A MOROCCAN gardener has gone to war with a car dealership trying to squeeze an extra €10,000 more than was agreed for a second hand Nissan.
Hafid El Hilaly, 43, has accused the Sevilla-based dealer who sold him the car of trying to ‘take advantage’ of him in the consumer dispute because he ‘isn’t Spanish’.
Instead of simply accepting the return of the car to resolve the conflict, Cars Selections Andalucia (CSA) has instead stonewalled El Hilaly’s lawyer while the financiers have bombarded him with demands for payment, the gardener has said.
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The father-of-two, who has lived in Marbella since 2004, signed an agreement to buy a Nissan Qashqai for €15,280 from CSA in December last year, documents show.
El Hilaly said CSA allowed him to take his new set of wheels home on the same day he signed, promising the remaining paperwork would be sent for signature shortly after.
But the Marrakech-born gardener was left stunned when the following month he received a financing agreement listing a base price of nearly €19,000.
In an even more infuriating twist, El Hilaly soon discovered the loan – issued by Santander Consumer Finance (SCF), which is fully owned by Santander Bank – included a 15% interest rate clause.
This pushed the overall price of the car to an eye-watering €25,500 – more than €10,000 above the €14,990 CSA had advertised the vehicle for online.
“If they think they can take advantage of me because I’m not Spanish, they are sorely mistaken,” El Hilaly told The Olive Press.
“How can they possibly think they could get away with this? This is downright usury,” he added.
El Hilaly insisted he never signed the financing agreement, and instead instructed his lawyer, Miguel Ruiz Jimenez, to take action.
This detail is disputed by CSA, whose spokesperson told The Olive Press that El Hilaly did, in fact, sign the financing agreement on the same day as the purchase contract.
What is not disputed, however, is that Jimenez sent a burofax to CSA stating that El Hilaly was returning the car due to a manifest error in the offer price.
A second burofax was sent to SCF, stating that no contract had been signed for that amount and that El Hilaly was exercising his right of withdrawal under Spanish consumer law.
However, neither company responded to the letters, emails, or calls – with SCF instead allegedly attempting to withdraw money from El Hilaly’s account each month, and bombarding him with phone calls demanding payment.
In a reply to a request for comment, a CSA representative told The Olive Press that El Hilaly was never deceived and the mark-up was ‘absolutely normal’.
They pointed out that it included €1,000 in administrative fees and €2,000 in insurance that ‘literally everybody has to pay’ when accessing financing – plus, of course, €6,000 in interest rates.
The spokesperson added CSA was in talks with SCF to decide on what action to take.
Either way, El Hilaly now finds himself stuck with a car he says he cannot use or return, while continuing to find ways to get to work each day and support his wife and two children, aged eight and 12.
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“It makes my blood boil that a car dealer and a financing institution can operate like this,” he said.
“They are like big bullies trying to take money from an honest worker. But I will not let them.”
“All that remains for us is to take legal action,” Jimenez added.
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