I just took delivery of my new CS HT. That night I was going over the paper work and saw a couple of fees I'm not sure of. First was a $279.00 to "Safeguard" for Theft Protection. The other was a $26.00 Waste Tire fee. I call the dealer and was only able to get the salesman. He said the Theft protection fee was for them etching all the glass. When I told him there are no etching on any of my glass, he then said they don't actually etch the glass, they take the numbers off the glass and add it to my registration. As for the waste tire fee, he said the EPA requires all dealers to charge that. Sounds like BS to me. Has anyone out there had this happen with a dealer?

 

The Waste Tire Fee may be legit in your area. The "etching/theft protection" fee is dealer nonsense, and you can refuse it. Others more local to your area can advise you more fully.

 

You might want to check all your documents again for fees and interest rate and everything else too.

 

My dealer added about $2000 in "dealer added" stuff to my car, including a stubby antenna ($300), sunshade ($200), LoJack (400), tinted windows ($400) and some floormats. I said get rid of all of it. And they did. Refuse all of it.

 

The etching fee is BS - the tire fee is not.

Threaten them with a poor review or dealer survey and see how fast they backpedal.

 

Stubby antenna $300 hahahahahha. Ridiculous.

 

Right, and $200 for a stupid Mini windshield screen that was in a box in the boot lol. I said "take it out" and they said "we can't but we won't charge you". Riiiight.

 

Wow, amazing your dealers would do that kind of stuff. I didn't have anything extra added. I'll have to give some kudos to my dealer when I see them next.

 

My dealer sales person was trying to add "Dealer prep fee of $395" which includes rubber floor mats for front and back ($150<), and 3M scratch guard for door edges and door handle scuff pad ($50<), and a carwash ($5). Of course I removed the Dealer Prep fee when I ordered mine. That sales rep was trying really hard talking about what a good value it is. I ended up going with another sales rep.

I installed door edge protector myself using a piece of left over 3M film I had, installed some 3M film on the 6" leading part of the hood, and bought the OEM rubber mats for just the front using $20 off coupon.

 

No dealer extra dealer fees whatsoever for me, in fact I was given a free tint. Not sure if this is the dealer's SOP, I took delivery of the car the same day it was dropped off by the truck.

 

horrible

i wish we could buy direct (ala tesla)

 

Below is a link to an article on VIN etching. You can assume most of the $279 charge is "stealer" (dealer) profit. Otherwise, why would the dealer be trying to force this on you? If they were not making a substantial profit on the scheme, they certainly would not be bothering.

The only logic to paying such a charge would be if you save more than the $279 on you insurance rates. Check with your insurance company and I suspect you will find that they offer little if any savings. Please let us know what your insurance company's response is. Safeguard (and other VIN etching schemes) claim that etching the parts reduces the chances of you car being stolen. I would love to see proof of that.

While it's probably true that the etching could help police trace stolen parts, what good is it going to do you (or your insurance company) to have some of the the stolen pieces of your car returned to you after the police bust a chop shop?

http://www.autoinsurancenow.com/does...surance-rates/.

So far as the waste tire charge, do a Google search on "Louisiana Waste Tire Fee" and you will see that the correct charge mandated by the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality is $2.00 per tire, not the $6.50 per tire your stealer is claiming. Would not be surprised if the additional $4.50 is just dealer profit buried into the fee, and if you question them on the difference they will claim that the $4.50 is their cost to administer the program. If that's the case, your position should should be that it's part of the dealers cost of doing business, not your cost. Remember they are already making a healthy profit on your car.

Please share with us which dealer is trying to pull this stuff on you so the rest of us are forewarned.

 

I bought my Mini F56 in Louisiana and was not charged any Tire Fee or any dealer prep fees but I also almost paid list price of the car.

 

One of my dealer installed "options" is a thing called LoJack, which they say allows police to locate the car via GPS if stolen. They told me all I have to do is call 911, report it stolen, and they can quickly find the car anywhere. I hope I never have to use it but if it works it would be cool (I had a car stolen once which was recovered in a week in my town abandoned by the side of the road with the battery disconnected intact). But there's nothing on the car that indicates that LoJack is installed to deter thieves, go figure.

 

No question LoJack does work, but you need to be aware that there are some geographic restrictions (see their website). Not sure what discounts, if any, insurance companies offer for having it installed. It is a high markup item for a stealer, so you should expect to be able to negotiate a significantly reduced price if you want it. And there would be no excuse for a stealer trying to force it on you. When I bought my Nissan Pathfinder the stealer claimed that LoJack was installed on every car they sold before they arrived at the stealer. When I told them that I was not interested, and that the cost (even after they offered to discount it by 50%) made their price not competitive with other stealers, within 20 minutes they "magically" found me a Pathfinder that did not have LoJack :-)

 

Don't forget the maintenance fee with LoJack!!

$100 every 3 years for a guy to check the Li ion battery!!

 

The best way I found out to deter such non-sense BS dealer added fee is asking them what their best OTD would be for the exact car you want to buy.

Then you can either buy it cash or finance from there.

 

Really? Well good luck collecting that from yo. My wife's Honda Element still gets Sirius XM radio 4 1/2 years after we bought the car (she's never used it). It was supposed to be 6 months.