Salesman goes into the back for ages to talk to his manager
Discussion
When I traded cars in November I had to go through this whole charade. I realise it's all a game and a dance, and it's a game you generally have to play, but it can still get very irritating especially if the salesman has to go scurrying back and forth several times, leaving you twiddling your thumbs for quite a while each time.
When I went to pick the car up there was yet more dancing to be done on warranty and the like, and on the PX value of my car.
At the end of it all, just before I drove away in my new car, they asked me for feedback on the sales 'experience'. I replied that I realise we have to dance the dance, but that next time I would prefer a Quickstep to a Waltz. The salesman got exactly what I meant, said it was fair comment, and apologised for how long it had taken to conclude everything.
When I went to pick the car up there was yet more dancing to be done on warranty and the like, and on the PX value of my car.
At the end of it all, just before I drove away in my new car, they asked me for feedback on the sales 'experience'. I replied that I realise we have to dance the dance, but that next time I would prefer a Quickstep to a Waltz. The salesman got exactly what I meant, said it was fair comment, and apologised for how long it had taken to conclude everything.
Butter Face said:
Crush said:
We had this issue with the Nissan dealer in Winchester. We'd sat there for 10 minutes while he "discussed it with the manager" and we chose to walk out.
We wanted to purchase a vehicle, not play salesman bulls
t bingo 
I don't get it. You went to buy a car, I assume you test drive it? He appraised your part exchange? Then you sat down to talk figures and he then said he needed to talk the figures over with his boss....We wanted to purchase a vehicle, not play salesman bulls
t bingo And you walked out? Why?
I don't understand the mentality, you say you went to buy a car, you probably got 90% of the way there then had enough? Because he was following (I suspect) company procedure by confirming a price/part exchange/finance quote with his boss.
It's never happened to me, but if it did I honestly wouldn't give a jot (apart from the waste of my time where I could have been actually selling a car) whereas the person walking will still go on about it for years afterwards
Typo in the OP, we'd sat for 20minutes twiddling our thumbs despite telling the chap we were in a bit of a hurry so just needed figures.
Vehicle wasn't anything special, it only had to tow and cope off-road on farm fields so we not too fussed by which brand we bought. Ended up with a Mitsubishi Shogun rather than a Pathfinder.
vikingaero said:
CS Garth said:
Back on topic I am surprised by the number of people who appear to have researched their choice of car, set out to buy it, and then allowed their emotive response to the salesman prevent them from buying said car and thus buying what I assume must have been their second choice.
I'm not sure this makes the buyer the winner here, a small victory over some smarm bag results in you driving round in your no 2 car for however long. Personally if I didn't like he salesman I'd just said I'd love to buy a car from you the garage but I'm not feeling the chemistry can I deal with someone else. This marks the salesman down and he doesn't get commission but you get the car you actually want.
If you have a choice of 2 cars that are so close together that there is no real No.2 choice - for example a 320d or a 220CDI then yes I would let the behaviour of a salesman dictate which car I purchase. If a dealership works on a smarmy level then the service department could be equally bad. If a salesman was professional then I would be inclined to think the service department was equally so.I'm not sure this makes the buyer the winner here, a small victory over some smarm bag results in you driving round in your no 2 car for however long. Personally if I didn't like he salesman I'd just said I'd love to buy a car from you the garage but I'm not feeling the chemistry can I deal with someone else. This marks the salesman down and he doesn't get commission but you get the car you actually want.
Sales people are selling the services of the dealership as well as the vehicle itself. If they've a s
t attitude with what you can see, what will the non-customer facing personnel be like?We bought my wife a brand new Fiesta in November, walked into the local dealer to have a look - having looked at VW etc.. on the same day, did test drive etc.. & sales lady came up with figures, about £2k higher than a broker could do (which on a Fiesta is quite a high %) my wife liked the car & was keen to do a deal that day (no trade in) so we gave them the broker pricing & asked what they could do, this resulted in a trip to the managers office for about 10 minutes, but they came back matching the price if we took a car which was on its way to them already (in the spec we wanted, new unregistered etc) & by the end of the month, didn't have an issue with that - I can appreciate they probably needed to understand where their numbers were (both the sales price of the car & I guess a target around registered cars).
The local VW salesman when I bought a Touareg however didn't even bother going to see his manager about discounting further, a not very polite no was all we got (£5k adrift from the broker I then bought it through).
I do remember BMW messing about with trips to the manager a bit on the price of a 6 month old ex demo 3 series a few years ago, we got there in the end but it didn't need to be that hard.
The local VW salesman when I bought a Touareg however didn't even bother going to see his manager about discounting further, a not very polite no was all we got (£5k adrift from the broker I then bought it through).
I do remember BMW messing about with trips to the manager a bit on the price of a 6 month old ex demo 3 series a few years ago, we got there in the end but it didn't need to be that hard.
djdest said:
What pisses me off is when you quite firmly say no you are not interested, yet they still persist in asking over and over.
When my Mum bought her Mini I went and sat in the car while she made the payment.
Half an hour later she still hadn't come out and time was getting on for me to be at work, so I went in to see what was going on.
Bare in mind she was buying the car in full with a bank transfer, so it shouldn't of taken above 5 minutes.
They had sat there for pretty much all of that half an hour trying to bully her into the bullst paint protection, gap insurance, wheel insurance and all other manner of crap.
She had told them over and over she didn't want any of them, yet they still continued. She later said she was very relieved when I arrived and put a stop to it all!
It REALLY wound me up, she she hadn't of wanted the car so much I would of told them to stick it
So your old Mum was paying cash for her Mini but the dealership had her out the back for half an hour trying to sell her GAP insurance? Really? Are you sure?When my Mum bought her Mini I went and sat in the car while she made the payment.
Half an hour later she still hadn't come out and time was getting on for me to be at work, so I went in to see what was going on.
Bare in mind she was buying the car in full with a bank transfer, so it shouldn't of taken above 5 minutes.
They had sat there for pretty much all of that half an hour trying to bully her into the bulls
t paint protection, gap insurance, wheel insurance and all other manner of crap.She had told them over and over she didn't want any of them, yet they still continued. She later said she was very relieved when I arrived and put a stop to it all!
It REALLY wound me up, she she hadn't of wanted the car so much I would of told them to stick it
Why do you idiots come on to these threads and make this utter b
ks up? vikingaero said:
I think most of us don't have a problem with a salesman getting a deal checked/authorised - 5 minutes - no problem. The big kicker was the 20 minute wait the OP experienced. You as the salesman aren't seeing this situation from the most important view - that of your customer. To your customer a 1 minute wait will feel like 5 minutes of sitting there awkwardly. If there is a queue and a 20 minute wait then that salesman should have gone back to the customer and say he was waiting for the boss to get back to him, move onto finance discussions, move onto GAP/warranty/service plans/paint pro etc or simply get the customer a coffee. But then again you will get the odd salesman who will pop out back for a smoke and to check the footie scores on his mobile.
Me? If the salesman leaves to authorise a deal, I go back to sitting in the car in the showroom and playing with it (Phnarr...)
Agree with that (the bold bit) 100%.Me? If the salesman leaves to authorise a deal, I go back to sitting in the car in the showroom and playing with it (Phnarr...)
Which is almost certainly why the OP's 'twenty minutes' was almost certainly more like four minutes (using your calculation).
No salesman is going to really leave a customer sat there for twenty minutes are they? Why would they?
unrepentant said:
So your old Mum was paying cash for her Mini but the dealership had her out the back for half an hour trying to sell her GAP insurance? Really? Are you sure?
Why do you idiots come on to these threads and make this utter bks up?
What has paying cash got to do with the selling of GAP insurance? Why do you idiots come on to these threads and make this utter b
ks up? 
You know what GAP insurance is, right? It bridges the gap between what the insurance company pays out to cover what is effectively a second-hand car in six months or a years time if it is written off, and the invoice price paid on the new car by the customer at point of sale..
Nothing at all to do with finance, many 'cash' buyers take it so that they can buy another new car with the total insurance payout if the worst happens, and quite rightly.
Why do you idiots come on to these threads and make this utter b
ks up? 
I just won't deal with them any more. In my experience about 75% of car sales monkeys are liars, stupid, ignorant of the product they sell or just plain annoying. Quite a high percentage are all of those things.
Life's too short to deal with such a high percentage of having to deal with an irritating no matter who they are or what they're selling.
Life's too short to deal with such a high percentage of having to deal with an irritating
no matter who they are or what they're selling.The last salesman I dealt with the process went like this...
I saw the car advertised on Pistonheads and gave the garage a call - someone called Greig answered and we had a quick chat about the car and it sounded quite nice. I mentioned my part ex and Greig said he would call me back in a while with prices as they don't sell BMWs so it would go straight to the trade.
Within an hour or so I got a call back and Greig gave myself the trade price and what the trade would probably retail it out for - the price offered was very good - but I knew I could get a tad more privately. There was no sucking of air through the teeth, no bullst, just an honest factual answer.
Anyhow I then said I needed some time to think about it and Greig said that should I wish to reserve the car I would need to leave a deposit of £1000 over the phone. I asked Greig whether I could negotiate on the car price and he told me this was the price he could do a deal at and that was that - no bullst, no talking up - just facts. I called back in 30 mins and left a deposit on the car and Greig took the payment and sent myself the invoice and bits to help myself insure the car and do a HPI etc.
On the day before collection I received a text from Greig stating they had a problem and might need to move my collection time to a bit later. I thought he we go...
...but when I read further down I saw that he was saying that when they had MOT'd the car it had its first ever advisory come up one of the rear tyres. Greig said he wasn't happy to send the car out like that and so wanted to put two new tyres on the rear and then do a geo set up - in addition as part of their sale inspection they also changed the front brakes as they within a few thousand miles.
I was appreciative of the due diligence and honesty - I then travelled down on the Friday from some distance away and was picked up at the local train station and taken to the garage. There Greig met myself and took me for a tour of their factory/premises where they do a heap of stuff and then showed me around my car as a first pass through before he set about taking me through this immaculately presented paperwork.
Greig then talked me through their warranty, where the basic message was this is the same as the Porsche warranty, here is the Porsche warranty booklet for reference - but lets not piss about, if you have an issue over the next 6 months call me directly and I'll sort it - we live of our reputation and repeat business.
I was then walked around the car in detail and saw it up on a ramp - they put fuel in the car to ensure I could get home without having to go to a petrol station and then Greig spent 10 mins with myself in the car showing the various things. He also mentioned in passing that they had put this Gtechnik thing over the bodywork - I subsequently found it was quite good!
Once I drove home I got a message from Greig to check in on how I found the car and if everything was ok.
The car was a Porsche 997.2 and the garage was RPM Technik.
Phenomenal service and attitude - and likewise I would hope that I reciprocated by not messing around and sticking to my side of the bargain. Treat people with respect and most will do the same back
I saw the car advertised on Pistonheads and gave the garage a call - someone called Greig answered and we had a quick chat about the car and it sounded quite nice. I mentioned my part ex and Greig said he would call me back in a while with prices as they don't sell BMWs so it would go straight to the trade.
Within an hour or so I got a call back and Greig gave myself the trade price and what the trade would probably retail it out for - the price offered was very good - but I knew I could get a tad more privately. There was no sucking of air through the teeth, no bulls
t, just an honest factual answer.Anyhow I then said I needed some time to think about it and Greig said that should I wish to reserve the car I would need to leave a deposit of £1000 over the phone. I asked Greig whether I could negotiate on the car price and he told me this was the price he could do a deal at and that was that - no bulls
t, no talking up - just facts. I called back in 30 mins and left a deposit on the car and Greig took the payment and sent myself the invoice and bits to help myself insure the car and do a HPI etc.On the day before collection I received a text from Greig stating they had a problem and might need to move my collection time to a bit later. I thought he we go...
...but when I read further down I saw that he was saying that when they had MOT'd the car it had its first ever advisory come up one of the rear tyres. Greig said he wasn't happy to send the car out like that and so wanted to put two new tyres on the rear and then do a geo set up - in addition as part of their sale inspection they also changed the front brakes as they within a few thousand miles.
I was appreciative of the due diligence and honesty - I then travelled down on the Friday from some distance away and was picked up at the local train station and taken to the garage. There Greig met myself and took me for a tour of their factory/premises where they do a heap of stuff and then showed me around my car as a first pass through before he set about taking me through this immaculately presented paperwork.
Greig then talked me through their warranty, where the basic message was this is the same as the Porsche warranty, here is the Porsche warranty booklet for reference - but lets not piss about, if you have an issue over the next 6 months call me directly and I'll sort it - we live of our reputation and repeat business.
I was then walked around the car in detail and saw it up on a ramp - they put fuel in the car to ensure I could get home without having to go to a petrol station and then Greig spent 10 mins with myself in the car showing the various things. He also mentioned in passing that they had put this Gtechnik thing over the bodywork - I subsequently found it was quite good!
Once I drove home I got a message from Greig to check in on how I found the car and if everything was ok.
The car was a Porsche 997.2 and the garage was RPM Technik.
Phenomenal service and attitude - and likewise I would hope that I reciprocated by not messing around and sticking to my side of the bargain. Treat people with respect and most will do the same back
ashleyman said:
What about salesmen that judge you based on what you're wearing and don't let you test drive something or don't call you back to discuss anything so you don't get to negotiations.
A local Audi dealer told me to my face very bluntly that I couldn't afford an Audi A4 as they are 'very expensive cars'.
I used to work selling Carpets. We were quite an upmarket retailer and one particular lady came in and ordered £20k of carpets for her new house.. She had won the lottery. I was admiring her new BMW and she told me she had gone into an Audi garage with the intention of buying one as it had been a dream of hers to have a TT. After being ignored for 20 minutes or so she was then given similar treatment to the above ( she was in t-shirt and jeans). She left, went into the Beemer garage next door and placed an order for an M3 and paid in cash. A local Audi dealer told me to my face very bluntly that I couldn't afford an Audi A4 as they are 'very expensive cars'.
unrepentant said:
So your old Mum was paying cash for her Mini but the dealership had her out the back for half an hour trying to sell her GAP insurance? Really? Are you sure?
Why do you idiots come on to these threads and make this utter bks up?
Why wouldn't a cash buyer want GAP insurance? Not from the dealer mind...Why do you idiots come on to these threads and make this utter b
ks up? mnx42 said:
I used to work selling Carpets. We were quite an upmarket retailer and one particular lady came in and ordered £20k of carpets for her new house.. She had won the lottery. I was admiring her new BMW and she told me she had gone into an Audi garage with the intention of buying one as it had been a dream of hers to have a TT. After being ignored for 20 minutes or so she was then given similar treatment to the above ( she was in t-shirt and jeans). She left, went into the Beemer garage next door and placed an order for an M3 and paid in cash.
Simply astonishing the amount of 'lottery winners' this happens to! 
I must literally be the only person left that doesn't personally know a slighted 'lottery winner' that 'bought a car next door and paid in cash'.
Do non lottery winning expensive car buyers always rock up in full formal wear or something?
Crush said:
Typo in the OP, we'd sat for 20minutes twiddling our thumbs despite telling the chap we were in a bit of a hurry so just needed figures.
Second biggest purchase in most peoples lives and you thought you'd fit it in when you were in a bit of a hurry, some right bright sparks on here.Ari said:
mnx42 said:
I used to work selling Carpets. We were quite an upmarket retailer and one particular lady came in and ordered £20k of carpets for her new house.. She had won the lottery. I was admiring her new BMW and she told me she had gone into an Audi garage with the intention of buying one as it had been a dream of hers to have a TT. After being ignored for 20 minutes or so she was then given similar treatment to the above ( she was in t-shirt and jeans). She left, went into the Beemer garage next door and placed an order for an M3 and paid in cash.
Simply astonishing the amount of 'lottery winners' this happens to! I must literally be the only person left that doesn't personally know a slighted 'lottery winner' that 'bought a car next door and paid in cash'.
Do non lottery winning expensive car buyers always rock up in full formal wear or something?
berlintaxi said:
Crush said:
Typo in the OP, we'd sat for 20minutes twiddling our thumbs despite telling the chap we were in a bit of a hurry so just needed figures.
Second biggest purchase in most peoples lives and you thought you'd fit it in when you were in a bit of a hurry, some right bright sparks on here.[quote=mnx42]
I used to work selling Carpets. We were quite an upmarket retailer and one particular lady came in and ordered £20k of carpets for her new house.. She had won the lottery. I was admiring her new BMW and she told me she had gone into an Audi garage with the intention of buying one as it had been a dream of hers to have a TT. After being ignored for 20 minutes or so she was then given similar treatment to the above ( she was in t-shirt and jeans). She left, went into the Beemer garage next door and placed an order for an M3 and paid in cash. [/quote
I'm always amazed me as to why someone in that situation doesn't buy their dream car from another Audi garage rather than change car.
I used to work selling Carpets. We were quite an upmarket retailer and one particular lady came in and ordered £20k of carpets for her new house.. She had won the lottery. I was admiring her new BMW and she told me she had gone into an Audi garage with the intention of buying one as it had been a dream of hers to have a TT. After being ignored for 20 minutes or so she was then given similar treatment to the above ( she was in t-shirt and jeans). She left, went into the Beemer garage next door and placed an order for an M3 and paid in cash. [/quote
I'm always amazed me as to why someone in that situation doesn't buy their dream car from another Audi garage rather than change car.
Edited by RVVUNM on Monday 15th February 15:03
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