Luxury car dealer booked for duping bizman of ₹1.8 lakh

The police said they received a complaint against the company, AMP Motors Pvt Ltd, Gurugram, in March from 42-year-old businessman Devender Singh.

The police have registered a case of fraud against a luxury car dealer in the city after a resident of DLF Phase-3 lodged a complaint that he was duped of ₹1.88 lakh, which he had allegedly paid in November last year for an extended warranty on his sports car.

The police have registered a case of fraud against a luxury car dealer in the city after a resident of DLF Phase-3 lodged a complaint that he was duped of ₹1.88 lakh, which he had allegedly paid in November last year for an extended warranty on his sports car. (HT File)

The police said they received a complaint against the company, AMP Motors Pvt Ltd, Gurugram, in March from 42-year-old businessman Devender Singh. After conducting preliminary investigation, the police found that the company, which deals in Jaguar and Land Rover cars, had called the complainant to pay the amount, and he did, but no service was provided later on.

In his complaint, Singh stated that he had bought a Land Rover Discovery sports car in 2015 and its warranty ended last year. On November 21, he received a call from AMP Motors to get the car’s warranty extended, police said.

“I asked them to send me a proforma invoice and after going through it, I asked them to send me the payment link so that I could pay the amount online from my savings account. All this happened within two days. On November 23, I received an email for the extended warranty and the acknowledgment of ₹1,88,773,” Singh stated in his complaint.

The complainant added that in February this year he faced some problem with the car’s air conditioner and sent it to the workshop for repair.

“I was under the impression that I would not have to pay anything because I had extended my car’s warranty, but I received a message from one of the employees saying that I needed to pay a diagnosis charge of ₹18,000, plus GST,” Singh said.

The company allegedly told Singh that the warranty had not been extended, and he approached the police after the company allegedly stopped responding to his correspondence about the warranty, assistant commissioner of police (DLF) Karan Goyal said.

“We contacted the company and asked them to present their records to know how many extended warranties were issued and to how many people. The company then contacted the victim on March 15 and sent an email stating that the extended warranty offer can be availed within 35th month of the standard warranty period i.e three years from the date of sale, and is only applicable with appropriate service records. They said the warranty extension (for Singh) was rejected by their channel partner because the service records were incomplete,” Goyal said.

The police said the company officials also mentioned in the email that their team had tried to contact the complainant over the phone to inform him about the conditions for extension and that they had arranged for the refund cheque of the payment made to be delivered at his address. However, they could not proceed due to non-confirmation from Singh’s end, the police said.

ACP Goyal said that the company had sent the email was on an incorrect address. The Hindustan Times has a copy of the emails exchanged between AMP Motors and the complainant.

“They had issued the warranty to many users, but hardly anyone availed the service. They came under the scanner after the complainant refused to accept their apology and handed over all the evidence to the police,” ACP Goyal said.

An official of the AMP Motors accepted that there was some “confusion” in the matter and that it was “serious”, but had been blown out of proportion. “We have apologised to him (Singh) for the error at our end. We have given him free extended warranty for three years and his refund cheque is ready. He is our premium customer and we are ready to resolve the issue,” said Sachin Arora, general manager, AMP Motors, Gurugram.

The car manufacturer could not be reached for a comment.