Nearly all of us have had the ‘pleasure’ (uh-hem) of negotiating a car purchase. Even though the experience has greatly improved since the cheesy olden days, it’s still pretty trying.
Two weeks ago, my beautiful 2001 beetle conked out, once and for all. It came as a shock; I thought I’d get a good 70K more miles out of it before I had to put her down. But alas, this time the repairs exceeded the value of the car. I wasn’t anticipating the dreadful extra expense of a new car (especially since I don’t really believe in financing a car, and would much rather pay outright for a used vehicle).
So to make a long story as short as possible, I was put in a difficult situation, where my 2001 beetle was sitting in the dealer’s repair shop–not drivable–and the dealer was pressuring me to make a decision about buying or leasing a new vehicle, otherwise I’d need have mine towed elsewhere until I could figure out the next step.
Even though I would have preferred to buy an older car outright, at this point in time, the numbers made more sense to lease a new one. And so the games began. First, I’m talking with a ‘consultant’ with VW for hours…a fella that is supposedly paid a salary rather than commission, therefore he has MY best interests in mind. MmmHmm. Then, when the time comes, he brings in the magic man from behind the curtain (we’ll call him Merlin). Merlin has that car salesman twinkle in his eye. He was a nice enough guy, but when he says ‘you’ve been a good customer for years, and clearly you’ve spent a lot here on VW repairs…too many repairs. We will take the very best care of you…’, well, you’d like to believe him. Yet, it was tough considering some of the things that he told me conflicted with what the ‘consultant’ told me prior. Example: that there was only $xx cushion in each beetle, and the ‘discount’ was already built into the lease agreement (consultant said this earlier, but Merlin said, No no, there’s more cushion. We’ll work with you).
Even with the inconsistencies, time was ticking and I had no choice but to make a decision (incidentally, usually I am pretty fast at making decisions, even big ones. But when trust is shaky at best, well….that becomes another story).
To further feed my suspicions about the honesty and validity of this ‘deal’, they took me to another room to go over paperwork and additional insurance options with yet another fella. We’ll call him ‘Slimeball’. Now, Slimeball convinces me that I need to buy some extra insurance so that if the car is totaled I will not have to pay the difference in it’s value and the insurance reimbursement. It seemed sort of legitimate, but the turn off was that before I could even open my mouth to say anything, he says, ‘Now, this special insurance is $329 but for you, we’ll charge $210.’
What the heck? Why do these people continue to live up to their shady reputation by just not giving it to me straight to begin with. So I say to him, ‘You mean you can give it to me for $210? How much lower can you go? Just give it to me straight; how much more room do you have to discount this?’ And he says ‘well, with certain cars, we have to charge $329, but since your’s is just a beetle, we can go to the lowest amount, which is $210.’
My response: ‘Why didn’t you just say so in the first place, then, if you know that is the ‘real’ insurance price for the beetle?’ And from Slimeball, no response. Completely ignored me. I guess they figured by that time they already ‘had’ me, and that I wouldn’t back down from the purchase.
Exactly two weeks have now passed, and yes, I’m enjoying this spankin’ new car, even though it was not something that I particularly desired (cars are not my priority; traveling is!) But I still wonder if I got screwed. If I could have waited longer somehow to get second opinions on the car repair amount, if I could have done a better job negotiating the lease deal, etc.
I have decided that I need to let it go. If I got ripped off, then so be it. To ponder it longer is only harming me, and certainly it is not in any way affecting those that could really be the culprits: the dealership.
And so I ask my readers, what experiences have you had in your workplace (internally or with clients) where you had a lack of trust, and yet had to make a decision, go with it, and let go of any suspicions as to integrity and credibility?
