This is the way a top class Dealership sells Skoda

[Alpha2110]

When I picked my car up I would have been happy if they had just done the PDI and removed the transport blocks, rather than the Swiss Tony sales man telling me the virtues of there new coffee mashine.

[Adenuf]

Got your money, now sod off until you want another one is the general impression I 've always received.

The flowers and other meaningless (IMO) gifts are all built into the price you pay for the car anyway.

 

I'd rather have an extra £20 off the purchase price, or something more than £5 of fuel

[Adenuf]

Quite a few cynics posting on this thread. :clap:

[Adenuf]

I got a key ring, just the one though so the spare had to have one from work

Just handed me two seperate  keys with nothing attached to them.

 

I actually had to ASK if they had a key fob, which after ferreting around he produced in a plastic bag and let me attach them myself.

 

Only a small thing but left totally unimpressed.

[Robjon]

No flowers from All Electric Skoda King's Heath.  No full tank of fuel.  No dramatic "reveal" of newly-purchased cars.

 

Just decent prices, sensible part-exchanges, exemplary PDI & handover, friendly staff and all-round excellent service.

I mean no disrespect to OP - but IMHO this is the way a top class dealership sells Skoda.

[Auric Goldfinger]

My local dealer in Harrogate arn't really intrested in selling me cars, I have to travel 75 miles to another dealer. I have just ordered a Vrs 230 from them and it was all done over the phone, 

[Adenuf]

I would be more than happy to purchase ANY car, make or model from a leaky roofed cowshed in the middle of a muddy field with straw on the floor, providing they gave excellent service, prices  and genuine concern to keep me happy both on purchase day and beyond.

 

You can stick the corporate image cups and matching saucers and fancy pants various coffees machines where the sun no longer shines.

A brew in an old chipped mug made with boiling water fresh off the 3 legged stove  supported by 50 old copies of Auto Express served by a decent honest genuine no frills witty salesperson wearing jeans and t shirt  will do for me thanks.

[Adenuf]

Mmmmmmmmmmmm. Have I just had a business idea ^^^^^^?  :sun:

[Skully]

No flowers from All Electric Skoda King's Heath. No full tank of fuel. No dramatic "reveal" of newly-purchased cars.

Just decent prices, sensible part-exchanges, exemplary PDI & handover, friendly staff and all-round excellent service.

I mean no disrespect to OP - but IMHO this is the way a top class dealership sells Skoda.

Whereas I found their salesman quite rude at times.

[Alpha2110]

The thing is most salesmen in the car game are dishonest, not all but most of them. The nature of what they do is to deceve, some call this salesmanship but at the very worse its dishonesty. Basicaly being trained to do anything to get a sale, even if this means telling lies.

When most people buy a car there nervious, its a big thing, car salesmen know this, they know you are at your most vulnerable. This is when they can confuse buy playing around with figures, they have been on many cources on how to do this. Even more so if your with your partner, they can play the situation especially when it comes to the options list. And most of the salesmen at big franchise garages are usually just rif raf in a suit, even worse are some of the idiots at car supermarket like motorpoint who follow you round doing the hard sell. I felt sorry for the guy, it turns out he use to work in a call centre, goes to show.

As you can tell i dislike salesmen immensely.

[Adenuf]

The thing is most salesmen in the car game are dishonest, not all but most of them. The nature of what they do is to deceve, some call this salesmanship but at the very worse its dishonesty. Basicaly being trained to do anything to get a sale, even if this means telling lies.

When most people buy a car there nervious, its a big thing, car salesmen know this, they know you are at your most vulnerable. This is when they can confuse buy playing around with figures, they have been on many cources on how to do this. Even more so if your with your partner, they can play the situation especially when it comes to the options list. And most of the salesmen at big franchise garages are usually just rif raf in a suit, even worse are some of the idiots at car supermarket like motorpoint who follow you round doing the hard sell. I felt sorry for the guy, it turns out he use to work in a call centre, goes to show.

As you can tell i dislike salesmen immensely.

....like slipping a £399 GAP insurance onto the finance docs without it being mentioned discussed or asked for, only realising the next day for instance. (separate thread on tha and quickly sorted) 

[Alpha2110]

....like slipping a £399 GAP insurance onto the finance docs without it being mentioned discussed or asked for, only realising the next day for instance. (separate thread on tha and quickly sorted)

I was asked to buy Williams ceramic coat and gap, and i said no. The car under closer inspection has it as its not been done right. So in one hand i got it for free, but its strange how they just assume your going to buy it. They did the same on my cousins lexus. Not to mention the kits cost 100 quid, i checked wiliams out at companies house, they have no conection to williams f1, they just pay royalty for the use of the name, compounding the fact its *******s. These treatments can be good but from the reading ive done on them how there applied makes all the difference, i dont see the dealer giving a monkeys on how its aplied, but how they can say lifetime garentee i do not know, mine dosent beed aswell, and i use the right shampoos. Edited 5 June, 2016 by Alpha2110

[Adenuf]

I was badgered and chased to within an inch of my life by the dealer when I bought my new Superb 2+ years ago.

 

They forced a leaflet into my hnd, and almost begged me to read it and seriously consider purchase of same.

Salesman even got the sales manager out to tell me just how much I'd potentially regret not purchasing it.

 

I had to be firm in the end, and told them that if they didn't back off I was going to walk right out of the showroom, RIGHT NOW.

 

Never mentioned it again funnily enough.

 

Horrible high pressure stuff though, and many would fall for it just to shut them up with their constant boring commision grabbing sales witterings.

[Gerrycan]

In late 2007 I was looking at buying a small relatively cheap diesel on a company lease.

Skoda had just opened in Australia and I went to have a look and despite it not being the cheapest alternative I ended up buying a Mk2 estate they had already landed here as part of their launch stock.

Same premises as the VW and the head salesperson was a very pleasant woman to deal with.

We had the 'voila' sheet reveal and got various bits of quite good quality Skoda merchandise (clothing, hats, key fobs etc) and was very happy with the fact it had not been a hard sell experience.

We chatted, and apart from learning that ours was the first one delivered to a customer for our state (South ​Australia), she seemed very interested to learn we were keen cyclists.

About a month later I got a phone call inviting my wife and I to the VIP stand at the finish line of a stage the annual local BIG cycle race the "Tour Down Under" (TDU) that Skoda had just announced a sponsorship deal with.

It is week long stage race which the locals support with 50,000 to 150,000 turning out each day. It has international recognition and as the first major event of the year many foreign teams attend with riders we usually only see on TV coverage of the Tours of Italy, France and Spain.

Fabulous day, free food, wine and got to shake hands with Miguel Indurain (retired 5 time TDF winner) but we had to rely on the interpreter. Really nice guy though and what I did like was that each time the race came by he excused himself from whoever he was with in the main stand (even our head politician at the time) to go into the crowd and cheer the cyclists.

Now THAT is how a dealership should sell Skoda!

 

PS Lance Armstrong came down here a couple of times as 'star' guest and also to start his career resurrection, but quite honestly he was just a complete knob.!

Edited 5 June, 2016 by Gerrycan

[Alpha2110]

I just got a vip pass yesterday for my local dealer, apparently the places are few, and i get a security pass, wow, vip. Now keeping in mind my car is 6 months old why the hell am i going to come and buy another one, i dident even buy it there anyway. why go through all the pretence of all this vip nonsense, its so cheep, who do they think there trying to kid. And do you think if a punter turned up he ,would be turned away.

Id rather they knocked a 5er of the first service.

[JohnMorr]

Some simple rules:

 

If you are trading in your old car, just keep saying "cost to change". Refuse to talk about what they're offering as the sale price on the new car you're buying, or what they are willing to take as the trade-in value of your current car - just keep saying "cost to change". They'll know what you mean.

 

If you are buying new, dispose of your old car privately then approach them on a cash-to-buy basis. But first go online to a raft of brokers and get a raft of online quotes. Up to you if you accept one, but a few sound too good to be true. Personally, I'd rather have a local dealer I can rely on. Then print the quotes out and take them with you when you go in to haggle. They'll see them on your lap and ask "what were you quoted?" Say: "I'm not saying. Give me your best offer". Make it clear you know exactly what the full list price is. If they ask what you're looking to pay, again don't answer. They'll then go away for 15 minutes to let you stew (it used to be to have a fag but now it's to to check the online brokers' prices. Have a jelly bean and read the paper. Your job is to be impassive throughout. (Actually, it's quite fun to outface them)

 

Then they will come back with some supposedly superior member of staff who is the only one supposedly authorised to offer a discount (I suspect they swap these roles around). He will hum and haw but should offer at least 10% off the list price - if not walk away. Quite an entertaining way of spending an hour or so.

 

Remember, you have the money and they want it. You have the whip hand. And don't fall for any of the extras (special coatings etc.) that they try to foist on you. Money for them, not value for you.

[Flying]

I have dealt over the years with many types of salesmen but it was the used car dealer in Arizona who had the best sense of humour in his dealing.  When I started the well-used Pontiac I could hear a deep knocking sound like a big end on the way out and when I stopped the engine I turned the ignition back on to see how long it took the oil light to illuminate - a long time.  I asked him if he had put treacle in the sump and he said 'No, sawdust - it's cheaper'.  He said 'Take it round the block' and I asked him if it would make it that far. He replied that it might.  Needless to say I didn't buy it but enjoyed the honest exchange!

[SkodaVRS1963]

As you can tell i dislike salesmen immensely.

 

Hmmm, I remember that my choice of vehicle immediately prior to my VRS was an Astra GTC BiTurbo.

 

Put £1k deposit down in February with a May delivery date.

 

Got an email from the dealer in May saying there were some delays due to "upgrades to the engine".

 

Ok.

 

Then I got another email in June saying "Vauxhall has tweaked the engine to comply with strict European standards and the tests have now passed those standards".

 

Ok.

 

And then later in June I got a phone call saying that the anticipated delivery date had been updated on the dealer's system to "NADD" (no anticipated delivery date) and Vauxhall could not / would not advise the dealer when they believe they can deliver.........would I like a refund as the car wasn't likely to materialise?

 

And the dealer was right.......Vauxhall pulled the plug on it.

 

So you get bad dealers and you get good dealers.  In my case, the poor Vauxhall guy was regally shafted by the manufacturer he was representing.

 

I felt sorry for him.  Lovely bloke and yet all he could do was shrug his shoulders and apologise profusely.

Edited 5 June, 2016 by SkodaVRS1963

[skd12]

My favourite dealer story is being called by the salesman that sold me my Koleos two years after I'd bought it. He told me there was a customer who had been into their showroom looking for a Koleos (there aren't loads of them around) and would I like to come in and have him value it. 

 

So, having nothing to do that weekend I drove to the dealership and let him value my car. He said its worth £x amount, what car would I have in mind to trade it in for? He wasn't best pleased when I said I'll sell you my car for that amount but don't want to buy another one just now