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A CI car is an ex hire car from Jersey/guernsey (Channel Islands) Every year ford send thousands of cars to Jersey and Guernsey to be used as hire cars,as the CI are outside the EU the cars qualify for various tax reliefs when re imported to the UK. As Jersey is only 15 miles by 12 miles and has a speed limit of 30mph,its pretty difficult for the cars to clock up the miles a hire car on the mainland would. Thus when the cars are re imported (after about 1 year),thay are very low miles,some never even get used if they are at the back of the compound at Jersey airport. The cars are then re registered from J xxxxxx plates to Uk plates and sold on in the uk,specialist dealers used to sell them on,but ford dealers now have acess to them,my local Polar ford had about 50 just before christmas. The service book would often show "la motte" as the supplying dealer which would set alarm bells ringing to future buyers ,hence the tendancy to loose the service book. The cars are returned to the mainland before the first service is due. When you looked at the car,you must have asked the question as to why it had such low miles,what did they tell you? Dave

I think you are dreaming if you think you can simply return the car, As for the cars history ,well 5k miles over 18 months does seem a little on the low side. Is the car an ex CI car?? The gap in the service history and "lost" service book would then make some sense. Was the car sourced through Ford Direct? If so it will have the Ford direct warranty ,so you dont need to worry about the late first service. Dave

I hear this so often I’m beginning to think on a future series of ‘Time Team’ instead of lost Roman coins they will be digging up service manuals. :) Then to issue you one with the wrong vin number is just taking the pee. Are there any details on the v5 of the previous owner? Could you give them a call and ask about the car, including ‘can you remember how many miles the car had done? - remember don’t tell them the mileage ask them. I don’t suppose there’s any clues on the car as to which dealer originally sold it ( i.e. sticker in back window or name on number plate?) ? You could give them a call and see if they serviced it and at what mileage? <_< hth Cyb

Main dealers are often no better then dodgy backstreet garages, full of dodgy sales men and cowboy mechanics, if they've got the money off you, trust me they won't give a monkeys about your paperwork, speaking from my experience anyway, hopefully yours will be sorted without the need for ford customer relations or trading standards, keep us posted on how it goes

Sounds very dodgy to me, although this kind of thing happens alot. Usually the trick is to 'Send you the service book in the post', which you never recieve. unfortunatly i think you have to deal with trading standards and citizens advice, but if ford customer relations are willing to help then don't let it drop till its sorted. Also you said its only done 5,000 miles? take it its a typing error?