They don't understand.

They don’t understand.

Who am I refereeing to? Well I should say some customers simply don’t understand about price and quality, it’s all too easy to simply look at the ‘price’ and not take anything else into consideration, even when you explain things in great details, some simply do not get it.

However I’m glad to say there are customers who get it and yesterday was such an occasion, although a wasted Sunday  for me trying to buy a car for my friend, I call him friend as it I’ve said for many years ‘customers become friends’ and John I’ve known since around 1991, I’ve lost count but as we drove to Birmingham yesterday we were trying to count the number of cars he and his family have bought from me( mainly him though!) and its around 19/20 cars.

He is ‘very fussy’ on the car and the spec, and on a lot occasions he’s searches the internet and sends me the links to ‘potential’ cars and simply says “do your thing”, he is also a realist that I’m in business and need to make profit, so he doesn’t expect to at times just pay the advertised price, I may need to add my margin and of Course my expertise on if the car is what it’s supposed to be, take his part exchange, collect the car and at times we’ve both gone and collect the cars ( saves paying an extra driver). He always says when we get to the vehicle that he’ll sit in his car read the papers while I do my inspection so he doesn’t get too emotionally attached until I make the final decision.

Yesterday was a private sale, a Mini for John’s wife, I had spoken to the seller a few times in the week to get an ‘accurate’ description, the pictures all looked great on Autotrader and he told me ‘ it was mint’ no damage, all original and so forth.

Windy cold day in Birmingham and in less than 10 Minutes, it was back in the car and empty handed, the car had previous accident damage and a poor repair, used cars have some paint work history and that’s a fact of life but this repair was appalling and in my opinion recently carried out, certainly within in a few weeks, I told the seller it had the poor repairs and showed him the very obvious to me tell tell signs, but he denied any knowledge and simply said “I don’t’ do car”.

John said, “It’s disappointing but that’s why I deal with you, had I come down on my own the chances are I would have bought it as I didn’t see what you pointed out”

That’s why when customers say to me “ I’ve seen it cheaper on the net or another garage, I always say I can ONLY tell you about my car, I cannot comment on anyone’s else’s car as I don’t know" but sadly some customers do not understand that!