What’s with the “going in the back for ages while muggins sits out front waiting” thing??

It’s the you should have gone to a broker shuffle.

Same thing happened to me today.
I think they are smashing out a valuation of your trade in on webuyanycar. He avoided the subject of the car I told him I wanted, and tried to tell me how I can afford the car he thinks I want.
A proper tool. Looking forward to telling him that he’ll need to beat quotes from his trader buddies at all other local dealerships.

Ha – been through that at the weekend!

I think it’s to waste your time so you get to the point where you think you might as well do a deal because if it takes this long you can’t be arsed to go elsewhere to go through it again.

Delay of Game (from Chapter 6: Dealing With Dealers – The Games Dealers Play)
Salesmen are good at wearing people down. One way they do this is by making you wait forever to receive an offer on your trade-in from their manager. Or several times during negotiations they will go ask their sales manager if they can accept a lower offer. When they leave they are gone for a good 15-20 minutes while you sit wondering what could possibly be taking so long. Meanwhile, your salesman is in the break room B.S.’ing with other co-workers who are playing the same game. They will keep doing this, waiting for you to break down, lose your patience and give in to their price. They wouldn’t do it if didn’t work, but now you know better.

We played the game in reverse by going for a coffee.

And phoning his competitors with a spec and his price.

Strangely another couple of percent came off his best offer

I had an offer from another (local) dealer via CarWow today that was over 10% better. I’m now using this guy for test drive fodder

As above, to wear you down, to make you think they’ve been working hard to come down in price but failed. To be honest we’ve fallen for this once and just “gave up and paid up” (admitedly on a car (Yaris) we wanted and we still have 10 years later trouble free).

When the dealer goes out the back, get up and wander around showroom/forecourt or ideally get in your car and leave, your mobile will ring soon enough.

What they all said, we had some fun with this recently, wife looking for a new car but not looking to buy right away (didn’t tell them that), we were literally just looking but wanted an idea of deals, its amazing what they will do when you keep saying no.

I will never walk in to a dealership again after using Carwow.

I would use that and then still realise yiu can get a slight 2nd hand car for much less. Why would you get a brand new car unless it’s on lease?

Just insist on going with them if they aren’t able to make the deal themselves

I overcame this by taking my young kids with me. Gave them chocolate then let them play in the cars in the showroom. Dealer took money off car when there were chocolate finger prints on the cars and all other customers were getting annoyed…certainly reversed the power on time pressure tactics!

We’d already been to one dealer and got his trade in and new car price (with all his discounts) so had an idea where they’d open. A bit of research to find out what is considered fair – and I had a deal price already in mind. Which for us, as we’re just cashing in a PCP and taking a new one, in the end comes down to monthly payments.

So we sat down with spec list, and I gave her a piece of paper with a price at which we’d deal, any higher and we’d go back to the first dealer to give them last bite, and a second price at which we’d just walk out.

She sat in the back office for ages but as I was drinking her coffee and watching the 6 Nations rather than sweating on a response I didn’t feel unduly stressed about it, every time she came out with a wrong number I just pointed to the paper and went back to the coffee, and in the end got a deal for 12p more than we asked for in the first place. So i suppose technically I caved, but I’m not fretting unduly.

I think it’s a slow cook tactic to make you think they really are trying their best/its alot of work.

Why are you buying a new car pook?! They depreciate in freefall. **** that.

As for WBAC for valuations- if anyone trys that pick up the phone to somewhere else.

I buy privately when I can. Why are you buying new?! Is it a work stipulation?

Bizarre way of doing business – I chose my last car(brand) on the basis that I liked the salesman and he didn’t dick me about like that.
Unlike the Audi and Ford dealers on the same strip.

My favourite is when they walk around your px and touch any marks in the paint. It’s creepy and weird.

It must be the first thing they learn in car sales school, right after how to buy an ill fitting shiny grey suit

It’s all covered above. Last time I had the ” I need to check with my manager”/ long wait bull poo I told them if they couldn’t make a decision they should bring me the answer or person who could quickly or I’d be off.

The trick is to be prepared to walk out and with so many online options that’s easier than ever.

For me I’m changing car at the minute and cars in general are so good these days that I’ve not picked a specific car just a set of key criteria. Whether we end up with a vw, a ford, a Vauxhall or a BMW or whatever is not critical to me so I’m chasing a well balanced deal. Bad salesman / tactics = walk away

For balabce though, There are still some human sales people out there thank goodness. I’ve encountered two this week while test driving.

Some dealers are good, some very bad indeed.

I bought a new car late last year from a Volvo dealer who id bought a car from 2 years before (and now trading it in for said new car) I went though a PX on the previous one too, and I remember being shunned into the naughty seats for about 1/2hr or so back then. When I was just about to leave I almost got chased out of the dealership with wafts of paperwork and excuses. My response was simple “if you want me to buy one of your cars don’t ignore me or play tactics” whilst that didn’t ultimately work that well (another 1/2 later) but I did come out with a good PX for the old car and some knocked off the new one.
This time, I walked in said what I wanted for the car, asked for £2.5k off the new one and walked off with the new one.

I think if you go in armed with a price for your car you want and a deal on a new one, you will “win”

Also, I bought a new car in Nov with no PX,(from a Merc dealership) that was painless in the extreme… Walked in, said what deposit I had, asked for £2k off and got £1.8k off and picked it up 2nd week in Dec. I didn’t even get to drink the coffee he brought over.

Aren’t these huge car supermarkets the worst at what you mention OP? My Sister went to buy a Lexus Hybrid, 12mths old, from one of these dealerships and was there nearly 2 hours.. 🙄

I bought a new car late last year from a dealer who id be ugly a car from 2 years before (and now trading it in for said new car) I went though a px on the previous one too, and I remember being shunned into the naughty seats for about 1/2 back then.

Again in english please? 😛

“12p more than we asked for” That would have you seen as a total and humiliating failure in Yorkshire.

Car dealers are (generally) a ‘unique culture’

I have said on here before, in looking for a car recently we had some shocking ‘traditiona’ dealership games –
Arnold Clark Toyota in Stirling = rudeness about arriving less than an hour before closing, and initially refused to let us look at a car, grumpy we had family in tow, questioned why a family of five were buying a small (second) car…
Stirling Mitsubushi dealer – car was accident damaged, half the interior out to fix and clean it, and yet wanted a deposit to buy the thing before they fixed it and let us drive it, and as I had to leave to get back to work they did the faffing for a further 40 mins with mrs_oab before she finally had to just up and walk out…

At the other end of the scale –
Skoda in Stirling = great price, took us straight out for test drive, when we returned they had price on the old car and a deal on the table (and it was their best one, no faffing).
Morrisons Seat = great price, car was in peachy condition, again an offer for trade in and cost was made asap, test drove next day and pre putting a deposit down they MOT and serviced it that afternoon…

One of our local Skoda garages is great in terms of very welcoming, not pushy, let us test drive as many cars as well like, etc. I’ve bought two from them so when looking to lease another one for my wife, we got the same treatment but they wouldn’t offer us any discount and the trade in for her old one was not great.

Went to look at a Jazz. Carol spent most of her time being ignored as the sales-bloke decided he only wanted to talk to me in spite of my oft repeated direction that it was nothing to do with me, he’d best deal with the brains of the family. Same as Matt ^^ one hour before closing, no chance of a test drive. Left.

Wandered up the road to different Skoda garage. Got a really good deal on car with extras we wanted and trade in. He was about to blot his copybook doing the ‘I’ll go ask my manager’ when Carol pointed out they closed in 5 minutes and if he wanted us to sign, these were the numbers and it was those or we left.

Nice fella tho, we signed. He tried to sell us some extra suff. We declined. He took it with good grace.

It’s not an experience I enjoy. Whereas I LOVE buying bikes 😉

I remember about eight or nine years ago when I was buying my Mondeo, I went to have a look at a 2.5 V6 – took it for a quick test drive and could see the fuel needle dropping as I put my foot down.

On returning to the very quiet small car lot 15 mins before closing, I made my excuses and went to leave – and the visibly desperate salesman told me another bloke was coming back to buy it that evening.

It’s the only time I’ve actually laughed in a salesperson’s face.

😀

I bought last car from dealer (s/h) – the guy was good on the phone, good on email, was pleasant, not pushy, didn’t dick me about, pleasantly chatty. Unlike the Arnold C***k salesman that told me what I wanted, (based presumably on what they had to sell), despite me telling them family of four, active holidays, carting lots of stuff about. Tiddly 1.2l Skoda Rapid – no thanks!

The main thing is never buy there and then. Leave your number, go home and take your time.

What’s with the “going in the back for ages while muggins sits out front waiting” thing??

It’s so you can check what’s on drive the deal dot com

The last deal I did the salesman was quite good and just got the finance manager out to sit with us while we negotiated.

Completely transparent, I could see all the figure they were putting in on the screen and the effect it would have.

No car to trade in which helped a fair bit.

Im potentially about to embark on my first PCP – whats the best tactic to save money?
I have a factory model offer from another dealer that is around £1500 off RRP – but being a factory model of course leaves pretty much no wiggle room for options.
I suppose its best to ask them to match the other dealers discount whilst also negotiating on any options?

@slimjim78 – Not sure you’d get £1500 off a custom specced car.

The factory spec car is cheaper as it’s probably a cancelled order, or one built to wrong spec at the factory. You’re more likely to get a bit more off this if you can live with the compromises.

Or you need to get a price on the exact spec you want then take that to other dealers.

that sounds about right. cheers.

Agree with the Man owning the Muffin 😉 We were offered a similar amount from carwow (amusingly from the same dealer who said they didn’t discount when we saw them face to face!), but my wife – rightly as it’s her first ever new car – wanted it with the options that’d make it better for her. So it’s a bespoke order and there is a lot less wiggle room.

We bought on the day as it was the last day of a couple of offers £500 back and 0% APR on PCP. As we were doing the deal for 4 years, seemed logical to get the car we wanted as it was in our monthly budget we’d set.

To get us to sign, they did throw in mud flaps, mats (how can these be an extra!) and a really good boot guard for our always damp labrador. Only a couple of hundred quids worth, but made us feel a little bit valued!

It’s how they make more money…

• You want a pink roof, yellow bonnet, and twin go-faster stripes down the middle? “That’ll be £2000 extra Sir – but it’ll be unique and you’ll be the only with a car like this!”.

• Come trade-in… “Well Sir it would be worth £10,000 if it was white, black or silver, but there’s a limited market for cars with a pink roof, yellow bonnet, and twin go-faster stripes down the middle so we can only offer £8500”.

😀

makes sense when you put it like that.

I may simply forego all the gimmicks I want bolted on in order to secure a rock bottom price via CarWow.

We’d have done that had she not already decided that heated seats and a DSG box were not for negotiation. As I have them in my car 😉

Selling a car is a lot like making love to a beautiful woman.

Haven’t bought many new cars but I’ve had a few new motorbikes

The last time I bought one where there was absolutely no hassle was around 2003

A couple of years later the motorbike dealers were starting to behave like the car people but the salesperson was still an actual biker who did ride bikes

2007 was the first time I experienced the ‘I’ll go and get a price’ tactic. The salesperson was still a real biker but their hands were tied

2010 the real biker had gone replaced by someone who had previously been selling Mercs for the same chain. Yeah he rode but he hadn’t got a bike he could choose any one from the showroom. Right.

“12p more than we asked for” That would have you seen as a total and humiliating failure in Yorkshire.

Humiliatingly, that’s 12p/mo on a 36 mo deal so actually £4.32.

I did however drink well over £8’s worth of coffee while she discussed figures with her boss. Pissed myself three times on the way home as a result, but a win’s a win.

Last new car I bought was done over the phone with a saleswoman I’d never met at a dealer I’d never been to for a car I’d never seen.

Got a great deal and great car. Easy.

I’m feeling this thread…

The Gf and I were after a pair of Skoda Yetis on lease with prices to match from a dealer advertising great lease deals. We contacted them and there attitude was pretty poor – they said these cars are hard to get hold of but they *may* be able to get us one. Sorry, is this a Skoda Dealership or a cheese factory?

Anyway we buggered them off and went to see the dealer local to us.

The local-ish dealer said they could match them from the start.Fine. But after enduring 3.5hrs of the aforementioned retreating to the office and coming back with PCP offers that were £100 a month more – citing they were a better deal we eventually put the deposit down on the original lease deal.

Gfs car turned up first but they requested two further trips to the showroom: one to bring licence and do paperwork and to collect the car – we said we want to do one trip. So we did, car was ready for collection but missing factory fit mats that they failed to notice.

After a few minutes we were told we couldn’t actually take the car home as there was a problem with their systems. So the ass. manager came to see us and said he would do anything we like to help us. We asked if we could pick the car up Saturday as coming back in the week was a pain but they said they don’t do Saturday handovers. They then offered to deliver the car the next day which did come (late and without mats.)

My car was then in the frame and I was hoping they would learn from their first experience on how not to do a car delivery but things got worse when they suddenly issued me with paperwork with a big price increase over what we agreed. Some tussling ensued and it was agreed that the way out of this would be to charge me the higher rate monthly and refund me ahead of the payments, instead of re-doing a contract. Not only this but they’d taken the £2090 deposits from both of is but had to refund us these and then re-collect the same amount again as the paperwork was screwy.

I’ve actually still not got my car yet and no apology for just awful customer service.

I’ve also left out several confusing debates with them about the purchase of a spare wheel – which has left us with two instead of the one we ordered. And numerous out of synch phone calls between the salesman and the finance department who appear to be in different dimensions of Skoda reality.

When I do get my car there is going to be a big letter to them.

His and hers cars?

How very sweet.