Cheeky f***er used car dealer

[Peter C]

My BIL is still on the lookout for an E39 Sport in Touring flavour.

He found a potentially suitable car not far from home and gave the trade seller a call, with a view to see the car asap.

Much to BIL’s surprise, the seller told him that he is welcome to view the car subject to payment of a non refundable admin fee of £80. Regardless whether he would buy the car or not, the admin fee is payable.

WTF? I would have thought that in post Christmas, miserable January conditions car dealers would be offering freebies to potential buyers rather than alienating them with silly tricks.

Is this unusual?

[Craig the Princess]

The fuck? I'd expect that to remain unsold for a very long time.

 

I have heard of lettings agents doing this with viewing properties in London, never shite BMWs.

[Tamworthbay]

I would still be laughing down the phone at him if it was me.

[AnthonyG]

Sounds like some sort of scam, run by a very hopeful/stupid conman.

[outlaw118]

Horseshit. What a Wankpanda.

Hope he's telling them to GTF.

It's not like he's after a Horsey Horseless or summert that's like rocking-horse shit. Even then, £80 is taking the piss Shirley?

There'll be another E39 about somewhere.

Got a link to the advert? Would be a terrible shame* if he got bombarded with calls from an unlisted PAYG mobile......

[stripped fred]

I can't believe anyone would agree to pay to view a car.

[hairnet]

14 minutes ago, Craig the Princess said:

The fuck? I'd expect that to remain unsold for a very long time.

 

I have heard of lettings agents doing this with viewing properties in London, never

11 minutes ago, Tamworthbay said:

I would still be laughing down the phone at him if it was me.

shite BMWs.

all this

we were looking at nice smol not cheap cars and even at non bombsite fairly nice places they were doing this

they got swerved very quickly

one of them was 129 - id wanna be blown and chocs and booze for that ffs

[Kowalski]

Please don't take offense but BIL probably sounded hard work. I've lied before now and said a car has been sold, you just don't want to get involved sometimes.

[sierraman]

Sounds like a scam to me. Why would you pay to view it? 

Same for that admin fee for filling the V5 out. I’d just get up and go if they suggested any of that shit. 

[strangeangel]

Name and shame time - let's see the advert.

 

 

[HMC]

Pay per view? Is he vince McMahon?

[Heidel_Kakao]

Is it £80 per person? If 80 of us turned up at the same time to view it would only be £1 each.

[w00dy]

I'd suggest that £80 was fine as long as he paid my £100 viewing fee for my time.

[Isaac Hunt]

What a twat, £80 non refundable fee.   He’s probs got that idea from the car supermarkets who will take a car off sale for x days, fully refundable.  I checked it out for my Lad, then we went for it and bought the car.  It wasn’t an Autoshite Ride though

[Peter C]

To be fair my BIL is not a man of many words and doesn’t ask annoying questions, at least not on the phone before viewing the car.

I’ve asked him for a link to the ad.

[hairnet]

8 minutes ago, Heidel_Kakao said:

Is it £80 per person? If 80 of us turned up at the same time to view it would only be £1 each.

then youd stone them to death with the coins

[sierraman]

I wonder if he’d let you Skype him for £50? 

[Agila]

£80 for a look. 

I wonder how much it costs to cop a feel. 

"That's extra sweetheart"

[Walter White]

59 minutes ago, outlaw118 said:

Horseshit. What a Wankpanda.

????. Mrs. Walter White is very impressed with Wankpanda as a new insult and is currently trawling Twatter to shoehorn it into a tweet. 

[sutty2006]

1 hour ago, hairnet said:

then youd stone them to death with the coins

I’d chuck in the contents of my change collection to be a part of that. 

[Wack]

Not all but a lot of used car dealers are twats , a mate was looking for a car in the £1500 range , he rang me to ask if I'd come with him as a second pair of eyes , he rang to make sure he still had it, we set off , arrived 15 minutes later to be told it was sold but we have this bag of shite available.

Wanker

[Isaac Hunt]

A few years ago I arranged to see two of the same model on one day.  A cheap one on the morning and and an expensive one in the afternoon.  £650 and £1000.   I started with the cheap one cos I thought it most likely be as rough as a Badgers but would provide some intel and a benchmark.  The cheapo one was alright. Surprisingly alright, so I chipped a very cheeky lowball offer.  There was some bartering and I drove away in it.  I called the seller of the afternoons ‘viewing’ to say we had seen and bought in the morning.   Whilst I can understand a certain amount of disappointment, when he started having a ‘bit of a go’ I said ‘hey, I didn’t have to call you, I could have just stood you up’ he backed down a bit then.

[AndyIggs]

1 hour ago, Wack said:

Not all but a lot of used car dealers are twats , a mate was looking for a car in the £1500 range , he rang me to ask if I'd come with him as a second pair of eyes , he rang to make sure he still had it, we set off , arrived 15 minutes later to be told it was sold but we have this bag of shite available.

Wanker

Unfortunately that's a common one, probably find the car was sold weeks ago as well

[Wack]

I'm sure it was , the one he offered had been hit on the wing and repaired with a bucket of filler and an aerosol, I could've done a better job in the dark pissed out of my brains.

[NorthernMonkey]

To be fair, I know a guy down south who operates on the basis that all his stock is immaculately prepared and advertised with dozens of hi-res pictures and a VERY comprehensive walk round video of around 20 minutes on each unit.

He works out of a remote unit and all his viewings are pre-qualified in so much as you have to pay a deposit and agree to purchase the vehicle, as long as it hasn’t been mis-described, which simply doesn’t happen.

Quite a few traders, myself included, were incredulous when we first learnt of his plans to build a business on this model but it’s worked out very well for him...he has an excellent reputation and turns over far more vehicles working as a one man band than he’d be able to by running on a more conventional basis.

So confident is he in his descriptions that should you turn up having paid your deposit and find the car not as described, he will happily refund both your deposit and all your expenses incurred in visiting him.

Apparently, it’s something he’s only had to do a couple of times, both of which were due to an unforeseen breakdown on the test drive.

 

[anonymous user]

I hope this dealer hasn't got a forecourt, can you imagine the hassle of trying to get money off any passerby who happens to glance in the direction of it.

[DavidB]

I expect he's sick of all the 'CN COME 2NITE BUD WAHTS UR LOEST PRICE BUD', staying in til 9pm and them not turning up.

[Timewaster]

1 hour ago, Isaac Hunt said:

A few years ago I arranged to see two of the same model on one day.  A cheap one on the morning and and an expensive one in the afternoon.  £650 and £1000.   I started with the cheap one cos I thought it most likely be as rough as a Badgers but would provide some intel and a benchmark.  The cheapo one was alright. Surprisingly alright, so I chipped a very cheeky lowball offer.  There was some bartering and I drove away in it.  I called the seller of the afternoons ‘viewing’ to say we had seen and bought in the morning.   Whilst I can understand a certain amount of disappointment, when he started having a ‘bit of a go’ I said ‘hey, I didn’t have to call you, I could have just stood you up’ he backed down a bit then.

Reading this, I really thought you were going to say you went to see the dearer one and it was the same car on a different lot of something. 

[sierraman]

9 hours ago, NorthernMonkey said:

To be fair, I know a guy down south who operates on the basis that all his stock is immaculately prepared and advertised with dozens of hi-res pictures and a VERY comprehensive walk round video of around 20 minutes on each unit.

He works out of a remote unit and all his viewings are pre-qualified in so much as you have to pay a deposit and agree to purchase the vehicle, as long as it hasn’t been mis-described, which simply doesn’t happen.

Quite a few traders, myself included, were incredulous when we first learnt of his plans to build a business on this model but it’s worked out very well for him...he has an excellent reputation and turns over far more vehicles working as a one man band than he’d be able to by running on a more conventional basis.

So confident is he in his descriptions that should you turn up having paid your deposit and find the car not as described, he will happily refund both your deposit and all your expenses incurred in visiting him.

Apparently, it’s something he’s only had to do a couple of times, both of which were due to an unforeseen breakdown on the test drive.

 

Having your time wasted is part and parcel of selling cars. The method described there could backfire big time if the seller changed their mind/didn’t turn up etc, he then won’t give the deposit back, the buyer then goes to their bank, reports it as a scam. He would very likely find his accounts frozen or worse closed down. 

[Bren]

While we can all stick the boot in I think it is an indication of how much hard work it can be selling a cheap car - if it discourages the mouthbreathing twats who think their £795 car should be of equal quality as a two year old lexus then it's fair enough.