MattW

This is not a n RS vs scoob debate, ok?

Mate of mine is looking to replace his car.

Won't bore you with the list but here's the results.

Subaru
Nice showroom, stocked with WRX, STi(non-prodrive-sold on windscreen in case anyone asks!), Forester Sport.
Salesman approaches dressed in smart suit, big smile, outstretched hand.
Mate talks WRX's asks whether there is a demo for a spin (never driven one before). Salesman says only for 20 mins as he is expecting customer at 2:30. It's now 2:10. Off he goes for drive with Salesman, who apologises for short run, and promises at least 45 min drive with demo of features if mate can return. Brochure given, cards exchanged, etc etc. Mate happy bunny, enthusing about driving a proper car. (he's got a 206GTI)

Ford
I'll skip the description of the showroom, but assume brown carpet stains are coffee!. Hang round showroom for 10 mins, receptionist chatting on phone, sales guys walking in and out riskly looking important, before scruffy salesman (no jacket, unironed shirt, tie not straight, top button undone) asks whether we are ok.
Mate asks for details of RS. Salesman says he has no brochures but does have the autocar review. Mate says fine, he'll take that. Salesman points out he can read it but can't take it as it is his only copy. This was said with a straight face while standing next to a photocopier!
Salesman says, the car is £19995 list, but their cars will be more expensive becuse of DiamondBrite paint finish(any good?), GAP insurance (Mate is paying cash ), and because they will be so sought after, they can charge more(supply and demand you see[img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img] ).
Then, and I still can't believe this, the guy says, everyone is excited about a new RS model, but as he's not 'into' cars, he can't get worked up about it. FFS when you take your polished Focus RS for a service, if their mechanics aren't 'into' cars either, maybe they won't be arsed looking after it properly either.

Suffice to say we made hasty exit, onto next marque!

I know it's been some time since Ford have had to sell a performance car, but at this rate they'll struggle to shift any!!

Paulo P

iTrader: (42)

Typical for ford I have a puma and the ford mechanics don't know their ***** from their elbows [img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img] they put a faulty gearbox in my car and said no fault found until it blew up they then admitted to my brother (ex ford) that it was the wrong box and couldn't handle the power I told them that after half hour driving the car but they didn't listen I like fords to drive but the dealers are 5hite [img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img]

Paul

RB5320

I was really interested in buying the Focus RS and went to the dealer close to you Paul - rhymes with Pratts! Registered my interest (this was in about March). Never heard a word from them. Rang up Dagenham directly. Again registered my interest. Not a thing. They seem to take the attitude that unless you are prepared to constantly contact them to try to drag information out of them, you are not worthy of buying their product. So bought RB5 instead.

beemerboy

Hahaha - same old story.

I used to work for Fords (85-92) and obviously took advantage
of the cheap employee prices.
However, even with employees, the sales and service was pants
I even caught some workshop engineer sitting on the bonnet of my car, eating his sarnies, when i went to pick it up, from a first service.

I cant repeat what i said, but it was just random expletives.

They dont deserve you hard earned cash, leave them with their autocar mags, and let someone else have the priveledge of actually being able to buy one.

For god's sake, its always the same, when you dont have cash, these people hound you, the minute you actually want to buy one, they make it the hardest thing on the planet.

Stay Clear!!!

BB

RB170

Earlier this year my wife and I were looking to replace her 206. She wanted to look at a puma so off to the Ford dealer in Harlow we trotted.

OMFG what a bunch of to55ers, she wanted a black 1.6 but apparently it's not recommended for women??? eh? and it's really only available in red and awight guv can I interested you in thi luvly little mota ???

We eneded up getting the f*ck out quickly and going back to Peugeot to get a 206GTi.

It's not exactly what she wanted but given the performance from the Ford reps we will NEVER buy a Ford.

Mike

CLSII

Ford..ahh Ford

Got a great deal and bought a Fiesta zetec as a second car from a local Ford dealer. I was so pleased with the deal I told a work colleague of my good fortune. He was impressed and went to the same dealership for a similar deal. The sales people then branded me a liar, stupid and basically off my f>>>ing head for even suggesting to him that I got the deal I did. I found this out later when talking to my workmate...I produced the invoice for the car and he apologised for even thinking I'd misled him!

Then again the dealership told me they'd serviced it. When it neede its next service I found another independent dealer. I was 'surprised' to find it had been neglected to say the least and the things the Ford dealer had promised would be done weren't .

Why does this still happen...it's not far from criminal behaviour

AJ Whites, Subaru dealers in Blackburn whilst being a bit put out/shocked initially by the price I paid for my Holland import MY00 were nothing but courteous and the service provided was excellent.

Would I buy another Ford?.....Am I saving for another Subaru...?

Answers on a postcard please!

cookiemonster

at the end of last year i sold my ITR to buy a track / race car and something to tow it with. We looked at bmw, ford, vauxhall, VW, volvo, audi (which we eventually settled for) and a few others. The difference in how we were treated was incredible - at one extreme bmw & audi, the first thing they ask is what do you take in your coffee ? while at vauxhall we couldnt get any salesmen to talk to us - they were all standing around having a chat with each other. Amazing.

Ford were pretty awful too - we were interested in a mondeo diesel hatchback (yeah, yeah, i know) but they didnt have one for demo, couldnt get one for demo, didnt know power, towing capacity or whether they could fit a tow bar, etc, etc.

Like someone says above, if thats the way they act before they get your cash how much are they going to care afterwards ?

So i'll have white, no sugar, and an A4 Tdi

MarkO

Our experiences of dealers leave a lot to be desired. When we were looking at replacing the STI, only Jaguar came close to the kind of service I'd expect when buying a car costing the best part of £30k. [img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img]

Audi - we went into the dealership on a Sunday, and although I wasn't expecting to get a test-drive without booking one, I also didn't expect to have to stand in the reception calling out "is anybody there!!!" for 10 minutes before a salesman actually showed his face.

I told him we'd looked at an X-Type, and were impressed, but wanted to see the alternatives. I explained we'd be spending around 28-30k. The guy didn't bother explaining the model range (just gave me a brochure to read) and didn't make any suggestions of what car we should look at (A4 or A6). There was a car in the showroom, but it had low trim levels - but in the entire dealership (a large one) they didn't have a single car I could look at which would show me the upper levels of trim/finishing quality. He did disappear off to have a look for something suitable, but after 15 minutes we gave up and walked out.

Totally useless!!!

BMW weren't much better, but our neighbours have a worse story - having looked at a replacement car for the lady (she bought an MGF in the end), the salesman gave the documents and finance information to the husband, saying "I'll give these to you, as your wife won't understand them". [img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img]

It seems strange that in this day and age, salesman are prepared to treat people like that when they're an easy sale. I mean, if the Audi guy had impressed me, I could well have given him the £28k of cash that I ended up spending at Jaguar....

MarkCSC

Yeap Ford are ****e.
Went with a female friend of mine to pick up her Galaxy. Bloody expensive to service in the first place but they justified it by listing all the things they had done and checked. Shame they didin't notice that none of the brake lights worked or there was no fluid in the window washer and it was down on coolant.

Mark
PS
DiamondBrite is crap. The sales people get more commission from it than selling the cars, that's why they push it so much. My girlfriend used to work for Alfa

Paulo P

iTrader: (42)

I also had a mondeo years ago and it took them a month to do a starter motor when I picked the car up I took it to a jet wash to get the mechanics dirty hand prints off of it and found the paint on the wing and bonnet to be chipped and damaged [img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img] needless to say I took it straight back and lost it for another week while they re-painted it [img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img]

FORD ARE 5HITE [img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img] GRRRR

Reidy2

Porsche are rubbish on the sales side, arrogant 30 somethings that look down their noses at you. I hate it when ****** salesmen with crap haircuts that are paid half as much as me look at me on a Saturday in their showroom just because I am wearing jeans and a t-shirt like I'd never be able to afford a porsche.

Bunch of a@*eholes!

MattW

I'd be interested to know whether anyone else has beeb quoted a higher than list price for the RS???

DavidBrown

Porsche / Ferrari didn't have brochures for the GT2 or 360 Spider

How on earth am I supposed to find out if I want one !!

RichB

Lets not get too excited, Subaru dealers are just as bad, my local dealer in Ferndown would allow me to test drive, didn't come back with a px figure and never bothered to contact me again, my money was burning a hole in my bank so I bought an STi from Japan
So long Cr4pelgate... to$$ers

NDT

I went to Storm Lotus ion Leicester a few years ago to test drive an Elise 111S and was treated with total contempt. Something to do with not immediately putting down a deposit after the test drive, and "if we'd realised you weren't serious we wouldn't have let you drive it".
OK I was "only" 27 but was a strategy consultant and could easily afford the car...

Later went to TMS in Melton to test drive a TVR - brilliant service, no hassle at all.

Didn't end up buying either (went for an STi...) but if I buy a TVR I'll go straight back to TMS; if I buy a Lotus, I'll go anywhere but Storm.

There was a long running series of letters in Autocar yeasr ago about people going to BMW dealers and being treated like crap because they weren't smartly dressed. Well surprise surprise, you wear a suit all week, would you wear it on a Saturday to go to the car showroom?

Half of these losers need to go bankrupt when block exemption ends.
Good riddance. The bad dealers add no value to any part of the car buying / owning process.

The Zohan

Friend of mine popped intro his local Lotus Dealership, the dealership had around 9 Elise’s, 4 new and 5 second-hand. It was also quite empty apart from my friend and his parents. His parents where really paying for the car as a 21st birthday pressie, he was driving his 1 year old MR2, parents came along in their year old XJR, both on private plates - these are people who have money to spend. My friend enquired as to what they had available, explained he wanted an Elise and the asked about a test drive, the salesman told him he would have to book one as they get a lot of people coming in off of the street to dive the Elise. My friend explained that if he likes it he would do the deal then and there. The salesman smiled and said he would have to book it. His father then got involved an explained that his son was really after an Elise and if he liked it he would be buying one. Salesman did not budge, could not hand over a brochure as they only had a couple left. What a ****, what are the brochures there for?

The arrogance of the dealership, it was almost empty, they had the cars available and could not spot a potential customer if he fell over them, their loss.

Anyway
They left there disgusted, ended up going into the local BMW garage, bought a new Z3 2.0l, he is now 27 and driving his second driving a Z3M

NDT

there's a new Lotus dealership in Northampton now (Orchard) - hope they destroy Storm!
whereabouts did your friend visit a dealer?

Stevep

Just another quick thing about Ford.

Had my car serviced a short while ago and I have a cd holder on my sun visor.
The car was in there all day having brakes done etc.

The next day I wanted to play one of my new cd's. Was not there. I'm sure it was there the day before I dropped it in for a service. I thought I would check indoors, my cousin may have taken inside to listen to. Nope she had not touched it.
The only thing I can think of is some at ford have stolen it and a couple of others I now can't find. Very annoyed and won't be getting it serviced there anymore even though I cannot prove anything, but everything points to them.
Come to think of it they did look a little dodgy when I picked it up.
Anyway just needed to tell someone got it off my chest now.
Oh and one of the cd's is an import from Australia which I can't get over here. B4stards!!!!

Steve

The Zohan

NDT

They live in a Village called Elmesthorpe, nr Hinckley, not sure which dealership, imagine in Leicester or Notts.

Can find out if you like.

Paul

NDT - Just read your post, i would imagine it is Storm by the sound of things, Tw@ts!

[Edited by Paul Habgood - 9/19/2002 1:56:40 PM]

The Zohan

When buying my last scoob i looked at the following, went dressed in Jeans and a polo shirt as that is what i wear most of the time, casual look.

BMW, 3 series 325CI, 1 y/o model - BMW garage treated me well and where pretty good, offered a test drive and took all my details, followed up on me later to see what i had done.

Alfa Romeo, 155 3ltr - Ignored me for 15 mins, could not supply a brochure logo fell out of the centr of the steering wheel whilst i was sat in the showroom model, good old Alfa build quality in the end i walked out after 25+ mins of having the receptionist tell me someone would be with me in a minute.

Mercedes, (saw a nice 1 y/o 230 coupe) - Polite and helpful, drove the car just not really my thing. The only Merc's i liked cost 30K+ out of my range

Vauxhall, Vectra GSI - in all fairness, could not get another Vauxhall, had a Vectra at the time, previously had an Astra. Astra OK, Vectra however was a right dog and the worst dealer service in the entire world!

Honda, Accord Type R - Good to deal with and helpful offered a test drive with couple of days. Had a Civic VTI for a while, dealers always helpful and treated me/car well

Subaru, MY99 Turbo - Polite, helpful and once i drove the car that was all she wrote. not had any problem with the dealership in 58K miles of motoring in fact they went out of their way to help me on a couple of ocasions.



[Edited by Paul Habgood - 9/19/2002 2:27:37 PM]

Woz

when I went to pangbourne (great dealership) to buy my scoob, I was hinted at by the sales guy that they were having trouble sourcing cars...new and 2nd hand. This kinda made me think about the bad experiences highlighted above, and experienced personally with non interested dealers. The long and short of it is the dealer doesn't want a forecourt with 2 cars on it. If hes got 7 spots and no likely delivery coming up, he's in no hurry to make the spot free...however much cash u flash, cos his forecourt will look...well crap. Would you stop and look at a delaer with 2 cars, or one with 7 cars?
So if its a good car, the dealer knows it will go today, tommorrow, next week....my explanation. and I have nothing to do with selling cars, just got the hint.

So u might just pick the wrong day. This kinda make more sense to me now, thinking about how audi, vw, bmw have treated me in the past. They have to wait 3 mnth somethimes for delivery, as cars are limited to the uk (high residuals). Can't explain Ford, they have millions of cars lying around....oh yeh...maybe they are just CRAP!

jasey

Looking for a car for the wife a few years ago - decided that a polo / Fiesta would be best for town run around - cash in pocket we headed off to the local dealers. First stop VW Garage - Wife saw the car - liked it - decided we were going to buy. As I was paying cash asked the guy if there was any discount available - To$$er replies (with that look you get from the wife when you fart lodly in church during a wedding) "Oh we don't give discount - we find these cars pretty much sell them selves" to which I reply "Well it aint F*cking well selling itself to me" - Walked out and onto the ford dealership where we bought the first of the wife's three fiestas !

Back to Ford - 15 years ago used to work for Hertz Car Leasing and Ford invited us down to one of their factories to see the cars being made - During the tour we rounded a corned to be met with one of the production line workers busily sleeping on a bench and the cars he was supposed to be working on passed through

I'm sure they are much better now

Little Miss WRX

The Ford dealer I bought my two cars off was fantastic in the sales area. The salesman gave me great discounts, both cars turned up on time and were perfect.

After sales? Forget it that particular dealership was sh1te IMHO.

Miles

Another Jag story, not that I was really in the market for an X-type, but after hearing MarkO's stories about his Jag, I popped round to the local Aberdeen dealer. Dressed a bit scruffy, 3 days growth, jeans and bright yellow Banzai T-shirt. Guy was nice as pie and let me take out a model for a 20minute test drive. Impressed.

On a side note, my old man was in the motor trade in Aberdeen for twenty years, and he says NEVER go by what people wear....