Am I being unreasonable?

Kingy · 14 Apr 2011 at 22:29

EddScott said:
So the moral of this story is if you want to be taken seriously at a BMW dealer, don't ask for a test drive dressed like Fonzie?

Minstadave said:

But, but...

That was actually my profile pic on FB for a while...

Cristian · 14 Apr 2011 at 22:31

Kingy said:
I don't give a **** if I get tossed a set of keys and ignored,

surely that's gotta be better than any salesman coming with you?

Kingy · 14 Apr 2011 at 22:33

[TW]Fox;18906622 said:
The running in service is at 1200 miles.

The BMW Warranty on an 3 Series class M Car (So M3, Z4M) with under 60,000 miles is just under £1k a year. With over 60k miles its a lot more expensive.

Ta, about the same as Porsche then... Do you know how much more expensive it is after 60k miles off the top of your head?

My new contract will mean living away from home during the week, which will bring my mileage down... While (like you) I don't subscribe to mileage concerns beyond stone chips, extra warranty costs mean that paying extra for a lower mileage example might not be such a terrible idea...

[TW]Fox · 14 Apr 2011 at 22:33

Quite a lot more, almost double I think.

The non M 3 Series goes from £540 to £903.

Kingy · 14 Apr 2011 at 22:35

Cristian said:
surely that's gotta be better than any salesman coming with you?

Meh, I wouldn't do anything without a *reasonable* seller in there than I would if he was... It's still their car and my license/health if I run out of talent...

Kingy · 14 Apr 2011 at 22:53

[TW]Fox;18906689 said:
Quite a lot more, almost double I think.

The non M 3 Series goes from £540 to £903.

Christ, 2 grand a year for a warranty over 60k?

Arse...

Dr House · 14 Apr 2011 at 22:58

[TW]Fox;18906689 said:
Quite a lot more, almost double I think.

The non M 3 Series goes from £540 to £903.

Fox, I pay 38 quid per month at the moment on both cars, the E93 is upto 47 000 miles now so will BMW increase the price after it goes over 60k or do the honer the existing price if it stays with the same owner.

[TW]Fox · 14 Apr 2011 at 22:59

If you pay monthly your rate continues as it is now despite the mileage. But BMW 'reserve the right' to review the cost by giving you a months notice - but nobody has reported this happening yet.

I take it you are on the Comprehensive plan with £100 excess and Emergency Service if its £38 a month?

Tute · 14 Apr 2011 at 23:04

I'm absolutely dreading looking for my next car - I don't want to go down in a suit because that's just not my normal wear and I never feel comfortable in one, but if I don't then i'm worried i'll get some imbecile along on the test drive ruining it for me.

I've only been on one test drive where I would consider it a good customer service experience. The rest were all a bit "meh".

Slumberbox · 14 Apr 2011 at 23:23

To be fair I think most people on here don't fit the profile of a typical BMW purchaser, a lot of them are in the 40 - 65 age bracket or corporate types, not 18 - 35 year old studenty types, in a lot of cases the older person regardless of the whole 'I'm not gonna buy today' thing will be given a decent test drive because the customer will be a lot more mature in appearance and may have his miss us tagging along due to weekends being the only free time available, and will be presumed to be a home owner etc.

Morba · 14 Apr 2011 at 23:30

Kingy said:
But, but...

That was actually my profile pic on FB for a while...

Lol

I wasn't far off the mark then

Do you have another BMW garage local to you that you can get a test drive? Must be worth trying somewhere else

Dr House · 14 Apr 2011 at 23:54

[TW]Fox;18906878 said:
If you pay monthly your rate continues as it is now despite the mileage. But BMW 'reserve the right' to review the cost by giving you a months notice - but nobody has reported this happening yet.

I take it you are on the Comprehensive plan with £100 excess and Emergency Service if its £38 a month?

We have 0 excess but no emergency cover as I get free green flag cover with my credit card, it may be 48 pounds per month I will have to check with my wife.

Kingy · 15 Apr 2011 at 00:11

Morba said:
Lol I wasn't far off the mark then
Do you have another BMW garage local to you that you can get a test drive? Must be worth trying somewhere else

Oh aye, it's not the end of the world, was partly feeling sorry for myself, but in all seriousness was honestly just wanting to double-check that I wasn't being unreasonable... No sense in wasting any more time off if I'm not going to get given the time of day by anyone (that I'm not being heavily tongue-in-cheek with), but will perseverve with anything I'd seriously consider, and practise my best puppy dog eyes impression to aim at anyone looking bored that happens to be holding the keys to something serious...

Turns out I'm just far too honest/niave/stupid for my own good... When people have wanted to buy some sort of computer stuff, I've always just given them a soft sell... A case of giving people all they info they want FOC (because it's not like they can't get it elsewhere anyway), selling the best products at the right price, and letting logic do the real work for me...

I think we've had similar exchanges previous regarding SJD... Similar principle, but yet somehow dropping a serious amount of money (to me) on a car has become so commonplace it seems it's taken for granted by those 'pushing' the product...

He asked me if I was going to finance 'it' before we'd actually discussed what 'it' would be... That's just messed up...

Kingy · 15 Apr 2011 at 00:13

[TW]Fox;18906878 said:
If you pay monthly your rate continues as it is now despite the mileage. But BMW 'reserve the right' to review the cost by giving you a months notice - but nobody has reported this happening yet.

I take it you are on the Comprehensive plan with £100 excess and Emergency Service if its £38 a month?

So it's better to pay for the warranty monthy rather than annually? If so that's useful to know as I usually pay for warranty/insurance up front so as not to pay silly APR on a monthly basis...

mejinks · 15 Apr 2011 at 00:35

Sounds about familiar with salesarses in the BMW franchise.

I got offered 2k part ex for an E60 530i against a car that was 5k overpriced. I told the idiot at Trainers that he was pathetic and walked off. I can honestly say I have never been so insulted. He was trying to impress a young trainee at the time, I bet that bruised his giant ego. I told him I had the cash and wanted to deal today (this was true) but he obviously couldn't be bothered. Recently they sent me a letter asking me to book my car in for a service. Lets just say I haven't been as diplomatic in my typed reply.

Maz · 15 Apr 2011 at 07:46

mejinks said:
Sounds about familiar with salesarses in the BMW franchise.

I got offered 2k part ex for an E60 530i against a car that was 5k overpriced. I told the idiot at Trainers that he was pathetic and walked off. I can honestly say I have never been so insulted. He was trying to impress a young trainee at the time, I bet that bruised his giant ego. I told him I had the cash and wanted to deal today (this was true) but he obviously couldn't be bothered. Recently they sent me a letter asking me to book my car in for a service. Lets just say I haven't been as diplomatic in my typed reply.

How can any E60 be worth £2k? Unless it's a cat C done 250k miles and is a total dog?

lordrobs · 15 Apr 2011 at 10:15

Kingy said:
Official list of things to sit in, maybe even actually test-drive if I find a sufficiently bored/skint salesman!

Z4M - Manual
E92 M3 - Manual & DCT (starting to stretch the bounds of realism in what I can justify throwing away in depreciation)
E92 330i M Sport - Manual
E92 330d/335d M Sport (hopefully just to convince myself I'm right to hate autos, diesels, and diesel autos.)
Boxster S
Cayman S (Damn you Housey I want a soft top again!)
997S (See E92 M3)
997 Turbo (LOLYEAHRIGHT)
997 GT3 (See 997 Turbo)
Nissan GTR (See 997 Turbo)
Nissan 350Z/370Z (for a dose of realism while I'm drooling over the GTR)
Audi RS4 (So I can poke Housey as revenge for all the Pork porn he posts, if I actually get the E92 M3 he wanted instead)
Audi S3 (While I'm there)
Golf R32 (cos I tried the S3, and I'm bored)
Golf GTI (cos I'm there, it's a Golf GTI, and I've never actually driven one)
Focus RS (See R32)
Evo/Subaru thingy (See Focus RS)
A Corvette (any corvette, because Lashout tries so damn hard bless him... )

If I break down outside a Vauxhall garage, I might *look* at an Insignia VXR/VXR8, but only so I can come back here at sneer at it for not being made by ze Germans...

So potentially 23 test drives before you decide what model you want... an then you will look at which particular one you want to buy.

Not wanting to take the side of the sales man here but his job is to take your cash in exchange for a car, that is what he gets paid for.

Going out on a test drive and not securing a sale is seen as a waste of his time.

While obviously you should be completely happy that you have made the right choice before parting with the cash I think you need to have done a bit of leg work yourself before hand and that list still puts you in the "I haven't got a clue what I want" category in the salesmans mind.

I've only ever test driven cheap cars but they have ranged from "here are the keys, bring it back later" through to "drive to the roundabout and back again" but looking back the ones where I was offered a long test drive were where I had genuinely been interested in that car.

My worst two were when curiosity got the better of us and we took a Proton Satria Neo out as a potential cheap slightly unusual looking car for Jane and when I wanted to get a feel for an Octavia vRS and test drove a slightly tatty one in yellow. The two best... I ended up buying that car.

What I'm trying to say is that you get a good test drive if the salesman thinks there is a good chance of taking you deposit at the end of it.

rypt · 15 Apr 2011 at 10:25

lordrobs said:
Not wanting to take the side of the sales man here but his job is to take your cash in exchange for a car, that is what he gets paid for.

Going out on a test drive and not securing a sale is seen as a waste of his time.

A salesman's job is to convince you that the car you are interested in really is the car you want ... simply selling to someone who already knows they want a particular model is worthless, the real use is to get someone who is unsure of the car/brand to buy.

monkey_boy · 15 Apr 2011 at 10:34

This looks awesome!!1!

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classif.../radius/100/page/1/postcode/le101ps?logcode=p

lordrobs · 15 Apr 2011 at 10:35

rypt said:
A salesman's job is to convince you that the car you are interested in really is the car you want ... simply selling to someone who already knows they want a particular model is worthless, the real use is to get someone who is unsure of the car/brand to buy.

I agree... but that requires the buyer to have some clue at least about the type of car they are looking to buy.