Otter Vale Motor Services Arvostelua 

Sold me a rip off service plan with a new van without explaining it was operated by a third party not them (look up the reviews of the service company and see how awful they are) and that I was effectively locked into a 3 year contract.
Managed to cancel it eventually after many emails which were mostly ignored.
The money I had paid in to date (nearly £400) has disappeared and again they ignore my polite requests for information on reclaiming this.
The van I bought had no spare wheel and has needed two different belts changing in the first 6 months.
Bad experience - charming and friendly when taking your money then not interested after that. Avoid

AVOID THIS GARAGE

I don't have long enough to tell you my experience with these people!!!!

Following my purchase of My VW Tiguan, having actually paid for it A week before collection( they asked for it before the end of the financial year) which we were happy to do but was always collecting the car Easter Weekend..
From day 1,we had problems
car wouldn't unlock on the first evening saying batteries were low, 2 hours later the keys suddenly worked to allow us to get the car home

I travelled to the garage ( 1.5 hours round trip) to get batteries replaced which was what i thought Problem was resolved!!
i was completely wrong
So many minor things going wrong, i actually lost power and broke down in a very close proximity to the garage, so i luckily got to the garage, when i was told the car wasn't drivable so had to find a way home after deciding that as the car was only 2 years old, it was still under warranty, the garage agreed to deal with VW direct to get it fixed

while i was waiting for my lift home, the manager,Lee was trying to sell me an alternative!!!

in the meantime we knew that Under Section 15. The law says you have a right to reject under 30 days of purchase( collection was 4/4)
we were well inside our 30 days

This is where we started to see the negative aftercare and incompetence of the team,
This was where Hannah, who owns the company who wasn't really aware of what issues i had, decides to tell me that she doesn't abide by the law and that she isn't refunding our £26,795.00!!!!!

in the meantime, my car was repaired by VW in Taunton who were great, and was told a completely different story from OV to what we told them.....

in the mean time it took about a month to try and get a refund but got nowhere with Hannah who finally said to me that my 30 day refund date was lapsed...

So not only lieing about incorrect info of my purchase dates of the vehicle and then raising her voice with abuse via telephone, i decide to terminate her call

in the meantime, she called me again to apologise but finally telling me that she wanted to agree that we are disagreeing and that she wasn't going to refund me any of my money

i did explain i would be leaving a bad review and she seemed fine with that but
it's such a shame that i didn't look at the reviews before i bought a vehicle from these scums

The hardest thing about this ordeal was that we have a taxi company so we were left without a vehicle so had to hire a Taxi replacement ( more money), otherwise we would loose a lot of income

we decided that we should take them to court because we were in full rights to be refunded but the only reason why we didn't was because the court case would have taken some time and the vehicle would have lost value

Stress levels, Tears and constant aggravation since March!!!
i wouldn't want anyone to experience and go through what we have
Take my word for it

Please AVOID Them

Very professional

Absolutely shocking after sales experience from start to finish.

I purchased a 2019 VW T6 BiTDI DSG Transporter from OVMS and within DAYS the vehicle developed steering issues caused by a worn inner tie rod — a critical steering component that should NEVER have been missed.

What makes this even worse is the fact OVMS carried out the MOT themselves with ZERO advisories and had also recently worked on the brakes before sale, meaning there were multiple opportunities to identify this dangerous defect.

So either:

the inspections carried out were completely inadequate,
or serious safety defects were ignored.

Neither explanation is acceptable from a dealer selling vehicles at these prices.

I immediately contacted OVMS and sent clear videos showing the fault. The response? Absolutely nothing. No urgency, no aftersales support, no accountability. Once the money was paid, the customer service completely disappeared.

Because I live around 8 hours away, I had no practical option other than to repair the vehicle myself at my own expense just to make the van safe to drive.

The van is also already showing oil sensor and stop/start system faults only one week into ownership.

The most concerning part of this entire experience is not even the faults themselves — used vehicles can have issues. The real problem is the complete lack of responsibility and aftersales support when serious safety-related defects are raised immediately after purchase.

I genuinely would not trust the MOTs, inspections, or “vehicle checks” carried out here based on my experience.

If you are considering buying from OVMS, I would strongly recommend paying for a FULL independent inspection before handing over any money, regardless of what assurances are given.

We were interested in buying a used van from them and telephoned, speaking with Ewan, to find out more details and to arrange a viewing. Initially he wasn't sure as to whether it had arrived or not but later called back to say it was in their garage and had just had its MOT and service. As there were few photos on their website he said he would go and give it a close examination to enure there was no damage to the body or interior. We were looking for something in excellent condition; particuarly as this van was only three years old.
He came back to us and said it was there and that there were no issues; he added that he would personally make sure that it was thoroughly cleaned as well as checking previous ownership and service history.
We were at this stage impressed and decided to pay the £500 reserve price and arranged to see it on Sunday 10th May. We were travelling quite a long way to hopefully buy this van, however, fifteen minutes before we arrived, which Ewan was aware of, he called to say he thought he should mention that there was some damage to the drivers door so we might not want to come and see it. This seemed very strange as he had assured us there was no damage and left it until we were nearly there before telling us. We wern't too happy but as we had travelled a long way and was almost there we obviously still went. On first inspection, we noticed a rear hub cap was damaged and a sharp part of it was sticking into the tyre. This was so obvious,yet Ewan said he hadn't noticed this - so much for his close inspection. He said it had been thouroughly cleaned but the inside cabin floor was very dirty along with marks on the passenger seat which looked as if they would clean off. Having said it had been valetted, he then decided it hadn't and apologised making the excuse that he wasn't in on the Saturday to check. It was obvious both inside and out that it hadn't been cleaned.
We then saw the damage on the drivers door - damage which had been badly repaired. Ewan said not to worry as they would put that right.
We had checked the value and our figure was was £650 less than theirs so sat down to talk about this. After him going away for just over ten minutes he came back and said he would reduce the price by £295. However, despite what he said earlier about them putting right the damage on the door, he then said, if we wanted them to repair the door, the price would be as advertised and we would not receive the £295 discount, which in reality, although Ewen denied this, meant we would be paying for the repair to the door or at least be giving £295 towards the cost. He also hadn't found out about previous ownership or the vans service history. He also said he would print out details of the service they had carried out; we didn't see this.
I then asked to see the manager and there wasn't one , only a salesman who said he was in charge that day but seemed to have no authority. I asked for the name of the owner; he wrote a first name only on a piece of paper, which on checking today was not the name of the owners. Our confidence in this garage was now rock bottom and we said we were not going to proceed and asked for our £500 to be refunded. Ewan, nor the other 3 staff there, had no idea how to do a credit card refund; this eventually happenned the following day.
We travelled over an hour to reach this garage, based on the assurances we were given by Ewan, all which were found to be incorrect / his promises were not fulfilled. If we had known in advance we would not have gone and wasted a considerable amount of time and incurred unecessary costs, i.e. diesel.
Our experience is that they say all the right things and give positive answers to all your questions but when you actually arrive at the garage you get a very different picture.
We are certainly owed an apology and a refund of the diesel costs incurred, which we realise, is very unlikely to happen!

I have had to take my truck back twice, for a total of 3 months it was there, I've owned it 8 months and during this time it was off the road for a further month. Two different wheels have fallen off of this truck, and twice the windscreen became loose, rattled and the truck cab filled up with water like a swimming pool. One so called repair after the second wheel was not acceptable, no wheel bolts were the same, the wheel alloy bolt holes had not been noticed to have been damaged and so the wheel became loose very qyickly again. This time at my request all new matching bolts and locking wheel nuts were added and they used the spare wheel as they did spot the damage, then put rhe unsafe one in as the spare and told me to buy a new wheel. Not acceptable. Communication was exceptionally poor.
When I asked for a swap to another vehicle it was used as a company opportunity to prosper from another sale. Lee was nothing short of very uncomfortable to deal with.
When I collected my car they had used up all the fuel and the tow hitch switches for my trailers had been smashed so unusable and the caravan one missing.
Avoid like the plague.

Great customer service and a really friendly helpful team. I would like to thank coby in particular for helping me buy my new vehicle

Spent nearly 30k for a used vehicle just over a year ago, had to go back a to have many faults some big some small put right last vist cost 1.2k to have something put right that i should have been told about a year ago.
With hindsight would i have bought there NO
will i go back NO
would i recommend NO

Great company to deal with. Huge stock, very competent salesperson, Coby. Definitely recommend.

I bought a 2018 ford transit the day I drove it away the engine management light came on. It’s obvious the fault code was switched off. A year later and another expensive warranty still no nearer to getting it fixed. Lee Hoskins the sales manager promised me the world to get the issue fixed. He also told me because the service manager Roger was hopeless and had complaints about him he was going to talk to the owners and business manager Hannah about taking over the service department as well his own department. Hanah was fantastic at talking over you and nothing else
Good luck if you buy a second hand car from them. On the six occasions it went in to be diagnosed to find the fault I found over spills of oil around the cap twice and once all down the side of passengers wing with black oil You have been warned as I’m not allowed to answer Mr L Hoskins I’ll extend my review
Thanks Lee for your poor excuse for an apology. Now you have answered my review I will now explain the shadiness of the OVMS business. In one year and two warranty’s later it was never fixed. The second warranty purchase would be fraudulent because you can’t buy a warranty with a technical or mechanical issue Both you and your service manager knowingly knew by purchasing a new warranty would be refused if you mentioned the issue was on going after the first warranty had ran out
There for you lied on the new yearly warranty of £500 because you both mentioned a new turbo would cost thousands so you both said the solution to that is buy a new warranty and it would be a minimal cost to pay. As I was told by you and Roger the service manager you both said leave it a couple of weeks so Auto protect won’t suspect it’s was an on going issue which would have been classed as lying on a document
When I mentioned this to Roger he said let us worry about that as you know I have video evidence of the conversation. You never resolved a thing. You promised a full refund for unnecessarily work carried out we only received half!! You also promised petrol for the inconvenience of travelling back and forth and not getting anywhere Anywhere I mean you still couldn’t fix the problem so there’s that expense we never had refunded.. I don’t want contact with you because all I would get is lid service and it won’t go anywhere. I also don’t need to and phoning me asking to remove my review is not very professional because I have only wrote the truth.

Got a nissan navara from these guys . Customer service was great felt well looked after , they gave me a resnable trade in for my car with no quibbling. On collection there were a couple of issues I didn't relise at the before hand as we'd only had a quick look, but sorted out on the day without any fuss . There was a dent in the bonnet which there sending out someone to sort . So after service seems great. coby was a great to do business with not pushy in anyway but there for any info you wanted. I would highly recommend otter vale to anyone 😀. We're very pleased with the truck .Thanks guys great job 👍

Not had the car a year, 2 replacement engines and still broke down 3 times since!. Forced to have a warranty I didn't want or agree to, couldnt collect the car without it apparently, set up anyway with my bank details! To say sorry i got free 6 months warranty?! luckily it got me enginee replacement number 1. I know why they forced the warranty, they knew they sold us a lemon. Should have just gotten a refund and called it quits this cars been nothing but a nightmare.

I recently bought a '23 reg Ford Ranger from them. I live in the North West and I collected the vehicle on my way to North Tawton where my wife's parents live, so timing was critical. Luke dealt with the deal from the start. Great communication from him, and everything was in place for us to do the paperwork and collect as arranged. The truck is excellent, as described by Luke. He is an asset to the company and all in all, their service was first class. Thanks Guys.rk

I originally contacted the garage online about a particular van on their website, Coby followed up my enquiry and after discussing the vehicle, it became obvious it wasn’t right for me. I needed to put my dog in the back but this van, with a solid bulkhead, meant the back was in darkness. Coby found a second van but on closer inspection, he found reasons why it wouldn’t be any good for me, so he searched again and found the perfect van for me (and the dog!). Throughout this lengthy process, Coby has been excellent, keeping me updated, sending videos and pictures. Finally, the van was ready to collect, exactly as described, previously test driven by Coby so we didn’t feel the need to drive it, and we had the handover, complete with my p/ex, done in under two hours. I’ve driven past Otter Vale on many occasions and always said I would buy a vehicle from them one day! I highly recommend them from my own experience and feel very confident I made a good choice.

Purchased a Renaukt Kangoo 2019 Van from Motor Vale Motor Services on 16 February 2025. The garage is in Devon and we live in Northampton. The Sales Executive - Mr Coby Pipe - dealt with us from start to finish. He knew our needs - sent us a video of the Van - and he arranged the rest. Tte whole transaction ftom start to finish was dealt with by one person only. We only saw the van in a video. The van was serviced, MOT, cleaned and brought to us on the 37th Feb 2025.

Everything went like clockwork. The van is in perfect condition and drives like a dream.
We can certainly recommend them for a stress free experience. We got exactly what we wanted and paid for hassle free.
Why use anyone else?

Hazel Harman

Just picked up our Ford Ranger today and we are super happy! The whole process was seemless and the vehicle is fantastic. We only dealt with Coby who was extremely helpful, polite, respectful and professional throughout. He responded to all our enquiries in a timely manner and did exactly what he said he would do and when. The company fulfilled all our requests on time for which we are very grateful. Coffee was excellent too ! Thank you

Paul Hood was extremely helpful, knowledgeable and professional- thank you Paul

I found the service at otter vale motor services very good. Everyone was extremely helpful and my sales advisor Paul was friendly and knowledgeable. Would definitely purchase another vehicle through them in the future.

Fantastic service by Coby; great tea and took the time to understand my requirements to ensure I picked the right vehicle.

After looking at other garages in the area I would highly recommend Otter Vale for their friendly service and not pushy like some other places.

Went to look at buying a pickup, there was an excellent selection of vehicles in stock, we were greeted by Coby, who then showed us about and helped with selecting the right pickup. He was very helpful and a pleasure to deal with, no pressure and great explanation of all the options. On choosing the vehicle that I wanted, it was checked over and all topped up and ensured to be clean and in mint condition for us to drive away, even put some diesel in!
Altogether a great experience and will certainly be returning in the future. I would highly recommend.