Incompetent garage couldn't fix my car

Around November/December time last year my car heater stopped working and as my father was a mechanic, I asked him to have a quick look to see if he could see what was wrong.  He suggested it was my cylinder head gasket that needed to be replaced.  Acting on his advice I took the car to the garage that I bought it from and after a check over, they decided that it was not in fact the cylinder head gasket but rather my thermostat that needed to be replaced.  The bill for this was £60 which at the time I thought was fine.

After a short period of time though my heater stopped again.  I took car back to garage and asked them to take another look at cylinder head gasket.  Once again they couldn't find a problem and told me that the cylinder head gasket wasn't the problem.

In February my car was due MOT.  I asked them once again to check my cylinder head gasket because I knew this to be an expensive job and I felt that if car was going to fail the MOT and cost a lot to fix, I would be as well getting new car.  They checked the cylinder head again when it went in for the MOT and I was told by the mechanic that there was absolutely no problem with it, the car was fine apparently.

A week after the MOT the heater stopped working...

The MOT cost £475 as some other work needing doing in order to get it through.  Well fair enough I thought and paid up.  I had my car back for less than a week after the MOT and then the heater stopped working!  So back to the garage with the car so they could hopefully "find the problem!"  When I went back to collect my car I was told that they had discovered the cylinder head gasket actually needed replacing after all and it was the reason the heater stopped working!

Fuming? - just ever so slightly I can tell you...

I feel this garage has tried to squeeze more and more money every week from me how do I officially complain about them and what are likely outcomes?

By: Jon Anderson