Bloody car dealers!

[grasmere59]

I'm on holiday this week and my O/H is in the market for another car namely a Freelander 2,we saw this one this morning http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/ ... ?logcode=p, so I ring the dealer at 10.30am and ask if it still available,just let me check he says and comes back and says yes it's still available and did we want to make an appointment to look at it,we arranged to see it at 12.30 so we jump in the pug and off we go (approx 60 miles),we just turn into the trading estate where the dealer is and my mob goes,she answers and the dealer says "sorry but the car has just sold" ,she hangs up the phone very upset so I ring them back and ask what the hells going on as we have just travelled 60 miles to see it and we had an appointment,"sorry sir someone has just put down a deposit on it",so I ask who's going to pay for my wasted time and fuel for the 120 mile round trip seeing as you gave me the 12.30 slot to look at it,"sorry we can't do anything about that".I wanted to go into the showroom and throttle someone but she held me back, so we just turned round and went home.Dealers are all a bunch of shysters !

[Welly]

How sh*t is that? they should have honoured your appointment and told the other party that they could see the car at a later time if you didn't want it. That's what decent customer service is, however who gives a sh*t about treating customers well nowadays

Me and Mrs_Welly got treated badly by a dealer in 1994 bought a lemon of a car with no warranty. We vowed NEVER to go near the place again and told all our friends/colleagues the same. The dealer is still trading today, not that I expected we could single-handedly bring them to their knees.

Buying cars is a bit of a game, you either seem to get someone really nice who works with you to buy the car or some twisting con artist trying to relieve you of lots of money with empty promises and such.

See those dealers who offer that you can return the car if not satisfied? well you try and return the car to them they WILL NOT have it and a virtual wall goes up. You may as well try handing them a bowl of streaming dog turd.

Enjoy your breakfast.

[benczuk]

(approx 60 miles)

Tis amazing what you can get from one link.. I'm guessing you have or had a nice Elddis Caravan?

Sorry, bored.

[Welly]

(approx 60 miles)

Tis amazing what you can get from one link.. I'm guessing you have or had a nice Elddis Caravan?

Sorry, bored.

How very dare you, snooping around like that

Anyway, what's the deal with the boarded-up house at the end of the road? looks a big place, care home/guest house maybe?

[trufflehunt]

I'm on holiday this week and my O/H is in the market for another car namely a Freelander 2,we saw this one this morning http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/ ... ?logcode=p, so I ring the dealer at 10.30am and ask if it still available,just let me check he says and comes back and says yes it's still available and did we want to make an appointment to look at it,we arranged to see it at 12.30 so we jump in the pug and off we go (approx 60 miles),we just turn into the trading estate where the dealer is and my mob goes,she answers and the dealer says "sorry but the car has just sold" ,she hangs up the phone very upset so I ring them back and ask what the hells going on as we have just travelled 60 miles to see it and we had an appointment,"sorry sir someone has just put down a deposit on it",so I ask who's going to pay for my wasted time and fuel for the 120 mile round trip seeing as you gave me the 12.30 slot to look at it,"sorry we can't do anything about that".I wanted to go into the showroom and throttle someone but she held me back, so we just turned round and went home.Dealers are all a bunch of shysters !

Why get upset over a large hunk of expensive metal you don't own. And besides, it's not as if they are some kind of rarity.
A significant chunk of a dealer's life, or indeed anyone who has sold a car or two... is people who phone up, absolutely hot for it..
"I'll be there... gettin' in the car right now..", and that's the last you hear from them.

Cash is king for second-hand motors.

[Welly]

A significant chunk of a dealer's life, or indeed anyone who has sold a car or two... is people who phone up, absolutely hot for it..
"I'll be there... gettin' in the car right now..", and that's the last you hear from them.

Cash is king for second-hand motors.

I hadn't thought of that to be fair. Dealers probably dislike us from the word go.

I put a £500 deposit on my Volvo 'unseen' to secure it, glad I did now as I wasn't disappointed when I got there.

[Captain Jack]

Car dealers fall in the same category as estate agents in my eyes. The first 406 I bought from a dealer was, let's face it, a lemon. Apparently RAC checked but the place was later closed down because they weren't checked by RAC at all. The needle lift sensor was knackered from the start...

The second car - Honda Accord diesel - was even worse. Slipping clutch (thankfully replaced FOC), clicking clutch pedal (never fixed), smelly cabin (replaced by main stealer under manufacturer's warranty but still smelt and they snapped of a small pipe on the radiator spewing coolant all over the engine bay), and the failed turbo, which ultimately wrote it off.

The third car - 406 HDI exec - actually the dealer was pretty good. The clutch pedal sank now and again (never fixed) and the windscreen wash tube came off inside the engine, spewing screenwash all over the engine bay. But other than that, no issues.

The current 407 I bought privately. A very nice guy and genuine. The car was in great condition - with the exception of the failed heater flap

Moral of the story, second hand cars will always come with problems, whether bought from a stealer or privately. You get a little more come back from a dealer but... not that much! A Russian roulette...

[Rolebama]

Some years ago I went with a friend to a dealers to look at a car. The guy we spoke to was quite happy for me to jack it up and have a good poke and prod at it, and even offered to put it up on a ramp for me to see. Anyway, about three weeks after he bought it, the HRW switch broke, so my friend phoned the dealer who told him to just buy one and fit it and he would reimburse. It cost £38 at the time, and after I had fitted it, we took the receipt back to the dealer. He not only reimbursed, but gave my friend £10 to cover the cost of fuel. We both began to recommend the dealer to others, and he made at least twenty sales over the intervening years, before he retired.
I don't understand why dealers behave so badly sometimes.

[Captain Jack]

That's a nice story Rolebama - I wish more were like this.

[Welly]

The place I bought my 406 from was a kind of mini 'Car Supermarket' and they couldn't do enough for you, I was presented with a bunch of flowers when I collected the car

They would happily have the car back in and fix anything you weren't happy with and give you a loan car too. I bought two cars from them.

They went bust 2 years later, couldn't make it pay. The owner got rid of the place and all the staff and now works from home selling hand-picked cars. I think the previous business just got out of control and, dare I say, they were a bit soft with the customers.

[steve_earwig]

a Freelander 2

Lucky escape if you ask me

[DaiRees]

I put a £500 deposit on my Volvo 'unseen' to secure it, glad I did now as I wasn't disappointed when I got there.

I did that with my (John's) 406. Is was 6 mths old with only 3500 miles and pretty much exactly what I was looking for it was always going to be fine, but it's still a counter-intuitive thing to do.


The stupidest dealer story I was involved in involved our very own Neil Davies. I took him car hunting after his AXGT was written off in a car park while we were in work one day (the uninsured tosser left the road, crossed the pavement into the car park and smashed into Neil's AX, pushing it into my Nova, writing off the AX and putting a tiny scratch on my wheel arch ).

Anyway, I digress! He fancied a diesel Peugeot 405 at one of those, then new, car supermarket type places, so we took this thing for a test drive and it cut out. It restarted but this happened twice more on the test drive. By the time we got back to the garage it wouldn't run at all so we freewheeled it down the hill and walked it in on the starter. Having glossed over this fairly major issue, the salesidiot then suggested that we go to the office to do the paperwork!! Neil politely informed him that he wouldn't be purchasing said vehicle at which point he got really stroppy and accused us of "wasting his f*cking time", what a prick!

Never went there again!

[Bailes1992]

I had this argument with the other half the other day.
Car dealerships don't do 'dodgey cars'. They don't go out specifically looking for dodgey cars. It's just pure luck for them.

I was chatting to my other halfs next door neighbors and they mentioned a dealer and how they would never buy a car from them again after 12 months of them owning it the crank pulley went (it had been rattling for ages prior) and took the engine out and now after 3 years of owning it the clutch has started slipping. They pretty much blame both wear and tare items failing on the dealer as if the dealer went out and purchased the car knowing full well that these two problems would arise.

How dealers manage their aftercare is the biggest issue. I was a bit annoyed with the dealer I purchased my car from. About two weeks after I had the car the temperature gauge started playing up and the car kept going into limp mode. They kept sending the car to Halfords Autocentres to get the problem fixed. 4 times the car went there and 4 times they shrugged their shoulders and said they didn't know what was wrong. In the end I had to have a bit of a go at the dealer to send it into Ford to be sorted. But once Ford identified the problem (which actually was a wrong diagnosis) the dealer stumped up the cash (£1200) to fix the car with no quibbles!

[grasmere59]

(approx 60 miles)

Tis amazing what you can get from one link.. I'm guessing you have or had a nice Elddis Caravan?

Sorry, bored.

Still got the Caravan,which is usually lugged about with the 406.

[grasmere59]

a Freelander 2

Lucky escape if you ask me

She wants a 4x4 and my mate is a Land Rover specialist and he says of all the L/R's he has to work on the Freelander 2 is by far and away the most reliable that carries the green oval.