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-   -   Bangalore Car owners/ Enthusiasts - Beware of Selvams Car Garage (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/vintage-cars-classics-india/82341-bangalore-car-owners-enthusiasts-beware-selvams-car-garage.html)

With this thread i wish to create an awareness amongst T-BHP'ians to stay away from a certain restorer in Namma Bengaluru

Workshop Name = Selvams Car Garage
Location = North Bangalore
Owner = Selvam

I got to know of this place through a BHP'ian and a friend, instinctively what i do is give him one car for restoration. The car anyways will get restored and come back to me. But the question here is ill practices involved.

He takes huge advances from people on the pretext of getting them any kind of cars, and months together keeps cooking stories, and end of the day the unsuspectful buyer forgets the money in this ordeal.:Frustrati

Also a new antic of his has surfaced recently, I used to leave my Bug and my Bus with him on the pretext of utilising his parking area. He used to claim my cars as his and has received few advances towards selling people similar cars.

At one point he's even tried to sell my Beetle to somebody. Lucky me.

I have kept my distance with this guy and have been carefull, but unsuspectful buyers needs to be aware.

KINDLY STAY AWAY FROM THIS PLACE

Note: Mods, kindly merge with relevent threads, as i could not find one. Also the heading can be BEWARE OF THIS WORKSHOP IN BANGALORE

Pavan,

Name of the place can sound very generic. Can you post exact location of this place. Hope this is Not the regular place you go to...

Santosh

Such things are common these days with many workshops. All mechanics are becoming car dealers and use such methods to make easy money.:Frustrati

Pavan:

Is this the same mechanic I tried to meet about a month ago (near the lake) where a MM tourer was parked and you also mentioned about him yesterday?

Located near the lake bed at Vidyaranyapura,

Its better to be informed,than falling a prey.

One of my friend and a T-BHP'ian doesnt understand, A simple and a good running MM540 , his jeep is lying in his workshop since last 2 years, Only for painting and powersteering job, Till date he's just playing around with that jeep. We cant forget the huge amounts of money he's been feeding that guy, Since Time is Money.

The same guy, My Morris is there with him since 8 months, last leg of work pending, due to some incidents in his life, i've given him a breather. But will get it out soon.

I only want to convey that, I have been too careful with him, inspite of that, he's gone around propogating my cars as His and even tried to sell it at a premium.:deadhorse

Pavan, you may want to request mods to put the garage name in the title of the thread. That way, if anyone googles for this garage, this thread will show up.

Pavan,

By any chance, do you stay near the Vidyaranyapura Telephone Exchange ?

Maybe we should meet up and go and see this Selvam guy one of these days.

I stay in Bloomfield Garden which is at the other end of Vidyaranyapura Main Road.

Cheers

KD

Pavan Ji,

I really repect your concerns and enthusiasm and thank you so very much for spreading this awareness. One thing i would like to say is, its not fair on your part to make it public this way. Whatever the person in concern might have done doesn't give us the right to make things public. And more so he has a Garage and many might stop going to him and as a result he would be completely out of business. Is that fair on our part that he stops getting work and his whole family is affected with it ? I am sure he has a family to feed and take care of. And it is not right on your part that something like that happens.
There are lots of kinds of people in this world and this line of work but it is not our responsibility to spread things which might be true in the name of "AWARENESS" .

I am even more surprised by the responses that our dear members are giving. Its really shameful.

Please do give a thought to what i said.

Regards

Indrojit Sircar

seriously indro?
can you vouch for him and his honesty? if not then let those who have been burned warn others. its still up to the others whether they want to use his services despite the warning. he has a family and his victims don't? who is working hard for money here? him?
if hes a crook then he ought not just to be out of business but in jail, cheating IS after all a criminal offence, these guys take advantage of the tedious judicial system and cheat people out of amounts that aren't worth the time and effort required to recover, but trust me,being cheated hurts more than being beaten up!
you of all people know how much effort it takes to do a car, both for the owner as well as the restorer,then these guys come up and create bad blood for everyone,
i know an old gentleman in delhi, who has three very valuable pre war British sports cars rotting away because he was cheated once in a similar fashion, and doesn't trust anyone with his cars any more, they are complete cars, which are slowly going into the ground!
that aside, when are you in delhi over a weekend?

Hi
There are some things which you say i agree on and some i don't.
You are right i cannot Vouch for him since i don't know the person at all. Yes we should definitely help and warn others but at the same time not make it public and humiliate the person.

There was a similar incident of a car dealer going into someone's premises and clicking pics of a car by paying the security guards.After that he floated those pics and said that the car is for sale and took advances against the car.The pics traveled back to the owner of the car by a person who didn't know that the person whom he was showing the pics to was the owner of the particular car and also had possession of the car. After much inquiry the culprit was found and was questioned as to why he did this. He said- " Sir what to do ? I am in dire need for the money and i am not being able to make any deals. I basically took advances and used the money for the personal expense i needed it for and i was going to return the money as soon as i had to pay back. Till then i would have managed somehow. " A year or so back Bhpian had posted pics of a car available for sale and since i was in contact with him off the forum, he told me that it was a dealer who had offered this car for sale and i told him about the incident i mention above and warned him. Today the bhpian owns the same car. Now there are different people having different opinions and have had different experience with this dealer, but i feel that neither me or anyone should humiliate and bring him to shame on a public forum.

There is a certain person who has a workshop and also does work on old cars. There is this Gentleman who had this particular car from when it was new. He used to take it to this workshop for all the work and repairs. His car after every 20,000 kms used to develop a peculiar problem of loosing power and becoming sluggish. He used to be advised to rebuild his engine and the problem would be sorted out. The person had little or no knowledge of cars and used to do as advised by the workshop owner, Until one day when he decides to try out a new workshop and the car had done about 1,10,000kms by then and on inspecting the engine after it was opened, it was discovered that the engine had never been rebuilt in its life. :Shockked: Can you imagine the amount of money the previous workshop owner cheated him off over the years ? This person is also know to swap parts from his clients cars and either swap them with the parts from his own cars or to take a good part out and get a defected one installed in it. Today the person is very well known and has a good reputation that has been built up on these basis.

On the other hand there is a very prominent Bhpian who has told me with great confidence that there is a certain respected member on this forum to whom he had paid money for some spares and its been more than 2 years today that he he hasn't received the parts neither has he received the money back that he had given him. This person had also mentioned that there is another very well know person on this forum who doesn't believe in paying for parts they have purchased from others. Aren't these people also cheats then ? I haven't taken any names of either the person telling me about this and also the other two people in concern.

I am sure that you and many others may have had or know of similar experiences. But what is the point in Shaming people in public ? This would only lead to more controversies and conflicts. I am sure there are loads of people whom we can say are cheats for one or the other reason.
I believe in one simple funda - " The law of Cause and Effect".

I will give you a call if that is alright with you ? :)

Note from the Team-BHP Support Team : Smiley usage restricted to two per post. Please refrain from using excessive smileys.

Guys....this is getting way off topic.

If you have personally had a bad experience with anyone then you have ll the rights to talk about it and warn others.

But if you have heard that someone on the foum has harmed someone else you have NO right to talk about it. It is solely the agrieved party who has the righ to do so.

Look at it this way, you got to dinner at a certain resturnat and the food is bad. Next week someone asks you about how the food at the resturant was. Wouls you not indicate it was bad or would you say its great go and eat there.
By putting up this thread Pavan is only doing a service to fellow car enthuseasts.

No offenses to anyone.

Indro, you are right in one way, but will you

1) Risk giving your car to his shop and get fleeced for Rs 1 lac when later after getting your car back will see only 20K worth work is done:Frustrati Same thing happened with my Morris convertible, i am again re-doing things at a different workshop.

2) What if your car is sold to someone else without your knowledge and this guy tries to wipe himself off all the mess created, My Bug was almost sold to one gentleman. He resisted since he knew my Beetle (Thanks to T-BHP )

3) My friend from Chennai had paid him 10K as an advance to buy a car, Nor did he find any car for him, but he started to avoid his calls too, it took 15 months for me to take out that money from him.

All said and done. He must mend his ways, else naturally he wont survive by cheating, nor do i like fellow enthusiast get cheated by such conmen.

Request Mods to close this thread.

we are a hobby group, and as wasif says, if someone has had a bad experience personally, it is his right to warn others.
the point is not public humiliation or malice towards anyone, but to safeguard ourselves as a group and to weed out those who prey on us.
do you know some years ago i was offered a car for sale which was being restored in your workshop? the pics i was shown also had your Studebaker in them! ask Anamit. its things like this which have to be nipped in the bud.
and as hobbyists we should also take steps to discourage unscrupulous persons, i too have been burned once,
i never pay an advance, i ask the dealer to pay a nominal advance on my behalf, and come back with an agreement to sell on a stamp paper from the car owner, i pay his costs plus the commission on the car if the sale goes through.
most of the time these dealers disappear, they don't want to forge documents such as stamp papers and signatures because the penal risk is too high, which is just as well, but this is how i bought the Lagonda.

call me if here, im free on saturday till late afternoon , this sunday is busy with a family do.

See again i do agree with you and not also.
As you said if i went out for dinner somewhere and the food was bad and someone asked me about the food next week i would surely tell him its not good and should try and avoid it. On the other hand another good friend of yours eat in the same restaurant a night before you ask him for his opinion and he says the food was good. Now its defiantly your choice if you would go or not. Being your friends we can help you see other perspective of things but not take decisions on your behalf. I would definitely not come on team bhp and start a thread saying avoid this restaurant and do things like that for sure. There is a way of making people aware of things. At the different rallys or club meets one can talk about it and make people aware of it. Worst case scenario one could start a thread with the permission of the mods in the Team Bhp Directory since it is more related to that section but have have the thread closed. There is no point of various other members on this forum who don't know that person make judgments about him. This is one way to go about it.

No offense meant to you as well or anyone.

See what i would do is ask you or someone else opinion about a few people in the Bangalore circles since this person is from their. I would then decide sir whether or not give my car to him. The other thing i would also do is give him a car that requires the least amount of restoration to be done something like what shyam's (Stanher) new Herald required and then give him a bigger project after i see the kindof work done on the car. Or suppose i don't have a car that requires that kindof work and i have only one car that needs a complete grounds up restoration, i would see the work done on other cars restored by the same person. I would also find a way to contact the owner and ask him about his experience regarding the same.
And i would pay a certain sum of money as advance and then keep paying him as the work progresses. I think this is a better way of doing it rather than paying him a chunk in advance and then realizing that the person hasn't done as much work. If i am being foolish by giving him Rs.X at the start of the project and then expect him to give me work worth Rs. X. For my foolish deeds i cannot blame anyone except myself.
If you also remember sometime ago in the Vintage section there was a restorer/ collectors workshop been photographed and the pics were posted and many remarks were made about how the person takes the car to restore and never returns them and at that same point of time another team bhp member had just got a complete restoration done from the same workshop. Remember ? What happened to all the things people had to say about this person ? Lots of negative comments were passed about how he has cheated many people over the years. Didn't peoples opinions and views change once they saw the restored car ?

See here again if i gave my car to anyone else to restore i would atleast go once a week and check on the progress and i am sure even you would but then i presume if you pay him for keeping your cars parked in his place i am sure he wouldn't to that and if you are careful in the way you deal with him.

At least you managed to retrieve the money on behalf of your friend. There have been instances where i have also lost money in a similar way and haven't got it back but you refer to Awini's post where he talks of a similar thing happenin g to him. Its common but we need to be careful ourselves in the way we handle it. This also doesn't mean that the other person is not at fault at all or he should not be told anything or no action should be taken against him.

I completely agree with you on this sir.


Agreed its necessary to do so but there are other ways of doing it also. As i mentioned above in this post that instead of making such a scene out of it, why not put it in the team bhp directory with the permission of the mods team. Even if someone then google's the workshop, it will show up and also can we have just the details and the reasons with the location. Ideally i would think its better to do it at meets and rallys rather than on the web.


Yes i do know of this. Not from one person but many people have told me about this.

See isn't this a better of way of doing it ? Instead of paying advances to someone? Another way of doing it is to fix the commission of the dealer and the cost of the car with him and then you tell him to take you to see the car and you will pay the owner directly and will pay him his commission separately which you have fixed from before. This is one of keeping it clean also.


The 13th seems to be a better day. Will co-ordinate with you in advance.

Ican't understand why this debate has started now as this thread has been herefor quiet a while, and this imples its OK with teh moderators so lets leave it athat.

In any situation the policy of "buyer beware" applies andit should here too.

People are free to get their cars restored at he local barber shop or at the best workshop in the world as people r efree to share ther opinion on whih is dubious workshop or not.

So if you agree with Pavan that "he must mend his ways" then why are you going on and on on this topic. Obviously you too agree teh chap needs to re think his business model.

However much its debated what will be he outcome ??? So why wate time o this debate