Ask a car salesman anything...anything at all.

[Dimebars]

OddCat said:

Thanks for the response but not sure I understand this. Am looking to buy with real money. Unless is 0% interest in which case that's fine.

Are we saying that pre-reg (£14k under list) isn't a bargain then ? In which case could I walk into Williams with £30k and buy that car ?

Thanks

Dave

0% APR isn't unheard of at present on 4 series

If you can find a delivery mileage car under 60 days old then the dealer can offer the "new" car APR which is 0% at present AFAIK

And I wouldn't expect you to get £3k off

[mcdjl]

sc0tt said:

I bought a fiesta st, the salesman told me I had to pay for my own fuel as it was low.

Edit - on the test drive

Whats its fuel economy? OK then 2l and 30 mile test drive it is.

[PSRG]

Butter Face said:

Lots of dealers (with larger groups especially Ive found out) have set test drive routes with no deviation allowed, I find in weird.

We have an insured demo fleet that people book, sign out and take for as long as they like (during working hours) so they can actually try out the cars properly.

I noticed that the MINI dealer our Clubman came from had three test drive routes up on the wall - town, motorway and mixed. But then they (MINI?) were also doing a 48 hour test drive so I was actually just given the keys. I timed it for when the BMW needed servcing and kept it overnight - and it worked, because I bought one. Likewise MB (again I assume HQ rather than dealer initiated) were also doing a 48 hour test drive. I didn’t need 48 hours so just picked it up in the morning and dropped it off in the evening.

[Dan W.]

we have just had a customer ask for a 3 hour test drive which we declined, we don't do them for that long I think the longest I have been on was about 40 minutes.

Again we have said to customers would be worth renting one for the weekend to see what they think, as a small garage we don't have the man hours to take someone out of the business for 3 hours nor the insurance to let them go out on their own.

[HTP99]

99% of the people that we deal with are more than happy with a 20-30 minute accompanied test drive, most assume it will be accompanied anyway.

We have on occasion lent a car out for a day and we have never sold from one; either they dissappear from the face of the earth after the test drive; ie they have gone away to look at other cars and then don't take our follow up calls or respond to follow up emails, or they end up buying elsewhere due to a dealer group elsewhere pissing it all away on CarWow.

I have the odd ZOE enquiry who want to take it for 24hrs "to see if it works for them", however that's bks; a ZOE does 120-200 miles on a charge, just drive your current car and see how many miles you do in a day and very rarely does anyone do more than 120 miles in a day anyway.

Also many ZOE enquiries don't realise without a Type 2 charge point, it can't be charged, they all assume it can be charged via a 3 pin plug; it can but the cable is extra at £430 and takes 36 hours to charge from empty.

I had one guy who got the hump with me as we wouldn't lend him a ZOE for a weekend to "see how it fits in my life" as "Nissan let me have a Leaf for a weekend", well if the Leaf worked for "your life" then the ZOE will so there is no need.

[silentbrown]

Dan W. said:

... nor the insurance to let them go out on their own.

That's the key bit. Probably the last thing I'd want on any extended test drive would be the salesman next to me for the duration. (No offence intended!)

The last new car we bought was following an unexpected 'extended test'. We'd gone to see a car at the dealer, expecting the usual fixed route stuff. After doing the paperwork it was "Here's the keys, bring it back before we close". It gave Mrs SB the chance to do things like parking, reversing, sticking shopping in that a test drive doesn't normally allow - all on roads that we knew. We had it for a couple of hours, I guess.

It certainly "sold us" the car and in hindsight stopped us shopping around at other dealers.

I'd hate to think how much your premiums are anyway, but would unaccompanied test make much difference?

[mcdjl]

HTP99 said:

99% of the people that we deal with are more than happy with a 20-30 minute accompanied test drive, most assume it will be accompanied anyway.

We have on occasion lent a car out for a day and we have never sold from one; either they dissappear from the face of the earth after the test drive; ie they have gone away to look at other cars and then don't take our follow up calls or respond to follow up emails, or they end up buying elsewhere due to a dealer group elsewhere pissing it all away on CarWow.

I have the odd ZOE enquiry who want to take it for 24hrs "to see if it works for them", however that's bks; a ZOE does 120-200 miles on a charge, just drive your current car and see how many miles you do in a day and very rarely does anyone do more than 120 miles in a day anyway.

Also many ZOE enquiries don't realise without a Type 2 charge point, it can't be charged, they all assume it can be charged via a 3 pin plug; it can but the cable is extra at £430 and takes 36 hours to charge from empty.

I had one guy who got the hump with me as we wouldn't lend him a ZOE for a weekend to "see how it fits in my life" as "Nissan let me have a Leaf for a weekend", well if the Leaf worked for "your life" then the ZOE will so there is no need.

Is there a way of getting a ZOE without paying the battery rental? The 2nd hand costs make them look manageable as a day-day car and keeping the current one for long journeys but the battery costs cancel out any savings.

[Dan W.]

silentbrown said:

Dan W. said:

... nor the insurance to let them go out on their own.

That's the key bit. Probably the last thing I'd want on any extended test drive would be the salesman next to me for the duration. (No offence intended!)

The last new car we bought was following an unexpected 'extended test'. We'd gone to see a car at the dealer, expecting the usual fixed route stuff. After doing the paperwork it was "Here's the keys, bring it back before we close". It gave Mrs SB the chance to do things like parking, reversing, sticking shopping in that a test drive doesn't normally allow - all on roads that we knew. We had it for a couple of hours, I guess.

It certainly "sold us" the car and in hindsight stopped us shopping around at other dealers.

I'd hate to think how much your premiums are anyway, but would unaccompanied test make much difference?

Its an odd one with test drives, I tend to have a real laugh with my customers so the test drive is usually just conversation and a bit of a giggle about stuff and when we get back they say I must of enjoyed it I laughed a lot.

on the other hand I have had some others who just sit in silence and wont engage or attempt to talk to you on test drive.

I was always told to sit in silence and wait for the customer to speak to you but in my experience that doesn't work, making customers laugh and having a bit of banter and showing interest relaxes them and then it doesn't feel like a driving test.

my old place we did unattended test drives and it did work ok... until a customer smashed a car up driving too fast lol

[HTP99]

mcdjl said:

HTP99 said:

99% of the people that we deal with are more than happy with a 20-30 minute accompanied test drive, most assume it will be accompanied anyway.

We have on occasion lent a car out for a day and we have never sold from one; either they dissappear from the face of the earth after the test drive; ie they have gone away to look at other cars and then don't take our follow up calls or respond to follow up emails, or they end up buying elsewhere due to a dealer group elsewhere pissing it all away on CarWow.

I have the odd ZOE enquiry who want to take it for 24hrs "to see if it works for them", however that's bks; a ZOE does 120-200 miles on a charge, just drive your current car and see how many miles you do in a day and very rarely does anyone do more than 120 miles in a day anyway.

Also many ZOE enquiries don't realise without a Type 2 charge point, it can't be charged, they all assume it can be charged via a 3 pin plug; it can but the cable is extra at £430 and takes 36 hours to charge from empty.

I had one guy who got the hump with me as we wouldn't lend him a ZOE for a weekend to "see how it fits in my life" as "Nissan let me have a Leaf for a weekend", well if the Leaf worked for "your life" then the ZOE will so there is no need.

Is there a way of getting a ZOE without paying the battery rental? The 2nd hand costs make them look manageable as a day-day car and keeping the current one for long journeys but the battery costs cancel out any savings.

Only if you can find an "i" version, this will have been bought with the battery included at approx £5000 more when new; good luck as you are unlikely to find one.

[mcdjl]

HTP99 said:

Only if you can find an "i" version, this will have been bought with the battery included at approx £5000 more when new; good luck as you are unlikely to find one.

Cheers, its slightly annoying as its something a lot of the advert fail to mention...

[Wooda80]

mcdjl said:

Cheers, its slightly annoying as its something a lot of the advert fail to mention...

Nearly all the ones on Autotrader fail to mention that this is "not an i model" You could always email the dealer and ask for the reg number of each one so that you can check

Actually, if you use the drop down search criteria box it will let you choose between the different models of Zoe including the i and non i models. But as HTP said there are only a couple and they tend to be advertised for £12-15000 rather than the £5-6000 of the battery lease models.

"People only lease the battery because they can't afford to buy it outright..."

Edited by Wooda80 on Tuesday 21st August 16:56

[mcdjl]

Wooda80 said:

Nearly all the ones on Autotrader fail to mention that this is "not an i model" You could always email the dealer and ask for the reg number of each one so that you can check

Actually, if you use the drop down search criteria box it will let you choose between the different models of Zoe including the i and non i models. But as HTP said there are only a couple and they tend to be advertised for £12-15000 rather than the £5-6000 of the battery lease models.

"People only lease the battery because they can't afford to buy it outright..."

Edited by Wooda80 on Tuesday 21st August 16:56

Yup, but its the fact that the battery cost isn't mentioned at all on (most of) the rest that feels like cheating. On the monthlies for a £5k one without it, my fuel would cover it (ish). The extra for the battery blows any saving. i doubt i'd get any responses to my emails....

[HTP99]

If its a 2-3 year old ZOE it will almost certainly be a battery rental one as these will be PCP returns; PCP ZOE's of that age are always battery rental.

[silentbrown]

Dan W. said:

Its an odd one with test drives, I tend to have a real laugh with my customers so the test drive is usually just conversation and a bit of a giggle about stuff and when we get back they say I must of enjoyed it I laughed a lot.

...
my old place we did unattended test drives and it did work ok... until a customer smashed a car up driving too fast lol

Oh, sure. For a 15-30 min drive it's usually a bit of chat and fun. but for an hour or so "test" you're not actually going to be driving it every last second. It'll be down to the shops, maybe pick kids up from school, etc.

As for customers trashing cars, I'm sure that must happen with sales and service staff too

[Little Pete]

Butter Face said:

DSLiverpool said:

Any Renault dealers here? (Butter / HTP?) I’m thinking of a Koleos for the Mrs - she’s ok with big stuff and I like the look of them.
Is the route to buy nearly new? Gets a 2017 signature about £20k
Will I lose my shirt on it? Anything else?
Cheers

Simple answer is that the 4 year residual on a Koleos is around the same as a Kadjar, the koleos is more expensive so expect to lose more money.

They are superb cars, we have a Signature 175 manual and I absolutely love driving it.

Are you sales guys on here car fans or is it just a job? I’ve been around cars for a long long time and some days I could easily walk away. Then a particularly difficult job will come in and I get a lot of satisfaction from fixing it. I suppose it’s a question about job satisfaction as much as anything or is the satisfaction in the bonuses?
Keep up the good work in the thread.

[Butter Face]

Little Pete said:

Are you sales guys on here car fans or is it just a job? I’ve been around cars for a long long time and some days I could easily walk away. Then a particularly difficult job will come in and I get a lot of satisfaction from fixing it. I suppose it’s a question about job satisfaction as much as anything or is the satisfaction in the bonuses?
Keep up the good work in the thread.

It’s a mixed bag, I’m ghr only true car ‘nut’ at my place but a couple of the people I work with like having ‘nice’ cars, the others DGAF and would sell fridges if it paid the same.

The money is good and of course is a great motivator, especially when you’re 2 weeks into a month, scraping the barrel then have a good run and pull yourself up again, makes it all feel better. I like the money, but I also like the buzz of doing well.

[renmure]

Well, I think we had a typical "poor experience" at a dealer today. A MINI main dealer in the nearest city who we had actually bought 2 MINIs from in the past although the last was a few years ago. They've always got a lot of stock on the forecourt, about 30 cars today, so we felt fairly comfortable going to browse with intent. We have a few cars but Mrs R would like another MINI. She currently drives a Fiat 500 as a train-station car and because its picked up a few dings and scrapes we were minded to just keep that as well to save the same thing happening if she used the MINI.

I tried to use some of the stuff I've learned from this thread so even when we got "pounced on" almost immediately I saw that as a sign of attentiveness and tried to be as helpful as possible. I made it clear we were actively looking to buy a car but initially we just wanted to browse. I said we didn't have a p/x, I gave the budget (around £14k) and said that we were less fussed about deciding on 3 / 5 door or even diesel / petrol and were really just looking for something that jumped out at us as being a good looking car and if it was fairly new, fairly low(ish) miles, still in warranty and seemed to have decent interior options and in budget then we would give him a shout and we could get more information and see where we ended up.

Jeeze. Would he leave us alone? Nope. We got the whole "qualifying" spiel, the whole "monthly budget" spiel, every car we even glanced at which was within £2k of our budget was "great value." After about 10 mins Mrs R had to politely ask him to give us some time just to look round ourselves. That lasted about 3 mins then he was back asking if we wanted to come in and have a coffee and hear the benefits of buying an Approved MINI and see if any of the finance options might widen our budget. It was as if there was a tick-box form somewhere where he had to tick every box, no matter what information we gave. Neither of us were rude enough to say anything directly but the only upside is that the business card that he insisted we take as we left had his day-off printed on it.

[Wooda80]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

Wondered where all used the Fluences went and where the prices bottomed out. Must make financial sense at some point for someone?

Only one for sale on Autotrader at the moment and I have to say the ad is really selling it to me https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

Edited by Wooda80 on Wednesday 22 August 15:02

[Nickp82]

Wooda80 said:

Wondered where all used the Fluences went and where the prices bottomed out. Must make financial sense at some point for someone?

Only one for sale on Autotrader at the moment and I have to say the ad is really selling it to mehttps://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201805186625887?radius=1500&model=FLUENCE&make=RENAULT&postcode=cf314hu&advertising-location=at_cars&onesearchad=Used&onesearchad=Nearly%20New&onesearchad=New&sort=sponsored&page=1

The car is at least somewhere approaching clean so the ad is a step up from your normal EH standard.

[Butter Face]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

Are you missing the part where just because it isn’t enough range for you, it may be perfect for someone else?

Used ZOE are not ‘unsellable’ we sell every one we take in and there is always a market for them.

You’re assuming your needs are the same as everyone else’s when of course they’re not.

As for the Fluence, I’m pretty sure there were less than 100 registered in the U.K., it wasn’t ever designed for our market and was never actively sold or promoted, not in the way ZOE is.