Pointless test drives

[robemcdonald]

Genuine question: why would you test drive a car you have no intention of buying?

In my experience arranging a test drive is a pain in the bum. To do it for a car I'm never going to buy, way too much time and effort. Do people genuinely have nothing better to do with their time?

[Phil Dicky]

I have done at the start of my car buying process, just to decide what I'm going to buy and discount other cars.

[Rick101]

I rarely do unless i'm very close to buying.

So much is made about 'timewasters' I'll often decline if I know that particular car isn't for me.

[HTP99]

When the manufacturer who I sell cars for does a national test drive promotion; take a test drive and receive a £10 M&S voucher, for example, it is amazing how many people will go to the effort to arrange a test drive for that voucher, the same names crop up again and again, sometimes they don't actually get anything apart from "the chance" to win something, ie being entered into a prize draw.

I remember one guy who put a request in to test drve a sport version of a car (requesting a drive in the sport version is always a giveaway) when a test drive promotion was running, we didnt run one as a demo so he said "oh a Coupe' will do" when I said we didn't have a Coupe' he said "well anything then", I just said I would contact him when we got a sport in as if that was what he was interested in; as per his enquiry, then he really should test drive the car that he was actually interested in purchasing, I binned the enquiry and have never heard from him again. Clearly he just wanted the freebie and a blast in a quick car.

Test drive promotions are a waste of time but the manufacturer sees them as bums on seats and something for the long haul however I've been where I am for long enough to know they don't work because if someone had bought something even 3 or 4 years later, it would flag up on our diary system and it never has.

[HTP99]

Phil Dicky said:

I have done at the start of my car buying process, just to decide what I'm going to buy and discount other cars.

That isn't pointless though as a test drive is part of the deciding process.

[rscott]

Must admit that I recently test drove a car even though I had no intention of buying it.
I was looking for a Z4 3.0i but the nearest was 90+ miles away, so I drove a 2.5i at a nearby dealer just to get a feel for the car.

[OldBuoy]

robemcdonald said:

Genuine question: why would you test drive a car you have no intention of buying?

In my experience arranging a test drive is a pain in the bum. To do it for a car I'm never going to buy, way too much time and effort. Do people genuinely have nothing better to do with their time?

Most people don't, some people are a little sad.
I've even arranged a demo drive for a birthday treat. Not a special model a boggo TDI for a middle aged man. (Wife phoned and organised it cheapskate )

We've all been in the situation where someone comes in and the question is "which cars are available for demo today"? Rather than an enquiry re a particular model.

I suppose it's the automotive equivalent of sitting through a timeshare presentation to get a "free" night out.

[robemcdonald]

Test driving as part of a decision making process is fine and something I do myself.

I was really thinking of this sort of thing:

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

To paraphrase "I test drove an i8. If I had the money (which i don't by the way) I would buy a faster version of my current car"

Later on in the same thread a different poster said (once again summarised): "I test drove a tesla, but would never buy one as I have nowhere to plug it in"

Why?

Note. I didn't post the question in that thread as there are enough people de-railing threads already without my joining in.

[Phil Dicky]

HTP99 said:

Phil Dicky said:

I have done at the start of my car buying process, just to decide what I'm going to buy and discount other cars.

That isn't pointless though as a test drive is part of the deciding process.

I have done it on a car I had no intention of buying due to its colour, but I was after that particular model. But I guess not quite what the OP was asking.

[philmots]

Test drive is the final thing I do before I commit to buy that particular car.

I always know what type of car I want next, never a bad enough model that a test drive would put me off buying one.

I did have someone waste my time completely with my ST220, went through the whole car, looked at everything, went out.. The car wanted for nothing! Then said he didn't want one in black. WTF?

It soon went after, but that's not the point.

[MKnight702]

Most of the test-drives mentioned above are not pointless though, yes you may not have wanted that particular vehicle, so for the seller it was a waste of time, but you used it to rule in or out a car from a shortlist.

There are pointless test drives, things like a Daewoo Matiz or Kia Soul or Toyota Prius, if you hate cars that much then you are buying on colour, trim or price, so how it drives is irrelevant.

[0000]

HTP99 said:

Test drive promotions are a waste of time but the manufacturer sees them as bums on seats and something for the long haul however I've been where I am for long enough to know they don't work because if someone had bought something even 3 or 4 years later, it would flag up on our diary system and it never has.

Out of interest, do you see if they buy one elsewhere?

[Vaud]

robemcdonald said:

Test driving as part of a decision making process is fine and something I do myself.

I was really thinking of this sort of thing:

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

To paraphrase "I test drove an i8. If I had the money (which i don't by the way) I would buy a faster version of my current car"

Later on in the same thread a different poster said (once again summarised): "I test drove a tesla, but would never buy one as I have nowhere to plug it in"

Why?

Note. I didn't post the question in that thread as there are enough people de-railing threads already without my joining in.

I think with the new technologies the manufacturers are happy to invest in getting as many people as possible driving them - there are so many misconceptions on the new techs, they want people trying and then talking about them.

The test drive events for these are relatively cheap influence positioning to future consumers.

[Hol]

I always thought that new car dealers all did a sneaky Google street level search of the postcode they were given by the customer. To see if their property matched their aspirations.


I have to say, I am not one for test driving a car purely out of curiousity.

But I have discounted a particular Make/Model after a genuine test drive with the intention of buying - as I just didn't like the way the car drove or another feature of the car (more than once).

So, I can see the appeal if you change cars frequently and have a wide pool of potential options to consider.

[robemcdonald]

Vaud said:

I think with the new technologies the manufacturers are happy to invest in getting as many people as possible driving them - there are so many misconceptions on the new techs, they want people trying and then talking about them.

The test drive events for these are relatively cheap influence positioning to future consumers.

I can see (to a certain extent) why a manufacturer would want this. A dealer less so though, for every test pilot they take out they could risk losing a genuine customer.
The question was why do people want to test drive a car they will never buy.
Using the i8 as an example. If I came into some cash it would definitely be on my list, but until that time I'm not going to waste a chunk of my free time essentially living out a fantasy for a 20 minute run around the block.

[anonymous-user]

I wasted an afternoon with Millwood looking at Caterhams, the man was very nice and let me waste his afternoon too... I had no intention of buying and I suspect he knew this too but it was an opportunity to close the showroom and go for a blat around Gloucestershire in the sun which I suspect he rahter enjoyed!

[HTP99]

0000 said:

HTP99 said:

Test drive promotions are a waste of time but the manufacturer sees them as bums on seats and something for the long haul however I've been where I am for long enough to know they don't work because if someone had bought something even 3 or 4 years later, it would flag up on our diary system and it never has.

Out of interest, do you see if they buy one elsewhere?

Fair point however you would expect one or two to buy from yourself and as I said the same names tend to crop up too.

[bigee]

You always see advice given on here when someone posts about car buying along the lines of "test drive as many as you can"....

[Vaud]

robemcdonald said:

I can see (to a certain extent) why a manufacturer would want this. A dealer less so though, for every test pilot they take out they could risk losing a genuine customer.
The question was why do people want to test drive a car they will never buy.
Using the i8 as an example. If I came into some cash it would definitely be on my list, but until that time I'm not going to waste a chunk of my free time essentially living out a fantasy for a 20 minute run around the block.

With Tesla the dealer is also the manufacturer and I partly agree.

I would never waste a dealers time. But if the manufacturer puts on an open event then I would be tempted to try one whilst being open that it was a test drive without me being in a position to buy, and allow them to say no...

[jamieduff1981]

rscott said:

Must admit that I recently test drove a car even though I had no intention of buying it.
I was looking for a Z4 3.0i but the nearest was 90+ miles away, so I drove a 2.5i at a nearby dealer just to get a feel for the car.

I've done this sort of thing very occassionally in the past.

When all your cars are pretty cheap and they're all fundamentally the same old front wheel drive diesel hatchback type thing there is no point. When looking to spend larger sums on more focused cars a test drive can discount a car immediately. That's possibly why I've never owned a type of car I didn't like whereas many on PH hate their cars.

Looks etc are important to me, but so are the attributes you only get from driving the car. I want to know long before being ready to sign on the dotted line whether I like the way a more driver focussed car drives. A Porsche 997 and a TVR Sagaris are very different propositions. It seems silly to me to think you want something like that and arrange the money to hand over without ever having driven one.