breach of warranty

breach of warranty n. determination that a statement as to title of property, including real property or any goods, is proved to be untrue, whether intended as a falsehood or not. It can also apply to an assurance of quality of a product or item sold. The part making the warranty is liable to the party to whom the guarantee was made. In modern law the warranty need not be expressed in so many words, but may be implied from the circumstances or surrounding language at the time of sale. (See: warranty)

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Question

Country: United States of America State: Michigan Probably contract law; I live in Michigan; I ordered a used transition from a company in TX. This part is used; I know it's a crap shoot as to how good it is. They gave a 90 day warranty on the part. NOT labor However! AFTER my mechanic installed this thing, it does NOT work. Will not shift into second or over drive and a hold light stays flashing. At my request, and with me in the room, I had him call TWO other transition specialists. Just to see if there is any chance HE could have missed something. (He is a general fix all mechanic, not a specialist.) BOTH seem to agree it's an internal sensor inside this transition. Pro Transition said “It's NO GOOD.” I was told BEFORE I bought this thing that it” has been tested.” It never should have passed. Now, I will have to pay the mechanic to put in, and then remove this worthless part. I'll of course have to pay him again when a replacement comes. There will be several days between him getting the bad part out and a new one arriving. He needs to put the axel back on to get my car out of his way. MORE LABOR! The company is basically telling me that's too bad. ALL they will do is send me a replacement part. (Which now I don't want. If they sent me one bad one, why wouldn't they do it again?) I SIGNED a contract with them about this part only warranty. AND it states something about not being able to go directly through my credit card to reverse the charges. (Yes, red flags SHOULD have gone up over that one. My red flagpole gets clogged sometimes.) My legal question here is this. I read that “implied warranty of merchantability” states that you are suppose to get a part that does what it is sold to do. Since I NEVER had a working part. If it worked for five minutes then gave out that would be that. But it was shipped badly! Wouldn't that precede and therefore void the part only, no labor, no refund end of that contract I signed? I mean, wouldn't that be a breach of contract on the seller’s part? I don't suppose there is any way to make them eat the labor. Probably not worth hiring a lawyer over 250 bucks. But I DO want a full refund for their part AND shipping. I'll get a GOOD part elsewhere! Finally, this company (who treats their customers like crap by the way) insists they want this part back to test for them self. (As they claim they already did!) They have already implied my mechanic is incompetent. Not so! IF they try and claim HE damaged this part, what can I do??? Should I pay to have it tested before I let them touch it? Sort of a CYA thing here?

Answer

Based on what you say here, you could probably file suit against them (or at least threaten to do so) in small claims court or in regular court; filing in small claims court is easier and requires no attorney...you could try to collect all of the costs and damages that you suffered due to their behavior... You may also report them to your state attorney general's office.