If only I had found your page before hand things could have been oh! so different

I am another one that has beeen screwed by the Heathrow engine centre. The fact that they did do the job even though they found a way of jacking up the price they now wont support their work as the car is now using a lot of oil and they wont look at it without payment. As said by others i would recommend that you STAY AWAY FROM HEATHROW ENGINE CENTRE at all cost. There must be some honest garages that would do the job properly at a fair price I just couldnt find them quickly at the time

Hmm... If it's any consolation you're not alone. !

http://www.moneysupermarket.com/community/forums/t/i-went-on-line-for-recon-engine-15344.aspx

Same here - i wish i checked on the interent first before going with these cowboys!!!

I got my car back yesterday after them having it for ONE MONTH!!!! They didnt even look at it for a week - kept on fobbing me off everytime i rang, saying it would be ready in a few days - those days went by and i receive NO PHONE CALL - its not until i got a member of my family involved did they do anything. A very time consuming, stressful and costly mistake!!!!

WHATEVER YOU DO - DO NOT GO WITH THESE PEOPLE!!!

Thanks for the advice with this - I have just come off the phone to Engine Centre in Southall, feeling initially pleased with what seemed a very reasonable quote for an engine remanufacture, complete with 5 year, 60,000 mile guarantee. On reflection the salesperson did seem overenthusiastic which always sets alarm bells ringing. Needless to say after checking this site and some reports on the RAC forum, I will not be using their services.

I've learnt a couple of valuable lessons today - if something's too good to be true it probably is and oil makes engines work better!

Thanks!

If only i had also found all this information before i used Heathrow Engine Centre/MPH Engineering Ltd/Hallmead Services Ltd and whatever else they call themselves! I bought a Chrysler Voyager and foolishly contacted MPH Engineering Ltd who offered a recondition on my engine for £1600. I paid the money up front as requested via credit card, and my engine was collected a few days later. After not hearing from MPH for around a month, i contacted them and was told that they were having trouble finding the parts for my engine, but will keep it for a few more weeks. Approx a week later my engine was returned with no warning, it was in a stripped state and had obviously had nothing done on it. I called MPH immediately and was told that they were unable to recon my engine. So i therefore asked to speak to accounts, in order to process the refund i was owed. Over the last 2 months (Prob longer!) I have been trying to get in contact with the accounts department (Tom/Kevin + whatever other name they choose) with no luck. I have spoken to 'Tom' + 'Kevin' a couple of times, but have been fobbed off with excuses like.. 'The Accountant needs to sign for me to process the refund, please call back tomw, unavailable as on *** break, unavailable as on lunch, off sick, only works on tuesdays, cannot process refund as is over £1000 - Need to speak to someone else... And the list goes on. It is ridiculous. I would say i rang them at least 5-10 times everyday for approx 2 weeks! I have sent them a letter, with no response, and have contacted my credit card who have also sent them a letter with no luck. Very fustrating. These people are purely out for your money, since i used MPH i have found a few forums with hundreds of complaints from people who have also been shafted by these people. I hear that they have been on watchdog, and other various things. How these people are still going is beyond me. I just hope the word gets about and we can stop these a*rseholes from shafting more people! Grr..! Would like to hear from more people who have had experiences with these people?

I wish i researched them before i went with them. It makes me feel a little better that im not the only one they have done this to, at the same time it makes me really really angry if that makes sense. They offered me a as new engine promised me the car will be like new when I get it back. They were very very nice, everyone from the sales team to the mechanics. I get a call form them a few weeks later telling me that my car needs more work so the hike up the price from £1000 to £1500 they demand instant payment, I pay them and get my car back a week later then they promised. I start the car up and it makes a funny rattelling noise, so I tell them. Their head mechanic who up to now was very nice (a indian guy) refused to even listen to it, i could clearly hear a noise but he would not even listen, refused to even come close to the car. Now I worked in BMW manufacturing in oxford for 1year and my main job was to listen out for noises in cars that are nmot supposed to be there so I knew what I was talking about. From the moment these people have ur money to turn and you feel helpless.

They also overcharged me and I have had exactly the same problem I can never get through to this fictionall account team, Ive lost track of all teh fake names they gave me, tehy promise me a cheque, they go as far as taking my name and address and say they will post it out tonight. Finally today I told them about all the info about they dealings on the net and the man got aggresive and violent.

They will not honour the 60,000 miles garuntee they will find a way of getting more money off you, they conviently forget to tell you that you have to take the car back to them for the service every 6 months or 6,000 miles for the garuntee to be valid, even if you are in scotland you have to take it back to them.

They have no boundries, they will rip anyone off, man, women, pensioner, student. The whole garage is the same, stay away from them. Anyone who has gone to them and been ripped off help me I want to fight these crooks back. We need to get together and stop these criminals.

I Can't believe that these Scam-Mongers are still operating and that consumers are still flocking to them for REMANUFACTURED ENGINES.

This shyster company cleverly say REMANUFACTURED instead of RECONDITIONED as very little new new parts are used. The engines come from scrap cars or from previous customers old units. Their idea of REMANUFACTURING is to Steam Clean the Engine, take cylinder head and cam cover off, fit a couple of new gaskets and fill up with cheap oil (£2 a gallon rubbish) oil filter and spark plugs, which they charge you for as extras anyway.

They have been going for approximately 25 years now under different company names and at different locations, Hayes, Hounslow, Southall to name but a few. It is about time tey should be featured on Watchdog and in National newspapers and then closed down by Trading Standards.

You would be financially better off by buying an engine from a scrap car from a more reputable junkyard that give some sort of guarantee or will let you hear an engine run because chances are that it will be better than an engine purchased from this crowd of w***ers.

If you cannot take out and replace your own engine, then try a local mechanic or use a main dealer to obtain a factory reconditioned engine (more expensive but you get what you pay for)

Heathrow engine centre has effectively, over the years, put most reputable engine remanufacturers out of business. How can you compete against a company who supposedly offers to rebuild your engine, give you a five years or 60,000 miles warranty for far less than anyone who is going to do the job properly can honestly quote for it. Our family have run an engine remanufacturing business in South London for over fifty years. If we had a pound for every person who rings us with a sob story after they had the misfortune to take their vehicle into HEC or one of their other business aliases we could have packed up years ago and be sunning ourselves on the proceeds. The irony of this is many of the people with their sob stories are the very same ones who accused us of being rip-off merchants when they originally rang for a quote and we gave them an honest fair price for the work that they needed. How true is the old adage that you don't get ought for nought. From reading peoples write up on their experiences we find it quite amazing how they were expected to pay up front before the job even started. Hopefully, with the aid of the internet perhaps people will become more aware and steer clear.

dengirl,

I thoroughly agree with your post, consumers these days just tend to see the big bright advert with a lovely guarantee and a super low price.

Driving many tens of thousands of miles a year for a living for years, I had to use reliable firms like your family run company and had reconditioned (not stripped and rebuilt with same parts like HEC) engines fitted with them outlasting the life of the vehicle.

I too noticed the good companies going out of business and was eventually forced to buy a dealer supplied engine for a Citroen.

It would be great if the rip-off HEC were put out of business themselves by Trading Standards and Watchdog, I just hope enough people complain.

I too have had a nightmare with Heathrow Engines.

I first called them December last year and needed the job done quickly.... i had little time to compare quotes as it was just days before xmas and needed it back for the busiest time of the year! I googled reconditioned engines and they were a sponsored link at the very top of the page... with no time to research I called them up and accepted an inital quote of around £1100 for a reconditioned engine (or so i thought), this turned into over £1600 with all the bits they decide to add on after they havew taken ur engine apart.

Within the space of 100 miles (and after them having it far longer then agreed) the engine warning light came on, 10 months later and 5/6 journeys back to them, the electronic devise used to read the engine fault kept saying it was the Cat convertor.... i therefore chnaged the cat convertor at a cost of £200, but this did nothing, the engine light came on another 3 times and each time i had to pay £20 to get it re set and also being told by HEC to put cat cleaner in which i did.... but suprise suprise it did nothing.

Since the summer i kinda gave up and kept running the car in the mean time seekign advice from Trading Standards, they have advised i contact my credit card company. But they also advised I give them a chance to put it right.... so i did i gave them my car 4 weeks ago and toild them it had gone through 5 litres of oil and it was coming out the exhaust not the gasket like they had continued to tell me (all lies which i later found out). They called me to say they were sticking another engine in... i was pleasntly suprised. I should have known i returned from holiday sunday and picked the car up yesterday .... low and behold 90 miles after the warning light is back on.

I called 'Kevin' what a guy he is... to be told to monitor the oil level and we will take it from there. I now plan to monitor the oil level, i know it will be leaking oil, i then plan to ask them for a refund as this will be seen as following due process, when they refuse I will go to my credit card company and seek a refund.

DO NOT USE HEATHROW ENGINES. They are rude and wouldnt know what customer service is if it hit them in the face.... once they have ur money that is it, i live in Essex and had to take 5 days off work to go back 5/6 times and each time sit there for 2/3 hrs in the cold for them to give me a load more lies. I wish i had gone to Dagenham Ford and paid the little extra knowing i would have got a far better quality of service and after sale service.....

Heathrow Engines should be shut down they are what give the car industry/ mechanics/garages a bad name..... i wish i had never got involved they have cost me well over £2000 and i have an engine just as bad as before.... learn from my mistake and dont give the *** your money.

Leigh

Oh dear .. wish I had found this site before June this year ! I live in Jersey and have had the same sorry experience from this bunch of crooks that everyone else seems to have had.

What amazes me , with all the consumer protection bits that are around nowadays , is that this sort of company can live beyond 1 week ! No-ione seems capable or interesetd in shutting them down. I bought, like most I guess, using a credit card. I will try to gain isnureance through that but perhaps if the Banks would shut the credit route off, and in the mihnting number of complainst WHY DONT THEY ? and the company would go out of business inside 1 week.

I have only lost £450 to these cowboys .. Kevin and Chris are the usual fob off names but all made up anyway ! Have written and posted several times, phoned up to 6 times a day ... got various people whose 3rd language is english .. and just about finally given up !

Hi these people still have my car since picking it up on oct 25th. I was quoted £1330.plus vat, once they had dismantled it they said the cost to put it back together was going to be Ł2931.62 inc.vat. Like lots of others I told them to proceed with the work as we needed the car asap and we would have to pay them £500 anyway to get car back with engine in the boot. About 4 days later I had still heard nothing so contacted them and was told the car was all done and being test run in the morning then redelivered back to me. Never heard nothing so contacted them again only to be told that the radiator motor fan had packed up and needed new at the cost of £250.00 plus vat. Again we paid because we have spent all this money already and just want car back. The car was promised back here on the thurs nothing fri nothing. We were told on the sat that car would be brought back mon of this week, when it never showed I called them and was told they have a shortage of drivers and it is booked in for weds. TOday I called again and was told by some smart *** that the car will be delivered tomorrow morning at nine oclock, I was furious and said you keep saying this but no show. His reply was the driver is standing here with your key in his hand what do you want a photo. I would like to help in anyway I can to put these cowboys out of work, so if there is anything that I can do plz let me know. I am so worried that when the car is returned it will still not be right, I keep seeing people saying about paying with credit cards is good thing but dont understand how that helps, would be grateful if you could inform me how it is so as I paid using my card.

plzchat - I keep seeing people saying about paying with credit cards is good thing but dont understand how that helps, would be grateful if you could inform me how it is so as I paid using my card.

This gives you the protection under the consumer credit act 1974 to hold both parties seperately or equally responsible for faulty goods or services supplied as you are in effect in a three party credit agreement if you pay by CC. This could include claiming the costs back from your card issuer or the cost of having the faulty work rectified not necessarily by the same company, this would need initial contact with the CC company, probably to be backed up by an independent motor engineers report stating that the work failed to meet acceptable standards, then finally approved by the CC issuer.

This company is now going into liquidation, Check Companies House; it wont stop them screwing people though; they now trade from their old site in Twickenham as The " Engine Warehouse" If anyone doubts the nature of the people who run Heathrow Engines and their offspring check out the link below

http://www.talkingmotors.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=6449:three-directors-of-heathrow-engine-centre-have-been-charged-with-vat-fraud-alleged-to-be-in-the-region-of-œ7m-it--emerged-last-week.&catid=25:general-news&Itemid=222

I purchased a "remanufactured engine" for my Rover in 2006. They found reasomns to bump the price up, and then took more than a month to steam clean and fit a second hand engine that had been "tarted up" ( this was verified by my local garage after I had towed the car back from their premises with the engine in bits after it had failed four months after the "rebuild". I took it back under "warranty" which they would not honour and said was invalidated as I had allowed the car to overheat which I had not.

My local garage found obsolete parts fitted which were known to contribute to early head gasket failure

I wrote to them, tried credit card company with no luck so I'm not sure what "advantage" that gave me.

I took them through small claims and was awarded judgement by default; (they didn't even reply)

I am about to get bailifs to go in but frankly I don't hold out much hope.

These people are modern day pirates, skilled at deception and without a concience; they are just interested in making as much money as they can at the expense of others.It's up to everyone who has had the misfortune of going to them to raise awareness of their schemes and scams.

Guys I to was a vicim of this Pirate Comapny isnt there anything people can do to shut companies like this down.

Without a doubt it is a complete SCAM of the highest order.

They offer u a cheap price for an engine replacemnt are nice as pie ,offer you a cheap price to collect the car from you,

wich because you are already in the SXXX take and think yes this will get me out of trouble!

Once they have your car,or should I say steal your car they have you over a barrell.

Durring my telephone conversation i was quoted £995 for an engine replacement once they had my car and removed the engine this was bumped up to £2,225 unbeliveable. The way there staff talked to me was unreal I have nevr been treat so badley and the copmany are just Pirates.I refused to pay the complete ammont and stopped the work it cost me £430 to get my car back "can you belive it" this was labour charge for doing what taking the engine out. I had to travel there to pay cash as they would not take any other payment I now realise if they would have taken credit card i caould have complained through the credit card company. When I arrived ,the company is like something out of an old western and i was fully expectant to me beaten up its just that mentality Cowboys !! I have complained through the Trading Stamdards office but hold very little hope,there is very little chance of getting anywhere through the small claims court I am sure they have been taken there many times.

Is ther no way this company can be closed down in these unsettled financial times the last thing I needed was to lose £430 plus scrap my car for zero return

Frustrated and *** off you bet I am !