Stratstones - experiences needed; good , bad or ugly?

[dasherdiablo1]

I'm looking at buying a used Range Rover and I've foud one up with Stratstones Land Rover.

I'm interested in people's experiences with Stratstone- are they decent and trustworthy or are they a bit dodgy?

They seem very keen on selling it (which I know most dealers are). I've noticed that the car is on the Stratstone website but not on the Land Rover site so how does it work? If its not on the LR website I'm guessing it's not an LR approved car but it does come with a LR Select warranty.

Cheers in advance!

[Big Al.]

Bad or Ugly not on these forums thanks, we have a policy in place that doesn't allow Naming & Shaming.

Suggest any negatives are sent via email.

[Watchman]

Walked in having parked our nearly-50K Merc ML. Stood around for about 20 mins while a salesperson did his best to ignore us as we hung around/showed interest in a new RRS - didn't even acknowledge us.

Walked out. Won't darken their doors again.

Edited by Watchman on Tuesday 9th October 20:34

[surveyor]

We have a Stratstone dealer that services my marque in Doncaster.

I drive 25 miles to Shorpe instead.

Hope that's not too negative for Big Al.

[2.5pi]

I cannot add anything positive about Stratstone...

[Corpulent Tosser]

We bought our Freelander new from Stratstone Perth, we got a better trade in than offered at our closest dealer, the salesman was very helpful and it was, as car buying goes, a relatively painless experience.

I would have no problem with going back - though of course it may be different next time and it could have been down the the person I dealt with rather than the company.

[Dick Dastardly]

Only ever used their Aston Martin dealership in Cardiff and so far, they have been brilliant. I also checked out a couple of cars in their local Land Rover dealer recently and the sales staff seemed friendlier than most.

[whoami]

Many stretchy truths.

No.

[dasherdiablo1]

Big Al. said:

Bad or Ugly not on these forums thanks, we have a policy in place that doesn't allow Naming & Shaming.

Suggest any negatives are sent via email.

This really annoys me- we are all car nuts and here to look after each other. If people have had a bad experience why shouldn't they share it to protect others?

For example there is a very long running thread about BMWs being stolen- surely this is naming and shaming a marque. What a load of crap and double standards are in operation here.

Is it just me or would the forums be slightly better if some of the moderators took a chill pill?

[Watchman]

^^^ To be fair, you signed up to the PH rules when you joined, and that's one of them.

[AndyBrew]

Watchman said:

^^^ To be fair, you signed up to the PH rules when you joined, and that's one of them.

Regardless he has a point!

Bought my m3 from derby stratstone and it was a painless process and they dealt with a cam shaft sensor issue brilliantly and there's a nice lady there who deals with customer service.

I can't fault them personally.

[steveatesh]

Like DD above, I use my local Stratstone Aston dealer and I have found the service side to be excellent - so much so I wrote and told the CEO about it at HQ. never had a problem with the service side.........

[Kolbenkopp]

dasherdiablo1 said:

Is it just me or would the forums be slightly better if some of the moderators took a chill pill?

Suppose the mods can't do much and would rather have it differently, however the site could get in some annoying legal $"%!" pretty quickly? Not sure about UK laws on that respect.

[Garlick]

Kolbenkopp said:

dasherdiablo1 said:

Is it just me or would the forums be slightly better if some of the moderators took a chill pill?

Suppose the mods can't do much and would rather have it differently, however the site could get in some annoying legal $"%!" pretty quickly? Not sure about UK laws on that respect.

True that.

That's why we've had the no naming and shaming rule for almost 10 years now...

[ucb]

The best thing about Stratstone In my experience has been the location, giving easy access to all the other dealers around about. It's a very positive feature of their forecourts.

[gavgavgav]

dasherdiablo1 said:

This really annoys me- we are all car nuts and here to look after each other. If people have had a bad experience why shouldn't they share it to protect others?

For example there is a very long running thread about BMWs being stolen- surely this is naming and shaming a marque. What a load of crap and double standards are in operation here.

Is it just me or would the forums be slightly better if some of the moderators took a chill pill?

I also find the naming and shaming rule annoying as I also wan tot know if a company is any good when after a recommendation, but ... I totally get it. It's too easy to have trial by internet by mis informed and mis guided people, rubbishing brands that someone may of worked hard to build. Totally open for litigation, the mods can't tell what is true or not.

Note that it is different if you post a link to a source from another website, like watchdog for example (which reported on the BMW problem).

[Big Al.]

Watchman said:

^^^ To be fair, you signed up to the PH rules when you joined, and that's one of them.

Yep as the man says also a brief note written by Ted stickied in Website Feedback forum sums up why we don't allow this.

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

So no N&S or the thread/post WILL be removed.

HTH explain.

[David87]

My neighbour seems to rate them. He went out of his way to buy his Discovery 4 from them.

[dasherdiablo1]

ucb said:

The best thing about Stratstone In my experience has been the location, giving easy access to all the other dealers around about. It's a very positive feature of their forecourts.

Am I missing something here?

[markcjd]

As with any franchise, in any industry, there will be good and bad. Within each garage there will then be good and bad staff. Stratstone had a Jag site next to ours in Aberdeen. They didn't seem too bad from what mutual customers mentioned and on the occasions we traded stock I had no issue at all.