Abismal Vauxhall Dealer

[ChinsVXR]

How do some GM dealerships survive
We need a 7 seater so poped to the local dealer to see what they could do.
Valued my wifes car without seeing it and relied on my description (trade in price was OK though).
Asked to look at finance and the finance girl came armed with a calculator Easy way to work out a PCP.
When they eventually worked out a quote the APR was 15.5%. Even loan sharks dont charge that much.
Then asked them how much their demo Zafira VXR was. Got a reasonable price and then the salesman told me how it had a new gearbox after 1 week. Then he mentioned how he wouldnt like to live with the fuel consumption of two VXR's. I asked why as I'm getting nearly 30 out of mine, to which he said "the service manager isnt getting anywhere near that, but he does thrash the crap out of it".
Would you buy that car
They also had a Meriva VXR out front with a cracked front bumper for all to see.
Distinct lack of IQ at this dealers.
So the hunt will go on.
Jonathan

[Sparky]

yep they did a good job there then, hope you are not put off as there's allot of really good dealers out there. Perhaps a word to the appropriate people might give them a kick, after all, it s not just the dealer who could loose a sale, without the ambassadors Vauxhall will not sell cars.

[Catherine]

Agree with Mark on this one, there are a lot of good one out there. The reason we are having an Astra is because of the service we have had from Hinton in Bath.
Perhaps you should privately communicate the name of the dealer concerned to vxrmothership.

[ChinsVXR]

Agree with Mark on this one, there are a lot of good one out there. The reason we are having an Astra is because of the service we have had from Hinton in Bath.
Perhaps you should privately communicate the name of the dealer concerned to vxrmothership.

As they are part of a large motor group it wont make a difference IMHO.
When the salesman were surveying the punter on the forecourt it looked like a group of bouncers
In my experience you tend to find in these large group dealers a horribly high turnover of staff with product knowledge less than my 7 year old daughters. The guy I dealt with told me the Zafira was fully loaded when it was sat there on 18's I think that if you find a good family owned business they are a shed load better with probably better trained staff, an eye on retention and a more profesional manner. Yesterday you knew that he would say whatever to get the deal, knowing if he got one over on me he wouldnt be there next time.
I also think that a big issue is that the good salesman in big dealer groups tend to be in the more prestige brands - a better class of saleman.
Being a Sales Director I do tend to analyse these things
Sales people are generally the easiest to sell to as they have empathy with the person selling, but when I see what I saw it hard to endure.
Buying on average 3-4 cars a year for the last 10 years, Ive only found a few very good dealers out there.
Jonathan

[Catherine]

Totally agree with you on big dealer groups. Our Citroen was bought from a branch of a large dealer group. The sales side is actually very good, but the service is dreadful.
I wouldn't write off letting vxrmothership know, I am sure he would be very interested to know.