Dealership experiences

[john wardman]

hi bought my xc70 from marshall volvo leeds last august,great experience had tracked this car for some months went in talked to craig sorted a test drive there and then got the car off the forecourt and on the road ,great enthusiasm and knowledge me dressed in jeans and polo shirt.
car now in at marshalls for service and mot advised needs new discs and pads,not happy as with the mileage I have done I don't think that I should be paying for this,they are however giving me a discount and loaning me a car,this niggle apart service and attitude fantastic

[1monkey600]

Originally Posted by john wardman

hi bought my xc70 from marshall volvo leeds last august,great experience had tracked this car for some months went in talked to craig sorted a test drive there and then got the car off the forecourt and on the road ,great enthusiasm and knowledge me dressed in jeans and polo shirt.
car now in at marshalls for service and mot advised needs new discs and pads,not happy as with the mileage I have done I don't think that I should be paying for this,they are however giving me a discount and loaning me a car,this niggle apart service and attitude fantastic

So you have had your car for a year. Did the car fail it's MOT for brakes or is the dealer just 'advising it'. Remember that generally, cars are only getting 'looked at' once a year, these days, so dealers tend to be much more cautious about things like that.
I certainly wouldn't be upset if a 2nd hand car lasted a year before needing service items.
Brakes on xc70 are very high use, particularly rear, and discs rarely last more than 2sets of pads

[Peter86]

My sister just got a newer car, 17,000 on the clock. Non Volvo dealer, very reputable brand though. Arranged everything and she went back to sign and they -
1 tried to charge the higher interest rate than agreed.
2 took original mats out and put new ones in, ones taken out were like new.
3 added supaguard to the bill although she had previously declined it and the car was already treated when new.
4 Told her she would have to pay for the next service in 3 months at nearly £300

Anyway her husband went in and got the manager to finish the sale and before he even complained the manager gave her 3 years free servicing and my brother in law got him to write it on headed paper and sign it.
The original mats were put back in, supaguard removed from the bill, interest rate dropped to agreed rate.

[biggbn]

I had a similar experience with interest rate. They tried to put my payments up by over £50 a month! Needless to say, car was not purchased

[I-S]

Since I will discuss some of this elsewhere, the dealers were:

1) Lexus
2) Mercedes
3) Tesla
4) Lexus
5) BMW
6) Infiniti

BMWs and Mercs felt much cheaper than they look. Lexus felt much more expensive than it looked. Lexus easily the best build and material quality in cabin, but strangely the Tesla felt much nicer to me than the BMW 7 (despite reputation saying otherwise). Infiniti almost a bad joke - the overhead console in the Q50 is the same one fitted to my Nissan Leaf. It's just about acceptable in the econobox that was built proper cheap in order to accomodate expensive EV bits at the time, but absolutely not in a "premium" model.

A couple of hilarious merc fails - the GLC can only be driven by those with no left foot, and the CLS (first gen) has no cupholders.

[biggbn]

Originally Posted by I-S

Since I will discuss some of this elsewhere, the dealers were:

1) Lexus
2) Mercedes
3) Tesla
4) Lexus
5) BMW
6) Infiniti

BMWs and Mercs felt much cheaper than they look. Lexus felt much more expensive than it looked. Lexus easily the best build and material quality in cabin, but strangely the Tesla felt much nicer to me than the BMW 7 (despite reputation saying otherwise). Infiniti almost a bad joke - the overhead console in the Q50 is the same one fitted to my Nissan Leaf. It's just about acceptable in the econobox that was built proper cheap in order to accomodate expensive EV bits at the time, but absolutely not in a "premium" model.

A couple of hilarious merc fails - the GLC can only be driven by those with no left foot, and the CLS (first gen) has no cupholders.

Lexus was best made car I owned, hands down

[MtillingVolvo]

This thread certainly is an interesting read....

I'm not based in the showroom myself now (look after ECommerce and Business Sales), but this was always my ethos when I was:

1) Make customer feel welcome/wanted/show interest in dealing with them

2) -Qualification -
Ask as many open ended questions as I could to glean as information from the customer as possible to identify requirements (I.e. What is important to you in your next car / what do you like (or not like) about your current car?

3) Present options to the customer to further qualify what they are looking for

4) Offer test drive in suitable vehicle

5) Once the correct vehicle(s) have been found then look at PX values/deal as a whole.

Within reason I didn't used to speak too much about price (other than to gain some general understanding of the budget to work with) as its a little pointless negotiating on a vehicle until you know if its suitable for your requirements.

I can't understand some of the experiences it sounds like some of you have had. At the end of the day (most) salespeople are on fairly low basic salaries and so have to sell to earn a sensible living.

On the flip side, we do get both extremes of customers; some who are genuinely nice people and a pleasure to deal with and others who are purposely derogatory to "mere salespeople". Some Salespeople can look past the bad experiences and ensure that there isn't any impact on future dealings with other potential customers... and some can't. This is the only rationale I can see and that people may get into bad habits when dealing with customers. It can be a slippery slope!

From a customers point of view our jobs look easy... deal with people and sell cars. The reality is that there are a lot of hoops we/the dealership have to jump through to ensure standards / processes are met. There is also a lot of paperwork behind the scenes to deal with, especially when any kind of finance is involved. Most of this is down to Compliance which has been born out of people being / feeling they have been mis-sold products (PPI anyone....?) but has filtered down to all kinds of finance now.

I always used to try and treat people as I would want to be treated... like 2 humans having a conversation..... if all salespeople could do this (and customers too...) then everyone (Salespeople and Customers) would probably be a lot happier!

[I-S]

Originally Posted by biggbn

Lexus was best made car I owned, hands down

Out of interest, what did you have?

My first experience of Lexus was in 1999 when my father was car shopping. We test drove several LS400 (mk3 and mk4) and the GS300 (mk2) - eventually he bought the E39 740iL instead, but Lexus was the only real contender (merc W140 just obscene, Jag X308 very cramped inside, Audi D2 very uncomfortable seats and suspension and extreme road noise). Ever since then I've had a soft spot for Lexus, and this process has really reinforced that. We drove RX450h, GS450h and GS250, and all very strong vehicles. Also very impressed sitting in the NX300h.

The GS450h is the one for us - so incredibly solidly made, beautiful to drive, serious oomph and real-world economy that matches our D5.

Mtilling - I sometimes wonder if you sold our car originally, as it came from your dealership (and still carries the plates).

Of course you're right, and there are ****hole customers too - I don't think we are that. I was immediately upfront with the salespeople that we're looking, in a slow process, sitting in cars, getting a feel, etc. Lexus and Tesla were keen to spend time on us, Merc made us feel unwelcome, BMW were "trump is great, buy this". Ultimately the dealership experiences of BMW and Merc didn't matter - we didn't like their products at all and even if the dealership experiences had been the best ever, we still wouldn't buy the car.

[MtillingVolvo]

Originally Posted by I-S

Mtilling - I sometimes wonder if you sold our car originally, as it came from your dealership (and still carries the plates).

Of course you're right, and there are ****hole customers too - I don't think we are that. I was immediately upfront with the salespeople that we're looking, in a slow process, sitting in cars, getting a feel, etc. Lexus and Tesla were keen to spend time on us, Merc made us feel unwelcome, BMW were "trump is great, buy this". Ultimately the dealership experiences of BMW and Merc didn't matter - we didn't like their products at all and even if the dealership experiences had been the best ever, we still wouldn't buy the car.

PM me your reg number and I'll tell you

I wasn't implying that anyone on here was / wasn't one of "those" customers... just trying to share input from the "other side"....it sounds like you were very up front with your position. A good salespeople would have done all they could to look after you and ensure that you didn't feel pressured, but while collecting relevant information. A bad salesperson would switch off and not give a s**t. Sounds like you experienced both ends of the spectrum!....

[biggbn]

Originally Posted by I-S

Out of interest, what did you have?

My first experience of Lexus was in 1999 when my father was car shopping. We test drove several LS400 (mk3 and mk4) and the GS300 (mk2) - eventually he bought the E39 740iL instead, but Lexus was the only real contender (merc W140 just obscene, Jag X308 very cramped inside, Audi D2 very uncomfortable seats and suspension and extreme road noise). Ever since then I've had a soft spot for Lexus, and this process has really reinforced that. We drove RX450h, GS450h and GS250, and all very strong vehicles. Also very impressed sitting in the NX300h.

The GS450h is the one for us - so incredibly solidly made, beautiful to drive, serious oomph and real-world economy that matches our D5.

Mtilling - I sometimes wonder if you sold our car originally, as it came from your dealership (and still carries the plates).

Of course you're right, and there are ****hole customers too - I don't think we are that. I was immediately upfront with the salespeople that we're looking, in a slow process, sitting in cars, getting a feel, etc. Lexus and Tesla were keen to spend time on us, Merc made us feel unwelcome, BMW were "trump is great, buy this". Ultimately the dealership experiences of BMW and Merc didn't matter - we didn't like their products at all and even if the dealership experiences had been the best ever, we still wouldn't buy the car.

I had a '97 ls400, 67k miles, fdsh, like new, silent, quick, remarkably frugal, cost grand sum of £1200 four or five years ago!!