I was hitherto a massive Honda fan, having had at least a dozen Honda cars and at least 6 Honda Izy lawn mowers for my garden business. My faith in the Company has been shattered by their treatment of my first ever claim under the warranty for my latest mower purchase. I purchased a Honda Izy HRG 416 PK from Just Honda (who are not part of Honda Group) online on 15/11/2022. The mower was received promptly and as it was Winter I left it in its box in my garage until 21/02/2023. At this point I unpacked the machine, added the engine oil and on seeing the fuel tank was empty I added unleaded petrol. Despite many attempts, the machine would not start. I had registered the purchase so was covered by the warranty, or so I thought!When I contacted Customer Support I was informed the Warranty would not cover me if I have left fuel in the machine over the Winter. I pointed out that I had not even taken the machine out of its box until the 21 Feb and that no fuel was put in the machine until that day. They replied that the mower will have had fuel in prior to dispatch and I should have drained it on delivery. Remember, there was no fuel in the tank when I took the mower out of the box!!! I assumed I had missed an instruction warning me that I needed to do something as soon as the parcel arrived. Fortunately I still had all the packaging and all the literature that came with the mower so I inspected it to see if I had missed an instruction. There was no warning on the box and the paperwork consisted of a registration card, a UK Declaration of Conformity, a card saying there is no oil in the engine, an Owners Manual and a carbon copy of the Pre-delivery inspection sheet. The only document that mentioned draining the fuel was the carbon copy of the Pre-delivery inspection sheet. However, every box on this form had been ticked, suggesting all necessary actions had been performed prior to delivery. This is what I would have expected as I would imagine it is forbidden to delivery a machine with petrol in it! I emailed a copy of this form to Customer Services and when I saw their reply offered an apology I assumed they agreed with me. However, their nonsensical (to me) full reply read as follows:- "We understand the frustrations and can only apologise for the inconvenience. With regards to the sheet, you will see that the old fuel has been drained which is from the factory and we then replace the fuel with unleaded petrol, which we do drain off as best as possible for transport but there is still going to be remnants in the tank and in the carb we do not continue to test the machine after it has been drained."This seemed absolutely ludicrous to me. How could I be expected to know there might be remnants of fuel in the carb and how was I supposed to drain it? Especially if there was nothing in the paperwork to say this!I took the mower to my local authorised Honda dealer. They agreed with me and said they would argue my case with Honda. However, they warned me that Honda will try any way to get out of paying under a warranty. Sure enough, Honda refused to honour the warranty and I have had to pay £27 for the repair! When I went to pick the mower up on 16/03/23 I spoke to the actual mechanic. I told him the full story as above and he agreed that I should put in a complaint. He said “they are treating you as though you are a mechanic and not a customer”. He added that if I had made any attempt to touch the carb I would have immediately invalidated the warranty. I then made a complaint to Just Honda, in the mistaken belief they were part of the Honda Group. They have informed me that my experience is quite typical. They frequently have genuine claims turned down by Honda on technicalities, which quite rightly upsets customers, who in turn, blame Just Honda rather then Honda itself. Just Honda have agreed to take my complaint up with Honda but they cannot give me any great hope of success. I certainly won't be buying another Honda lawn mower and if I was in the market for a new car with warranty I'm not sure I would trust Honda. BUYER BEWARE!
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