my car, which I left at Marshall on 16th September 2025 for replacement of the traction batteries. It is now 2nd October 2025, and the repair has still not been completed.
Despite calling Marshall several times, I have received no communication or updates regarding the status of the repair. I assume the delay may be related to the recent Jaguar Land Rover computer system issue, but I have no way of confirming this.

Attempts to obtain information directly from Marshall have been unsuccessful, as they no longer respond to my calls. What recourse, if any, do I have in this situation?

Ian


This is The Complainer’s advice… 

Dear Ian,

I sympathise with your predicament. The situation you face with Marshall is unacceptable. The law is on your side although I appreciate that getting Marshall to realise this is challenging. 

Section 49 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 requires Marshall to provide their service with “reasonable care and skill”. This plainly means that they must carry out repairs in a timely fashion and it must be satisfactory to you. It seems to me that they are not meeting this standard, which is surprising for what I assume is a company that holds itself out as a reputable main dealer.  
In short, you need to escalate your complaint and I would suggest that you look at doing these two things: 
  1. Keep a record of whatever is happening in a letter or email. It may be a good idea to do this in advance of your visit and subsequently. I would also suggest copying that communication to the customer services department at Jaguar head office directly or using Resolver to do so.
  2. Make a personal visit to the dealer and tell them that unless they give you a proper explanation for the delay together with an acceptable timeline, you will be demanding the immediate return of your vehicle and that you will not be paying them anything. This step alone should spur them into action.
If these two steps were to fail, your fallback position would be a formal letter threatening to sue Marshall in the small claims court. When making this threat you should: 
  • Recount the history,
  • Set a deadline of say 14 days, say that you will hold them responsible for all and any costs of switching to another company,
  • Conclude your letter with “I reserve my rights generally to take any action necessary to protect my interests”.
I would sincerely hope that Marshall cares enough about their reputation to respond positively to this sort of action. Do bear in mind that this is a civil dispute and you would be of no interest to the police. You need to take proactive steps to make Marshall take your complaint seriously. 

I wish you the best of luck,

Jasper Griegson
The Complainer

 

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