Pre Registered Vehicle Purchase

[joey0027]

Good morning

I am hoping that somebody can put our minds to rest with regards to a pre registered vehicle that we recently purchased from a main dealer.

At the time of purchase, we were advised that the car had been registered to the dealer to meet sales targets just 6 days prior. This was fine, the car was as new with the mileage still in single figures.

Yesterday however, we received the registration document only to find that the car wasn't pre registered to the dealer but to a company not associated with vehicle sales who we have never heard of. I did a little research last night & found that the Director of the dealership is also a Director of the company mentioned on the registration document.

Has something underhand happened here or is this normal practice when it comes to pre registered vehicles? What concerns us is that we paid the dealer in full when on paper it wasn't in fact their vehicle to sell.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks.

[marshalla]

Registered keeper is not the same as owner. It even says that on the V5.

What is your evidence that the vehicle did not belong to the dealership or was not being legitimately sold by them on behalf of the other company ?

[markmullen]

The dealer has registered it to another company so it appears to the manufacturer as a legitimate registration, some manufacturers are jumpy about pre-regs.

[750turbo]

markmullen said:

The dealer has registered it to another company so it appears to the manufacturer as a legitimate registration, some manufacturers are jumpy about pre-regs.

I have seen this happening in the past also, but the Manufacturer was adamant that it did not appear as a pre-reg, so it was registered to A N Other (employee) of the Dealer.

Possibly massaging the figures, but if the purchaser makes a few quid at the end of the day...

[joey0027]

marshalla said:

Registered keeper is not the same as owner. It even says that on the V5.

What is your evidence that the vehicle did not belong to the dealership or was not being legitimately sold by them on behalf of the other company ?

I have no doubt that the vehicle belonged to the dealership, I am just concerned as to why it was registered to a third party.

[joey0027]

markmullen said:

The dealer has registered it to another company so it appears to the manufacturer as a legitimate registration, some manufacturers are jumpy about pre-regs.

Thank you. Would the manufacturer have access to the DVLA database to establish as to whether a vehicle had been registered to a dealership or another company/individual. I read somewhere about pre reg cars sometimes being registered to a third party in order to obtain a fleet bonus from the manufacturer..could this be the case?

[joey0027]

750turbo said:

I have seen this happening in the past also, but the Manufacturer was adamant that it did not appear as a pre-reg, so it was registered to A N Other (employee) of the Dealer.

Possibly massaging the figures, but if the purchaser makes a few quid at the end of the day...

Thank you. We saved a few quid, not a great deal but every little helps!

[BOBTEE]

I worked in a dealership where the garage was called one thing and the Co. running it was called something else, which could explain your third party name. I wouldn't be too worried, just the dealership trying to meet quotas/bonus.

[joey0027]

BOBTEE said:

I worked in a dealership where the garage was called one thing and the Co. running it was called something else, which could explain your third party name. I wouldn't be too worried, just the dealership trying to meet quotas/bonus.

Thank you.

[New POD]

joey0027 said:

markmullen said:

The dealer has registered it to another company so it appears to the manufacturer as a legitimate registration, some manufacturers are jumpy about pre-regs.

Thank you. Would the manufacturer have access to the DVLA database to establish as to whether a vehicle had been registered to a dealership or another company/individual. I read somewhere about pre reg cars sometimes being registered to a third party in order to obtain a fleet bonus from the manufacturer..could this be the case?

Yes. If you could only see the accounts, you'd know that the dealer made almost no profit on that car, but got some "loyalty bonuses", for achieving some pre-agreed sales targets to keep a factory (most likely in another country) on 3 shifts, thus meaning that the fixed costs were spread across more cars.

It's another version of the BL field really, except spread around the dealers of the world.

[CarlT]

joey0027 said:

markmullen said:

The dealer has registered it to another company so it appears to the manufacturer as a legitimate registration, some manufacturers are jumpy about pre-regs.

Thank you. Would the manufacturer have access to the DVLA database to establish as to whether a vehicle had been registered to a dealership or another company/individual. I read somewhere about pre reg cars sometimes being registered to a third party in order to obtain a fleet bonus from the manufacturer..could this be the case?

Not the DVLA database, but the manufacturers own system would show who it was registered to. In this instance it sounds like your cars has been registered to the Holding Company of the dealership or similar. Not an issue at all.

[djdestiny]

Does this mean that you are then buying a brand new car yet are the 2nd owner on the V5?
I wouldn't be too happy about that personally

[Mandat]

djdestiny said:

Does this mean that you are then buying a brand new car yet are the 2nd owner on the V5?
I wouldn't be too happy about that personally

That's the whole point of pre-reg cars and it is why they are usually cheaper.

Also, the V5 doesn't list owners, jusat registered keepers.

[Jim AK]

djdestiny said:

Does this mean that you are then buying a brand new car yet are the 2nd owner on the V5?
I wouldn't be too happy about that personally

Yes. In theory the car has a '1st owner' but I cannot see any reason it should make you unhappy. I did it years ago on 1 the dealer registered to their holding company.

I assume you are worried about when you sell it on it will affect value? Unlikely in my view & in all fairness if it did, well you saved when you bought it. Assuming you keep it for more than a year I don't think anyone will bat an eyelid.

As previously stated a dealer will do it to get a bonus from the manufacturer, of some considerable value to them, then sell on with a discount as a Pre registered unit. You will see on the V5 when it was 1st registered too so will know how long it's been on the forecourt.

Only possible issue I can see would be with manufacturers that offer 'Lifetime' warranties as I believe some are non transferable, so only apply to 1st owner.

[SteBrown91]

djdestiny said:

Does this mean that you are then buying a brand new car yet are the 2nd owner on the V5?
I wouldn't be too happy about that personally

A pretty reg car with 1 owner after would not put me off at all. Don't see what the problem is other than you may have lost a month or 2 of warranty

[SV8Predator]

djdestiny said:

Does this mean that you are then buying a brand new car yet are the 2nd owner on the V5?
I wouldn't be too happy about that personally

It's not brand new, it's a used car with (presumably) one previous owner and priced as such.

Pre-registered cars are often 'sub-standard' in that they have need a repair that means that they cannot really be sold as new. So they repair them and then register them. They are still usually showing just delivery mileage.

[eybic]

I've not known of any "sub standard" cars being sold as pre-reg. I'm sure they do this but I would say this is definitely the minority. The reason 99% of the time is to meet targets.

[Engineer1]

New POD said:

joey0027 said:

markmullen said:

The dealer has registered it to another company so it appears to the manufacturer as a legitimate registration, some manufacturers are jumpy about pre-regs.

Thank you. Would the manufacturer have access to the DVLA database to establish as to whether a vehicle had been registered to a dealership or another company/individual. I read somewhere about pre reg cars sometimes being registered to a third party in order to obtain a fleet bonus from the manufacturer..could this be the case?

Yes. If you could only see the accounts, you'd know that the dealer made almost no profit on that car, but got some "loyalty bonuses", for achieving some pre-agreed sales targets to keep a factory (most likely in another country) on 3 shifts, thus meaning that the fixed costs were spread across more cars.

It's another version of the BL field really, except spread around the dealers of the world.

This that sale could mean they get bigger discounts next quarter or a bonus or higher up the assignement list for a desireable vehicle.
The Pre-reg may have been a demo vehicle, or it could just have been the one they needed to get to meet a sales target.

[markmullen]

SV8Predator said:

It's not brand new, it's a used car with (presumably) one previous owner and priced as such.

Pre-registered cars are often 'sub-standard' in that they have need a repair that means that they cannot really be sold as new. So they repair them and then register them. They are still usually showing just delivery mileage.

Put the tinfoil hat down and step away from the computer. You couldn't be more wrong. In my 11 years of selling cars I've never seen a "sub-standard" car dressed up as a pre-reg.

What really happens is dealers get so much margin to play with on a car, at Mercedes for example it was 8%, so a £100k car comes to the dealer for £92k. In addition if the dealer hits the targets the manufacturer sets (including but not limited to number of units sold, correct demonstrator spread, CSI scores, mystery shop scores, dealer standards (how the showroom looks etc) and often manufacturer's finance penetration) then they get a bonus, applied retrospectively to all cars in that quarter.

If you have ticked all the boxes apart from the number of units sold, and the end of the quarter is coming, you might register a few to yourself, or another company, to count as sales. That hits your target for the quarter and applies the retro bonus (back end money) to the whole of the cars you've sold in the quarter. As you can imagine if it is a busy dealership selling plenty of new cars, and suddenly you get an extra 2.5% across all the deals you've done it is worth it.

From a customer's PoV you get essentially a new car, albeit with a registered keeper, for much less than a brand new car.

The downside from a dealership's point of view is you have to pay for the cars as you register them (the dealer lends you them for usually 180 days to sell them), regardless of who you register them to, so if you register a load of cars you've got to have the funds for it. In addition you enter the next quarter with these pre-reg cars to shift in addition to the new car target for the quarter, customers rarely want to spend more than necessary so they'll buy the pre-reg in preference to the new car, which means you're a few units down approaching the end of the quarter, so you end up pre-reging a few more to hit your target....... ad infinitum. Having to pre-reg cars to hit targets has sunk quite a few dealer groups over the years.

[Ozzie Osmond]

^^^^

+1 to both of the posts above - nothing remotely dodgy about pre-reg.