A friend of mine told me recently of a dealer somewhere in So Cal who is actually charging people for test drives!Is anyone else aware of this and if so ,let's haul the turkey dealer out on the mat and give him a thorough NAMing

 

That's ABSURD!!!!!

 

Nope...haven't heard a word about any such practice! Smacks of urban legend stuff, eh? I sure hope it's not true. Find out which dealership, so we can check it out!


Clo/Wanda

 

socal has a lot of rip-off business, so I am not surprised if this is true.

 

:smile: Well....we have a HUGE auto enthusiast population in SoCal and a lot of MINI dealerships, as well. But this is pretty hard for me to believe! EVEN HERE! Bwahahahahahahahahaha!!!!


Clo/Wanda

 

I agree. I believe it.

 

Up here they won't pay you to test drive,but never in the dealers wildest dreams would they think of charging you.

 

Hey, I don't know about y'all, but my test drive cost me $23,850.00 (plus tax, title and license). If I'd only never heard of MINI......

I can resist anything, except temptation. -Oscar Wilde

 

We didn't even test drive, just picked out the one we wanted and bought... shame on us!

 

Yep, and stupid, naive people who are happy to do business with them.

 

Can you ask for more details?

How much for a test drive and how long does it take?

In my area there is no charge for a test drive, not even at the BMW side of the dealership.

 

I use to live in Torrance, so it is not hearsay.

 

>>Smacks of urban legend stuff, eh?<<

And after the test drive, you discover you've got one kidney missing!
Diabolical!

Dogspeed.

 

I know Brecht is not because we drove one on Friday..

Chow!

Donna :smile:

 

Yeah, I had a similar experience But at least the charge was not up-front.

 

I was in a Hummer dealer and there was a group of people arguing with the salesperson about taking a test drive. It was 100% obvious that they had absolutely no intention or ability to buy it, but they brought the entire family along. The dealer said, "this is not Disneyland. We give test drives to prospective and qualified buyers only, which we determine by running a credit report." They left.

 

Thats the way it should be. I have no problems if people who are not going to buy a car want to look at it in the showroom or the lot but when they want to go for a demo ride for the fun of it.........especially on a Saturday afternoon...........sorry its not going to happen.

 

Still waiting for the name of the SoCal dealership that is charging for test drives. C'mon, holdenontoit, cough it up!


Clo/Wanda

 

Maybe holdenontoit has this particular nick for a reason?

 

Ok so maybe it's half heimers or something, but I can't remember who told me this, BUT THEY DID, HONEST! I'm still on the track of a few leads,but stay tuned, cause I won't let this one slide,and that's a promise.(funny ,my oldest son is named nick )

 

Ok, so I don't have ALL the info but I DO have some.........Firstly ,to all the So Cal people that got inadvertantly dissed by my reference to the dealer being in their area,I was WRONG! Ok, that's out of the way.The person who told me this, lives in Seattle, Washington, he's my first cousin ,a lawyer. A friend of his ,almost a year ago, went into a Seattle area dealership and was told that she would have to rent a mini to take it for a test ride. He's going to call her and find out which one (are there more than one in Seattle?) ,and get back to me by Monday at the latest.She was so grossed out by this, plus the wait time that she went and bought a new Beetle.More, when I know more ,sorry for the lag time ,but I truly couldn't remember who had told me this,and to all my friends who I saw in the meantime that I called frantically asking them if they had made this statement, no, I am not losing my mind! (hard to lose something that's already gone) Peace.

 

this JUST in and hopefully now we can put this thread to bed:
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Hi Jock,

I finally had a chance to speak to my colleage about the story I had told

you regarding dealers charging customers to test drive mini's out here. It

turns out that it wasn't an official dealer that charged cutsomers, it was

an enterprising used car dealer which had bought a bunch of new mini's and

then was reselling them to the public at a much higher price (29K instead

of 19K, my colleague told me). She was interested in getting a mini, but

the dealers had a 9 month wait list, so she was looking at other options.

But she balked at "renting" a mini from the used car dealer who had them

(that's how they termed the test drive fee).

Still an interesting story, though perhaps not quite as bad as I

originally thought.

Take care,

Henry

So there you have it,Tell a story around a table and it will change ......................Pax vobiscum, Jock

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