ú30 or ú90+. and a Latte or just a wander around.

[cris_408518]

Talking Car dealers and to some extent caravan dealers.

If you buy a new car are you really interested in the show rooms Italian tile floor, tinted one way windows and a choice of latte or expresso and the cheasy sales people in Armani suits.

Personally I make my choice before I enter a show room that I don't care if its a shed and no dumb sales person sells me anything I dont want. All I'm interested in is getting WHAT I WANT to buy and knocking the dealer down to a price so low they hate me.

And I dont want to pay £60+ an hour over the odds for servicng to pay for a poncy fancy show room and waiting area with stereo sat tv and the staffs designer labels.

Any views because I think the UK motor trade has got it all wrong. A nice "big shed" in the middle of French countryside with mechanics that care doing a good job for reasonable costs is much better in my book.

What do you think?

 

[colin(bridgend)]

Cris they probably work on the assumption of first impressions. Personaly I agree with you 100%. I have recently bought, second hand mind, a Peugeot Motorhome from a main Peugeot car dealer and with a full twelve month warrenty on both the mechanics and caravan part. Prior to buying the vehicle I asked if the servicing etc. had to be undertaken in house to satisfy the warranty. The reply was that any service centre could undertake the work as long as they were VAT registered (don't know how this affects the quality of workmanship mind). I therefore use the garage where I have been taking my previous vehicle for service and so far every thing OK and the warranty is still being honoured. Servicing also a hell of a lot cheaper than main agent work.

 

[Lol1]

I'm not going over to France just to buy a car. You do realise they eat everything over there, don't you, be it live or dead, walking/crawling/flying/slithering. In fact, we could get rid of the tyre mountain just by covering it in garlic and gently frying in olive oil!

I know what you mean Cris about some dealerships, but they aint all like that and you can always vote with your feet. If you do find a good dealership/garage they are worth their weight in gold though.

Over to you Brian (Our resident, semi retired, dealership)

 

[cris_408518]

Wasn't suggesting buying in France but have had to use French garages and Dutch over the years. Have had better service at lower cost with out all the fancy clap trap.

The likes of BMW and Mercedes have cut out all the small dealers and as with the likes of Porsche garages have to be like mini palaces with more and more companies going the same route you can see prices going up and up.

My feet do a lot of voting !!!

And you may like the Frech's diet but they sure no how to complain and so do I.

 

[BrianStAlbans]

Lol, dont tell my boss Im semi retired . I actually agree with cris about the luxury showrooms but please dont blame the dealers. The manufacturers set the standard of a showroom and if the dealer does not comply they loose a percentage of the margin given by the manufacturer. As for the sales staff, I've said on here before car sales has changed totally since the Accountants started running the show. Gone are the days when the guy in charge had worked his way up from the bottom . Now all they see are figures and the staff simply collect the imformation for the back room guys to work out the figures,very impersonal. Brian.

 

[MONKEY1]

I don't mind paying for good service, but what I can't stand is a dealer that lies to you either by telling that additional work needs doing when clearly it doesn't or by charging for work that clearly hasn't been done.

What does make me laugh is I could take a

 

[cris_408518]

Yeah tell me about it Monkey, merc truck dealers can service V Class or Viano if you talk nice to them ;-) ;-) ;-)

My brother fixed a part on a ford a few weeks back, his mates son who is fully trained fitter didn't know that you didn't have to replace the whole assembly of what ever the part was. Saved