Reg Vardy has become embroiled in a legal dispute with a disgruntled customer who acquired the reg-vardy.com domain name in order to air his grievances.

The case, which dates back to the summer, concerned a Northumberland customer who registered reg-vardy.com to highlight complaints against the company.

The website could still be accessed via www.reg-vardy.com until last week, despite successful legal action taken by the dealer group, when it was finally withdrawn.

The courts ruled that the customer had no legitimate interest in the domain name, and that it had been registered and used in bad faith.

However, AM understands the site continues to operate under the www.time4talk.co.uk/regvardy.htm address, side-stepping the original ruling.

A Reg Vardy spokesman said the case highlighted a major drawback for business of the internet explosion - anyone with a grievance could set up a website to vent their anger and create negative publicity.

"The customer had an issue with one of our cars. We went through our normal procedures, but he took it a bit further," he said.