Arnold Clark - attempting to succeed with marketing?

[BenS94]

I've just heard the latest radio advert Arnold Clark are churning out and I just had to drop everything and start this topic.

"Arnold Clark - Home of the best deal guarentee!" They say. Yes, maybe poor is the best they can offer, which is how they get away with it.

Before placing a deposit on my "achievable" dream car after being left some money by my dearly missed gran, I, naturally did plenty of shopping around. My current car is in quite substantial negative equity, and I'm at my wits end with it, so I've had to take part exchange prices in to account when searching.

According to them, before taking in to account the marked wheels, slight dents, a worn tyre and a few scratches (it's really quite clean, but it pays to be realistic) it's worth just over £6,000. I've secured £7,500 for mine at a local prestige dealer - who walked round it, but didn't really need to as I was shouting out all issues as he was looking.

All of their cars seem to be "High Price" on Auto Trader. In comparison, for an equivalent car (same price for a 6 month newer 2.0 with no options, mine is a 3.0 with many boxes ticked), my cost to change through Arnold Clark would be around £2,500 dearer before tax, fuel and any other add ons, and the car would need to be brought in to the local branch which would take a week, and I'd probably reject it anyway.

Losing Ford and Toyota have really hit them hard I think. I must say, I know many staff members at my local (former Ford, now Motorstore) branch, and I sincerely hope when our new Ford dealership opens, they will see sense and migrate there as it's only half a mile down the road.

[BenS94]

750turbo said:

BenS94 said:

I've just heard the latest radio advert Arnold Clark are churning out and I just had to drop everything and start this topic.

"Arnold Clark - Home of the best deal guarentee!" They say. Yes, maybe poor is the best they can offer, which is how they get away with it.

Before placing a deposit on my "achievable" dream car after being left some money by my dearly missed gran, I, naturally did plenty of shopping around. My current car is in quite substantial negative equity, and I'm at my wits end with it, so I've had to take part exchange prices in to account when searching.

According to them, before taking in to account the marked wheels, slight dents, a worn tyre and a few scratches (it's really quite clean, but it pays to be realistic) it's worth just over £6,000. I've secured £7,500 for mine at a local prestige dealer - who walked round it, but didn't really need to as I was shouting out all issues as he was looking.

All of their cars seem to be "High Price" on Auto Trader. In comparison, for an equivalent car (same price for a 6 month newer 2.0 with no options, mine is a 3.0 with many boxes ticked), my cost to change through Arnold Clark would be around £2,500 dearer before tax, fuel and any other add ons, and the car would need to be brought in to the local branch which would take a week, and I'd probably reject it anyway.

Losing Ford and Toyota have really hit them hard I think. I must say, I know many staff members at my local (former Ford, now Motorstore) branch, and I sincerely hope when our new Ford dealership opens, they will see sense and migrate there as it's only half a mile down the road.

"Business in attempting to make a profit scandal"

I'm not against any business making a profit - thats the nature of the beast. I am however, pulling them up on their pretty intense advertising campaign full of lies.

[BenS94]

bugo said:

Once had Arnold Clark refusing to negotiate at all despite clearly listing something over-priced, but the weirdest part was them calling me back a week later to change their mind.

Cool story brah etc I know, but I just formed the opinion that their MO was to price pretty high and see who might pay it. Some places are like that I suppose, but it was just a bit perplexing at the time.

Thats what I was thinking, too.

With all "faults" declared on my part exchange, that dropped the price to £5,200. Frightening considering they could retail it for up to £12,000!

[BenS94]

bugo said:

BenS94 said:

Thats what I was thinking, too.

With all "faults" declared on my part exchange, that dropped the price to £5,200. Frightening considering they could retail it for up to £12,000!

You just have to move on though. Like anything you don't agree with, just don't support it and wherever possible and asked for an opinion encourage the same from friends/family.

Life's too short but there are plenty of car supermarket style places all pushing the "you'll be safe with us" malarkey and that's one way to do business if you lay it on thick and convincingly enough but it never feels like the nicest one when all is said and done.

Others will support it as "but it doesn't matter if you know your stuff, and let someone who doesn't have a clue get bent over" without knowing that there are countless other areas of their (or the people they care about's) lives that they are getting rodded on due to not having the knowledge or visibility. Simply wouldn't happen if everyone was a bit more honest but capitalism doesn't really correct for that until people really take the piss.

Nothing new under the sun.

I think I hold such an issue with it as I've been done over by dealers before - one fully knowing they were going bust, running away with £4,868.75 which I have not got back 4 years on.

[BenS94]

mmm-five said:

Here are the Terms and Conditions if you want to go over it with a fine-toothed comb, so you know what you're moaning about to the Advertising Standards Authority...

Terms & Conditions
https://www.arnoldclark.com/best-deal-guarantee/te...

Checklist
https://www.arnoldclark.com/best-deal-guarantee/ab...

Claim form
https://www.arnoldclark.com/best-deal-guarantee/cl...

That to me is so much hassle for little gain, with many hoops to jump through. Clearly to put people off in the first place.

[BenS94]

Driver101 said:

Arnold Clark are usually at the cheaper side of the market. Too often you'll find the reason that many of their cars are cheaper.

I know people who have - more than once in one case after they wouldn't refund, but said they'd replace - left with a worse car!

[BenS94]

biggbn said:

Had four cars from Arnold Clark, cracking deals and after sales. Just. For. Balance.

I personally have had 6 and any issues were dealt with very quickly.

[BenS94]

Driver101 said:

BenS94 said:

Driver101 said:

Arnold Clark are usually at the cheaper side of the market. Too often you'll find the reason that many of their cars are cheaper.

I know people who have - more than once in one case after they wouldn't refund, but said they'd replace - left with a worse car!

I know they are a big company, but the amount of people I know that have had serious issues with AC tells me all I need to know.

When an engineer came out to inspect a car a friend was trying to reject he had the opinion AC were the worst dealer by a huge margin. AC inspections were by far the most common and some of the cars they sold were in embarrassing condition.

I will admit 3 bad experiences have left me in a situation where I'm overly paranoid and I'm on high alert for issues. Frustrating and depressing, if I'm honest.