Hi all,
I need your help.
I bought a new card end of March and been advised that the delivery date is 5th May.
Now, the dealer said the delivery date is late June.
If I change to different colour, I may get it by end of May and I have to make decision soon.
I promised to sell my current car to a colleague and she will take the car this weekend.
What should I do know?
Thanks all.
Mod: Now resolved, see op comment
THIS!! You've handed over good money on good faith. It is not your fault that the delivery has been delayed, expect the dealer to make things right for you, I would. In terms of taking another colour, if you are OK with it consider that but cars cost a lot of money to go home with something you arent entirely happy with. I would be suspicious that your car has been 'diverted' on the delivery schedule before it has even arrived and given to another more pushy customer elsewhere in the supply system. If you are OK to accept one of a different colour that they have sitting around, or if you are OK to wait for the next ship from Japan/Korea/Malaysia/Sth Africa/Europe then the dealers can kill 2 birds with 1 stone, they can sell your car to the pushy customer and sell you one they had sitting around as well. Cars are expensive, too expensive to have to compromise before you even take delivery!
I am a salesman too (not cars) but if i didnt deliver to my clients on time I can get hit with liquidated damages and other penalties. I dont expect the car contract will allow you to claim LDs but if the delay is of their making then you should expect them to make right somehow, i would!
tell them you will go to another dealership if you don't get a loan car(you can get a refund if they cant deliver on original contract)
colour bait and switch is actually more common than you think!
Yeah. i got the colour bait and switch.
Had the price all done, colour, extras etc. and deposit. Then I get a call giving me the option to get a red one this week if i wanted. The colour I wanted was VERY specific (Yellow Suzuki Swift Sport, which were rare and hard to get at the beginning)… so i kindly rejected this and waited the 6 weeks out. At least this dealership was upfront, and told me that it was gonna be a while for the Yellow.
Check the contract of sale though. It usually says something to the effect of them delivering the car within 90 days. If you cancel they will probably try to say the buyer renegged on the deal and point to the clause in the contract the buyer signed which states that they will lose their deposit. However that contract will have a cooling off period, so if within that, then should have no issues cancelling with full deposit returned.
Yes loan car should be provided. Similar situation happened when we bought our last car in 2013. We arranged a private sale for the weekend after our new car should have been delivered. Two days before new car delivery dealer said car would be another 2 weeks. We insisted on free loan car and after escalating to senior management this was provided. This seemed to focus the dealer's mind a bit as 5 days after we picked up loan car, our new car was suddenly available.
Ha… loan cars tend to focus them a bit more.
I had an EGR fail, and Nissan were saying that it was at least a month wait to get the part from Japan. I said fine, but btw, my car is under warranty (I had purchased factory extended), so I need a car - got a 6 month old Corolla @ $50/day. Amazing how quickly the part was air freighted to regional NSW (where my car got towed to) and was delivered back to me. They had to pay for a Kluger for the first few days, because of all the camping gear and passengers I had.
THIS! Absolutely.
When I bought my current car from the dealer I did not have a car(written off) and one of the conditions I put on the contract of sale was that 'Either a next day delivery or a free loan car until delivery of new car', dealer agreed on the loan car and said new car will be delivered in 2 weeks but it took 2 months and I had the loan car till then. Dealer was also kind enough to pick me up from the nearest train station to get me going in the loan car.
They can lend you are old car or demo car easy more like older car eg used car for few to few months. i had this happen before.
Call every other deal of that car inside the state tell if donot take care of you walk all way to car you dream of other side of the state.
Spoken like a true warrior!
(Car salesman here)
What do you want to do? Do you want to wait for the colour you chose, or are you going to be happy with 2nd option?
Have you asked your colleague if she can wait?
My colleague bought the car for her son, he turns 18th this Saturday.
I don't really like the colour of the 2nd option …. but if I take it, I still have to wait until end of the month.
Options are endless, all depends on what you really want to do.
I'd go and purchase something from other dealer's floor stock with the same/next day delivery. No point really in waiting for a car. I'm sure you are not waiting for the delivery of microwave in appliance store.
Congrats, you then own 2 cars.
As per the terms on a new vehicle contract, the dealer has up to 3 months to supply the vehicle.
Wouldn't that depend on any terms and conditions the purchaser placed in the contract.
If they did.
@Spackbace: Curiously how many customers put any terms and conditions on a contract i know very few of my mates do despite advice from others.
I'd say less than 10%. Typically it's us putting in delivery by end of month (for an in-stock car).
What sort of conditions do you normally put in?
@Spackbace: I dont i lease a car direct from my employer but some of my mates put in the latest the car can be delivered and what will happen if that is not achieved.
What type of car ?
I picked up my new car last week, They kept trying to add weeks on top of weeks. Had enough and told them if i dont get it by wednesday coming (last wed) im not interested. Suddenly the car was ready for pick up. Odd.
Correct, they already have your cash and commitment, if they have a customer in store that they could sell your car arriving the next day to close a deal, they would. Then call you to say there is a delay and then repeat as many times as required or until you push hard enough they think they might lose you. I have a friend in car sales and he is not proud of it but does this on a regular basis. Tell them you want your car in the colour you requested by this weekend or a borrowed car until your car arrives or you will cancel you order. Don't be afraid to tell them you are pulling out, if they haven't met the time frames in the agreed contract you are entitled to your money back. Show them you mean business or they will continue to walk all over you.
Wow, not something that happens here. And its dodgy stuff like this makes all of us look bad.
I agree. Not all car salesmen are dodgy, some genuinely want to give their customers the best. Unfortunate things like shipment,it's probably out of their control. If you threaten them enough they might be able to swap their cars with other dealerships to get you one. I believe if you buy one of those more luxury cars they might be able to lend you a car for a while. Bear in mind that they probably don't get their commission until the car is delivered to you. The delay is not ideal for them either.
That's exactly the type of answer one would expect from a car salesmen! We are onto you….
@Spackbace:
Seems pretty simple, you sell one car and you lock them in with your evil charms, next week someone comes in wanting a car tomorrow or no sale and you have 1 just rolling off the truck, sell them that and call the first customer that its delayed a week. 2 car sales now, instead of just the first 1 = more commission for you. Provided your evil charms are locked in deep, you could easily pull this off for a number of weeks.
I thought they would teach you these things are Evil Car Salesmen School?
Lol yep that's right, not like we dont have customer satisfaction reports, and targets to hit for those or anything :/
@Spackbace:
If I ordered a car and it arrived before or on the day I was told it would, I would seriously question if I was being scammed in some way
@cypher67:
Haha not a car salesman myself but I have heard enough to know :P but yeah believe it or not some people do care about customer satisfaction. After all, most dealerships make money from customers coming back for services etc.
@Spackbace: because if you could sell his car to someone else and then convince him to take another one in a different colour that is already sitting in the lot you get 2 lots of commission instead of 1. If this all happens inside the month it just means a bigger pay at the end of month/quarter whenever your bonuses are paid.
@cypher67: LOL Evil Car Salesmen School, that would be an awesome course to do, somebody find that on one of those free web courses!!
Did they give a reason and was it believable? i have waited months for cars to be delivered but normally I was told well in advance, before i had signed up for anything that there would be a delay. I have bought new model cars sight unseen and placed a deposit 6 months before that miodel was released in Australia BUT i would be upset if i had signed/paid and was told of a last minute delay and it was suggested i take a different colour of in-stock' model. That to me would sound like i was being 'played'.
I test drive the 2014 model.
It was end of March so I asked them for 2015 model. They said it will take 4 weeks to deliver but in the contract they put 5 weeks and I was okay with that.
Their reason is because it's new car and they have to order it from overseas for me and the delivery has been delayed.
That seems pretty fair. What sort of car?
Delivery has been delayed? Maybe let us all know what brand of car so i can avoid them and look at other brands more likely to deliver on time. I once bought a new model WRX on spec, paid $5K deposit and they gave me a loan car for 3 months until the new model WRX arrived. Loan car was a sad old ford that someone else had traded in but it got me around.
I also had a Renault Sport that i once ordered 6 months or so in advance and it was delivered as per the contract. i had a Holden and a VW where they tried chopping and changing around for colours and availability and gave me the same run-around and I said i would pull out of the deal unless they were able to deliver on time, they both did.
I would get them to refund me at the nearest possible opportunity seeing its end of financial year. Get the money back and try out a different dealer and see if you get a discount.
You can always back out of the contract if the timeline seems unreasonable.
More bargaining power to you. This is especially the case if the car you ordered has alot of options or is one of the less popular choices for your model. Colour is also a big factor for dealers too.
Speak to sales manager and try to sus out what the dealer don't want you to do.
You never know… they might be pushing you out because the car is very popular and you have put them in a position where they are losing more on the (because of the discounts you gouged out of them) car selling to you, then them selling to a new customer in late June.
You can always back out of the contract if the timeline seems unreasonable.
If it's longer than 3 months, yes you can, otherwise you have signed a contract! How would you like it if a month after you bought your new car, while you wait, the dealership did the same thing, just said "sorry, no car for you". The conditions on the contract are to protect both parties.
If the contract has the 5th May written explicitly into it as the delivery date for XX model and YY color and ZZ options, then the dealer has already breached the contract by failing to meet his end of it.
Then OP has every right to cancel the contract and receive his deposit back with no penalty, if anything he might even be able to take the dealer to court for costs incurred by the delayed delivery.
Of course I could be completely wrong, and the law isn't as logical as I hope it is.
You'll find only a very very small minority of new vehicle dealerships wont put a delivery date on the contract, unless the vehicle is in stock. All because of reasons like this thread. Unfortunately there's too many outside influences that can affect delivery times, especially for imported models.
So I'd be guessing the OPs contract has no delivery date
@Spackbace: OP should check his contract, but there's no reason for him to not get annoyed at the dealership and request a rental car, as it may fall within unreasonable delays and such.
Fully agree that he should ask for a loan car, haven't disagreed with that from the start :)
The delivery date on the contract is 5th May 2015.
Nah, I've backed out when it was 1 month late. If they breach the contract (mine had the delivery dates specified) then bad luck to the dealer.
So.. the biggest problem is, he has sold his car to someone else that needs it, try and get the loan car and wait for the colour YOU want!
^^ This. Just wait for the desired colour. It's a new car, it'll be worth the wait.
what does your contract say?
I love the car but waiting until end of June is so long and inconvenient for us.
I decided to buy this 7 seater car so 6 members of my family can travel together.
We also planned for an interstate trip next month.
Now 😔😔😔
I know someone who had bought a brand new car, but the car couldn't be delivered for a month or two. As a result, the dealership lent her a brand new rental car (probably a demo car) for no extra charge I believe. This was with Honda, not sure about other dealerships.
I would ask for either a free rental car or a discount(%5+-), if these option didnt work i will ask for immediate refund and threaten them to seek a legal action.
Next time you sign a contract I hope you read the conditions :)
Read about Cooling of period(Not applicable in WA), although its only for short period ( Most car dealer will not mention it in the contract:) ).
Not applicable in WA
Soo… no need!
Also would be 2 days max I'm assuming, and wouldn't have offered OP any help.
How about you read up on the terms on a new car contract (dealer has up to 3 months to supply the car)?
Asking for 5% ($1500 off a $30k car) after the fact is just laughable, as is any threat of legal action. Any loan car would be a privilege not a right, and would entirely depend on your demeanour as to whether you got one.
OP could ask nicely for a loan car, maybe ask for something that's small to medium size if that would be sufficient, and just hope they get lucky.
But at no point can you now get out of the contract unless 3 months has passed.
@Bnjam3
Since OPs second sentence was "I bought a new card end of March"
I would hazard an intelligent guess that the cooling off period is no longer applicable…
lol legal action
found myself in this exact same dilemma few months ago.
legally the dealership has 30 days on top of quoted ETA (if any) to deliver your car. you are or will be entitled to a full refund of your deposit.
however in our case it was due to short supply at the time, i called around and no other dealers in australia could get their hands on the model we wanted any time sooner.
so we just thought whats another 6 weeks when weve already waited 6.
my advice to OP is if its a stock availability issue, wait it out and get the exact colour/car you want.
you may also try ask the salesman nicely if he/she is willing to throw in some accessories or free servicing to make up for the inconvenience.
in the end, kicking up a stink wont get you anywhere.
WOW, I need to sell stuff to you.
I would be kicking up a hell of a stink, especially since it appears the OP wanted the car for a holiday and now wont have his car for the holiday. If there is a 3 month period and they are a month and a half into the 3 month period could you just tell them it was not convenient for you to pick up the car when it arrives because of a similar 'delay' on your end and then when it has tripped the 3 months ask for your $$ back.
Good idea to call around for another dealer, if another dealer has a car they will tell you all the tricks to get out of your current contract because they want the sale instead. I would try that, I always play dealers off against each other, it is amazing what tricks they tell you to use against the salespeople at the other dealership.
If a car is imported, yet to be released etc, it is likely that no dealer will have it. Calling around will have zero effect, as will trying to bully the dealer.
Case in point. Customer called yesterday asking if we had a certain car. Turned out they signed up elsewhere on Saturday, dealer thought one was going to be available but turns out stock isn't expected till June. Customer didn't want a demo vehicle.
We checked, same eta for the car. Nothing is gonna change that!
What you don't seem to realise is unless the car is a demo vehicle, all dealers can see each others stocks. If we can get you the car from a dealer swap, we will!
Feel free to play us off each other, but some of us don't play those games and would rather not go through all your fuss over $100 (before tax). Bring us your best quote and we'll see what we can do, but be prepared to actually sign up there and then.
I lease 2 new cars every 3 years. Last car was a VW Passat for my wife. Leasing company always claims they can get a better deal than the public….and they never do. I took the lease quote to my local dealer and he squealed like I was taking food off his Kid's plate then beat the lease quote by $100 or some token amount. He tried to tell me he was breaking all the rules etc etc. I took his quote and literally called 2 other dealerships in my lunch break. One of those dealerships beat the quote by $2K. I took the cheaper quote back to the local dealership and the guy was caught out and embarrassed, he matched my best quote with no haggling at all and he tried badly to apologise, made up some story that he had mis-read some pricing info on the computer etc. I had to wait a couple of months for my car to be made up. As my quote was also much cheaper than the lease company's quote the lease guy was furious, he too would not be getting a commission. They tried the whole colour/options merry-go-round on me and I gave them 3 colours I didnt want (Black, white or brown), they tried asking me which one exactly I wanted and I said I preferred grey but was OK with other colours and wanted no options. They seemed desperate to have me choose a specific colour and options, probably so they could put some pressure on me about the availability of that car. I told them i really wanted a vanilla car of any one of about 6 or 7 colours. In the end they gave up and told me they would order 1 from Germany but there would be a 2 month wait, I agreed and waited 2 months.
When i did the 'Spin selling' training they were big on how people's ability to make decisions is affected when they are under stress. Best way to get people under stress is to confuse them or put pressure on them. By puting complicated decisions over colour and options and then putting time limits on top, this can affect a lot of people's decision making and often force them to make irrational or under-considered choices. This is why many of the 'time-limited' promotions are run. People need to make a rushed decision before the offer runs out, no time to go away and crunch the numbers or make comparisons, need an answer now etc.
Car before that was a new WRX, I bought sight unseen as I wanted the new model. When i did the research I found out that some years ago a company called Inchcape bought the local rights to Subaru from Fuji Heavy Industries. Their distributorship covers a 30 km radius around all capital cities. Any Subaru dealer you go into is essentially all part of the same company and shares the same stock/ordering system etc. Not surprisingly they dont vary too much on price as they have a suburban monopoly. At the 31Km mark outside of Melbourne are 2 independent dealerships (Frankston and Lilydale). I took my lease company's quote to Lilydale and they instantly beat the lease guy's quote by about $1K. As he was looking at the quote the Lilydale Lady had a laugh as she remembered making up the quote for the lease company. Essentially the $1K was the lease company's commission (on top of all the fees and charges in the lease). I took the cheaper quote back to the lease company and told them I had sourced a cheaper quote than them so wanted to lease my deal instead of theirs, they weren't happy but had to do it.
Finally, I once worked for a large engineering company that used McMillan Shakespeare for their novated leasing. Once again I did my research and found out that McMillan is really just the front office for Macquarie Bank. All of the advertising they gave out to employees was about convenience and the message was 'let us take care of all that complicated leasing stuff for you' which instantly made me suspicious. I was buying a Renault Sport car at the time and I found out that the Macquarie rate they were charging was about 2.5% higher than other financiers i could find elsewhere, in fairness I think there were some promotional rates but hey, it is all $$ out of my pocket. Our company's agreement with McMillan had a clause in it allowing us to use a different financier if we could find them but I am sure that across all the hundreds of lease cars i was the first person probably to even read that part of the agreement. In the end I chose my own financier, they were upset and word soon got out, soon I was the unofficial lease guy at work and helped a lot of people to find cheaper finance costing McMillan a lot of commissions on finance. One day my phone rang and it was someone from management at McMillan asking me what I was doing. He seemed to feel like I was being a trouble maker and costing them commissions, I told him I was legally helping my work colleagues save money. He didn't dispute the legality but I think he thought I was someone that was costing his employees their commissions.
Maybe I have just been through too many episodes and maybe I haven't run into the right dealerships yet but my experience in the world of cars and finance is that unless someone is getting pretty upset, I am probably being ripped off or at least not getting the best deal that I could. Anytime I am being offered 'convenience' it is probably costing me money.
Spackbace you are probably an honest car salesguy and good luck to you, and I am probably a PITA customer to have to deal with but cars are one of the most expensive things I've ever bought. I'm not rich enough to be be taking the 'convenient' route through these things that normally means somebody is skimming a margin along the way.
I hope you insure that passat for an agreed value, and not market value. Depreciaton is enormous! Also recommend motor equity insurance in the event that you are going market value.
Disclaimer: work for insurer.
@ankor: Original lease just ended and my wife wanted to keep it (i wanted to buy her another car) so i have re-leased for another 2 years. Depreciation is less of a worry now as the main loss has already been incurred. i get your point though, most people miss the fact that depreciation is normally the biggest cost of car ownership. i mitigate it a little by both being a PITA over negotiating a price and then as I buy through a novated lease, the lease company or my employer normally wear the GST component of the price. I normally start out at a lower starting point on the depreciation chart…but it is still a mugs game buying cars!!
Passatt is being replaced by a new model later this year. I normally spend a lot of time looking for cars that depreciate slower than the rate that the tax ofice allows, this means i normally walk away ahead at the end of the lease. This is one of my first considerations, long before deciding on things like colour or options. Find a slower depreciating car.
I have a few insurance policies including equity and redundancy insurance on the car lease, all of which are paid out of pre-tax income.
Have been in the same situation before, I told the car salesman up front that I need a car to go to work while waiting for the new $30k car to arrive. They lend me a $50k car that they use for demo for free until my $30k car arrives.
Just explain to your salesman that you need a car by the weekend and ask if they can lend you a car while waiting for hte new one to arrive. They should be able to get you something.
I waited 7 months for my new car since it was a new model with a huge backlog of orders. I could have picked an automatic (I prefer manual) in another colour and received it within a month, but since it's something that will last me for many years to come it was definitely worth waiting for my preferred configuration.
I would just explain to your colleague that you can't sell your car right now for reasons out of your control. There's no reason why you should still sell your current and it's not worth being stuck with a colour you don't like for the next decade over a promise. I'm sure they'll understand.
Delays happen and sometimes it's out of the dealers hands.
Sometimes it's also a dealer selling your car to someone else who wants the car ASAP and is paying more for the car than you.
I'd wait and also ask for a replacement car while you are waiting for your one.
Once your order is confirmed and you have a car assigned to you, I would ask them to provide you with the VIN number of YOUR car. That way your car can't be sold to anyone else, and if there are any further delays, you can call up the Australian Head Office to complain.
We had the same delays with Cardiff Toyota, they were dreadful to deal with.
Yesterday, I sent an email to express my disappointment.
I talked to the saleman before lunch, he wasn't happy about it.
After lunch, he told me he has found the car with my choice of colour and can deliver it within 10 days.
My cousin let me drive his car while he's on holiday next week.
All good now.
Thank you all for your replies.
Cheers.
Glad it has worked out, but why have you not replied to anyone who asked you what make of car it is?
Just curious.
Why didn't you ask them to give you a free loan car like the 50+ people above had suggested?
I really don't want to talk him, he's a bit rude to me on the phone when he found out I sent email to the Co-Ordinator.
Also, last time when I test drive the car, I signed the paperwork and I noticed that they charge 2-3K for the insurance excess fee.
Well, now all I want is my car and don't want to deal with him anymore.
They charged you ?
@Ninjastud … It's Nissan ….
After reading some replies, I had a feeling that the dealer sold my car to someone else, so I wanted to talk to them first. I doubt that Nissan have no X-Trail until end of May/June as been told so I hesitated to mention the name.
Also, the customer service at Nissan advised that we can ask the dealer for AUO number, this 7 digit number is the car order number not contract number. Nissan CS can track the ETA for you.
Have you asked the dealer if they can loan you a car? We waiting for our new car which took a little over 3months. To make it in japan, to ship it to oz then to truck it to our location. The dealer did say it is taking a little longer than normal. We told the dealer that our old car was sold so he organized a courtesy car for us for 3 weeks until our new car arrived. It wasn't a new courtesy car obviously a traded car from their 2nd hand section but it was still a late model and suited us fine.
Nissan is having supply issue on some of their models.
If still not getting the vehicle as promised in 10 days time, I will suggest having a courtesy car organised from the dealer as a few have suggested. This will be a reasonable arrangement, considering that you have committed to sell your existing car and you have a trip plan based on the promised delivery date. I was in the similar situation before and had a 7 seaters courtesy car organised. On top of that, additional accessory was thrown into to the new vehicle to compensate for the late delivery. Hope things will work out well for you.
Currently in this situation, ordered a new card in January (the options were incredibly hard to source due to demand). The estimated delivery was early april… Still waiting.
I ordered a new Nissan 370 in November for January delivery. I was not trading anything as I had sold my previous car. They lent me an Astra until my car arrived. It was a month late but it did not worry me as I had wheels. The dealer was fantastic, (Westpoint Nissan Brisbane). He even apologized for not having a better loan car for me, despite the fact it was only 12 months old.
The 370 would feel even faster after driving a POS for a month prior.
I love the irony in calling someone dumb then making grammar and spelling mistakes.
Also, someone actually has to buy brand new cars for you to be able to buy used ones.
cmon.
Monique says you dump brew!
I look forward to the next post.
Sold car to colleague and engine and gearbox died. HELP.
Hopefully it won't happen.
She drove my car once to Blue Mountains and her husband checked the car twice already.
That's the reason why I wouldn't want to sell my car to family or friends, even if the car was in very good mechanical condition.
If something goes wrong, I'd feel obliged to fix it, even though I could have sold the car more privately on the open market.
I have once sold a car to a friend for the same price I was offered as a trade in. Friend who bought it is a mechanic so knew the history of the car, it wasn't perfect but in good condition for a car that traveled 180k km. He also had it for a few weeks before he confirmed he would buy it. I suppose this case was different as he's a mechanic.
Ask for a free loan car.