Dear Skoda UK

 

I want to order a new Octavia Estate 245 with a couple of nice factory options.  I have used your online configurator to spec the car to my requirements.  This will be my third vRS and I will be using your PCP financial services as I have done in the past.

 

I have done my research and used your parent company (VW) website to give me an estimated CAP value of my trade in.  I have also used Drivethedeal to see what kind of discount I could expect.  I am a serious buyer and have done my sums.

 

So with all this information, I trotted along to my local dealer to say this is what I wanted spec wise and was upfront with my ideal target cost to change (Skoda finance contribution, trade in and discount).  This was met with the usually scoffing - you'll never get that etc.  I appreciate with negotiation (unlike BREXIT) there will be a bit of to-ing and fro-ing but to say the dealer was downright rude was an understatement.  When I finally got the dealer to talk about money they completely blanked me and refused to quote for what I wanted and subsequently tried to force a model on me that they wanted to shift by the end of December.  Eh?  Are you listening to your customer?  If I wanted different vehicle options I would have asked for it?

 

A £30,000 car is a lot of money.  I'm not looking for special treatment but a bit of professionalism, customer service and serious business negotiation is what is needed.  Listen to your customer and act accordingly - you will then get the sale.

 

I politely declined the dealer offer and said if they could improve on what I wanted then they could give me a call.

 

Looks like I may take my business elsewhere.

 

Oh well.

 

Yours

 

BA

 

 

 

 

Not really a Skoda UK issue but a dealer issue. Speak to a different dealer. Have you tried the spec you want on Carwow?

Cheers - went to Drivethedeal for initial quote and happy to go down this route although not sure if they take trade-ins.  Think it is a Skoda UK issue as the dealers are representing their brand and reputation means everything.

They probably felt threatened as you knew exactly what you wanted. Did they not try and tempt you by throwing in LifeShine for free?

2 hours ago, BA Baracus said:

Dear Skoda UK

 

I want to order a new Octavia Estate 245 with a couple of nice factory options.  I have used your online configurator to spec the car to my requirements.  This will be my third vRS and I will be using your PCP financial services as I have done in the past.

 

I have done my research and used your parent company (VW) website to give me an estimated CAP value of my trade in.  I have also used Drivethedeal to see what kind of discount I could expect.  I am a serious buyer and have done my sums.

 

So with all this information, I trotted along to my local dealer to say this is what I wanted spec wise and was upfront with my ideal target cost to change (Skoda finance contribution, trade in and discount).  This was met with the usually scoffing - you'll never get that etc.  I appreciate with negotiation (unlike BREXIT) there will be a bit of to-ing and fro-ing but to say the dealer was downright rude was an understatement.  When I finally got the dealer to talk about money they completely blanked me and refused to quote for what I wanted and subsequently tried to force a model on me that they wanted to shift by the end of December.  Eh?  Are you listening to your customer?  If I wanted different vehicle options I would have asked for it?

 

A £30,000 car is a lot of money.  I'm not looking for special treatment but a bit of professionalism, customer service and serious business negotiation is what is needed.  Listen to your customer and act accordingly - you will then get the sale.

 

I politely declined the dealer offer and said if they could improve on what I wanted then they could give me a call.

 

Looks like I may take my business elsewhere.

 

Oh well.

 

Yours

 

BA

 

 

 

 

ah so what your saying is your dealer is acting like the un-elected EU bureaucrats? and is trying to force a deal on you? i hope you dont act like Treasonous May and roll over for them!

Who wastes time sitting at a salesman's desk these days?

 

I took my best Carwow offer and then approached several other non-Carwow dealers asking them to beat it.

 

The dealer that beat it by the most got the sale.

 

The first time I entered a dealership during the whole process was to pick the car up, after signing and paying for it all online weeks before collection. I reckon the wife and I were in the dealer for about 30 mins max.

 

No coffee, no lifeshine bull****. I bought a car on my computer and picked it up a few months later.

 

Edited 14 December, 20187 yr by silver1011

Sorry but I fail to see the point of your email. If your local Tesco sells petrol at £1.18 / litre, and the Tesco branch 5 miles away sells petrol at £1.15 / litre, do you write to Tesco UK and complain?

 

If you can't make a deal with the dealership then do what anyone else would do - take your business elsewhere. 

 

Let's turn the table. If you were a salesman and someone made an offer of £10,000 for your car but you reckon you could sell it to someone else for £11000 - what would you do? If that deal wasn't attractive to the garage, why on earth would they accept it?

 

BTW -  when you say you've done your homework re; CAP value  -  no you haven't.    A car is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it - CAP values are only a guideline, they mean nothing. If you want to know what your car is worth then ask several dealers what they're willing to buy your car for. Or go to websites like WeWantAnyCar, WeBuyAnyCar, Arnold Clark etc and get a price for your car (be 100% accurate in the description otherwise you're wasting your time).

 

Another inaccuracy is when you say you go to DriveTheDeal to know what discounts are on offer.  Those discounts are almost certainly at other dealership who's in a position to offer a discount, they are not available to every dealership.  Furthermore that dealership may well be at the otherside of the country therefore if you have any difficulties with the car and you're asked to return it to the supplying dealer...   There are pros and cons to everything.  I think you're being incredibly naive.

 

"...and subsequently tried to force a model on me"        If I were in customer services and read that, I'd reply saying I was sorry to hear of your experience, thank you for being a Skoda customer and wish you well on whatever manufacturer you chose next.

 

Edited 13 December, 20187 yr by Guest

Worth the effort to get one, and to get 'much cheapness'!

 

 

I would guess that the dealership you approached couldn't see any profit in the deal, so were not bothered, ask yourself OP would you work for free? Or if you were selling something and the offer was too low would you entertain it? no you wouldn't! Fact is you probably wanted top dollar for your part exchange as you say you'd done your homework!! Why would the dealership bother quoting? Just for you to walk off and use their quote to bargain with another dealership, it doesn't matter if the car is £3k or £30k you are in effect just renting a car from VAG using their finance thats all.

Everyone has the right to buy from whoever they want, just as EVERYBODY has the right to sell or refuse to sell to whoever they want.

I spoke to Jonathon Lawless at www.carfile.net to get mine, he was very helpful.

Smaller company, so much more personal.

You get this all the time. They only want to sell you what they want to sell you - they never listen. 

23 hours ago, BA Baracus said:

Cheers - went to Drivethedeal for initial quote and happy to go down this route although not sure if they take trade-ins.  Think it is a Skoda UK issue as the dealers are representing their brand and reputation means everything.

It will be that dealer/sales person. Check with another dealer. 

That kind of money for a cheap hatchback? 

 

Rather buy 1-2 year old top spec Passat or Superb and ride much more comfortably.

Most dealers aren’t driven purely by profit - they have sales targets to meet and stock to move. Quite often, they’ll sell at cost if they’ve had a lean month. If they’ve had a good month but have sitting stock, they’ll play hardball as there’s no further incentive to sell a factory order. You need to approach them at the right time to get the deal you want.

 

Also bear in mind that the salesperson will be on commission - they’re trying to earn a living too, so if you’re trying to take the mick with a deal, again there’s no incentive for them.

10 hours ago, toni8b said:

That kind of money for a cheap hatchback? 

 

Rather buy 1-2 year old top spec Passat or Superb and ride much more comfortably.

By it's very definition, £30k is not cheap.

15 minutes ago, Stoofa said:

By it's very definition, £30k is not cheap.

But I think matey is making the point that in his opinion the Skoda Octavia by definition is “cheap” not that £30k is cheap

Edited 15 December, 20187 yr by Defenderben

This is my problem buying a Skoda at the moment - I've been looking at the Octavia, Karoq and Superb and also like a few toys in the spec - which quickly starts pushing the price towards high £20k's - £30k. For mr + mrs bigjohn in Yorkshire I'm afraid our pockets are too deep and arms are too short for this sort of price.

 

I agree with the original poster that the experience at the dealer is painful these days especially when you consider the buying of a car is frequently our second biggest expense after rent/mortgage. Like with the high street if dealers don't look after their customers then more and more of them will go elsewhere.

 

 

 

However noticed on Drive the Deal can get a VW Passat SE Business for under £18k!  - looks a lot of car for the money. Some PCH lease deals looking good as well :- https://www.leasehub.co.uk/skoda/octavia-hatchback/10-tsi-se-technology-5dr-special-offer

 

 

Edited 15 December, 20187 yr by bigjohn

50 minutes ago, bigjohn said:

This is my problem buying a Skoda at the moment - I've been looking at the Octavia, Karoq and Superb and also like a few toys in the spec - which quickly starts pushing the price towards high £20k's - £30k. For mr + mrs bigjohn in Yorkshire I'm afraid our pockets are too deep and arms are too short for this sort of price.

 

I agree with the original poster that the experience at the dealer is painful these days especially when you consider the buying of a car is frequently our second biggest expense after rent/mortgage. Like with the high street if dealers don't look after their customers then more and more of them will go elsewhere.

 

 

 

However noticed on Drive the Deal can get a VW Passat SE Business for under £18k!  - looks a lot of car for the money. Some PCH lease deals looking good as well :- https://www.leasehub.co.uk/skoda/octavia-hatchback/10-tsi-se-technology-5dr-special-offer

 

 

Think VW were doing some amazing deals on Passats as they are not selling in the quantities they wanted. So as you say could be a good alternative, unles bhp is the driving force?

Skoda pricing is a joke...

 

if if they want to price as a non budget car, then they need to be careful how far they cut corners.

 

excluding those lot entirely, did I read somewhere that some German car makers were being investigated for price fixing?

Edited 15 December, 20187 yr by cheezemonkhai

Something is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it.

 

I imagine we have passed peak Skoda now... the mk 1was cheap, the mk2 was not expensive and the mk3 isn’t a nice enough car to Justify it’s list price new.

 

Heavily discounted or a used private sale however is a different matter.

 

 

Edited 15 December, 20187 yr by cheezemonkhai

16 minutes ago, cheezemonkhai said:

I imagine we have passed peak Skoda now... the mk 1was cheap, the mk2 was not expensive and the mk3 isn’t a nice enough car to Justify it’s list price new.

 

Heavily discounted or a used private sale however is a different matter.

 

 

List price is becoming less and less relevant in a market dominated by PCP and leasing. 

29 minutes ago, Kenai said:

List price is becoming less and less relevant in a market dominated by PCP and leasing. 

 

It's rather relevant if you have a company car - you pay tax against the full list price.

 

Also with PCP the whole of what you're borrowing inc interest and GMFV shows on your credit file - could be a problem if you will be going for other credit/mortgage/re-mortgage. 

Edited 15 December, 20187 yr by bigjohn

As an aside, in principle I’d never pay £30k for a Skoda, whether it was outright purchase or PCP. The Skoda brand simply isn’t strong enough to avoid hefty depreciation at that level. Outside some of its halo models even VW would struggle a bit. £30k is a nicely-specced A3 or middling A4. 

46 minutes ago, Kenai said:

List price is becoming less and less relevant in a market dominated by PCP and leasing. 

 

Car tax in the private world is related to it.

 

In the company car area it affects BIK and can really hurt you.