A major UK car dealership has backed down after threatening to sue a Dundee garage for £50,000 in a row over alleged infringement of copyright.
We Buy Any Car raised the action against Glencross Motors of Clepington Road for displaying a forecourt sign with the message “wheel buy any car”.
The lettering was in black instead of the national company’s blue and green but the Glencross sign also had a row of five vehicles similar to the We Buy Any Car logo.
In the Dundee garage’s logo the cars were blue, green, red, yellow and purple whereas We Buy Any Car’s are purple, red, blue, pink and yellow.
Agents for We Buy Any Car, a major used car dealer with 125 branches throughout the UK and an annual turnover of £290 million, lodged a writ at Dundee Sheriff Court seeking £50,000 against Glencross, owned by Charles Sandeman.
The money was for loss and damages as the national company believed their business reputation was liable to suffer.
The Manchester company operates through a website, with people invited to give details of their cars for a valuation.
The company then makes an offer in principle less a transaction fee, and if the customer is happy they take their car to the nearest branch to complete the transaction.
We Buy Any Car’s title, artwork and slogans are legally protected.
Mr Sandeman runs Glencross Motors as a business buying and selling second-hand cars. Last year it had a turnover of £2.5 million.
Last summer a customer of We Buy Any Car noticed a sign in the Dundee garage’s forecourt displaying what looked like the national company’s logo and the message “wheel buy any car”.
“The defender has infringed the pursuer’s copyright by, without the pursuer’s consent, copying the whole and/or a substantial part of the logo and/or authorising the same,” the writ continued.
We Buy Any Car’s trademark attorneys gave a deadline of two weeks for the offending sign to be removed by Glencross. Further letters were sent to no avail.
We Buy Any Car raised the action, believing the defender was “likely to deceive the general public into believing that they are dealing with the pursuer or a dealer authorised by or connected with the pursuer”.
Mr Sandeman has now removed the sign, and his solicitor Kris Gilmartin said: “He has been shocked by the heavy-handed tactics used by We Buy Any Car. Realistically, no-one would have mistaken Glencross Motors with their company.”
A spokeswoman for We Buy Any Car said: “Our brand represents a standard of service that our customers can rely on. We would be doing them a huge disservice, and opening them up to a risk of fraud, if we allowed other companies to assume our identity for their own gain.
“We wish to resolve the matter as quickly as possible. After trying to do so out of court for more than a year, we are now simply looking to recover our costs.”