Mr J

WMG Sell Dangerous Cars

Poor vehicle knowledge, insufficient checks, and hidden admin fees. This place (knowingly or negligently) sells dangerous vehicles. I enquired regarding a BMW 520d (LL12 JVF) that this dealership were selling, and discussed the vehicle over the phone with Ross. Disappointingly he was very vague with detail when asked very simple and direct questions (i.e. "please talk me through the vehicle's service history"). He advised me it was 'good' (despite being advertised as 'excellent') and only divulged more detail when pressed. The history was certainly not 'excellent', with some gaps and a large amount of work not having been undertaken by a main dealer. This particular model of BMW benefits from the iDrive system, which dictates service schedules and provides countdowns for when certain parts (fluids, brake pads/discs, etc.,) will require changing. There is NO fixed service schedule. When I asked Ross to check the system for me he advised me that this particular model doesn't have such levels of detail. It does. I'll be charitable and accept that he might not have sufficient knowledge of the vehicle to interrogate the system properly, but others may think that he was trying to pull a fast one. Having arranged to view and test drive the vehicle (trying to get Ross to agree that I'd be allowed to test drive the vehicle before we discussed the financial side of things was an ordeal in itself) I carried out some further research into the vehicle. This was when I discovered that the vehicle has at least one (the government website doesn't disclose specifics) safety recall outstanding. Now WMG make a big deal of the fact that all of their vehicles are checked and approved. Indeed, this forms part of their justification for adding on a £99 'arrangement fee' on purchases. (N.B. this was NOT disclosed in their advertisement for the vehicle on motors.co.uk) This tells me either that they are not as thorough in their checks as they claim to be, or that they were aware of the recall but decided not to do anything about it, and not to bring it to the attention of prospective purchasers. The 'arrangement fee' is another thing entirely. I do not expect to be told that a product is available at a certain price, and then have the price increased when I come to pay for it. I note that the proprietor has defended the charge in another review but, frankly, none of these are things for which I should expect to pay a dealer. Dealership prices are already inflated compared to private sales, as they take into account checks, servicing, warranties etc., I have my own breakdown cover, I am perfectly capable of purchasing my own fuel, I have no need for finance and, frankly, if a vehicle had not been recently serviced or MOT-ed, then I would not be considering it as a purchase in the first place. Similarly, it is a basic expectation that a car is clean when it is being sold; I do not expect to have to pay for the privilege of purchasing a non-dirty car. No doubt WMG will already have reflected the cost to them of selling the vehicle when they purchased it, either at auction or as a part-exchange. This is just shameless profiteering by double-charging for things that should be included and/or carried out as a matter of course. Thankfully some other poor soul placed a deposit on the vehicle online before I came to inspect it (what kind of fool orders a vehicle from sharks like this without so much as a physical inspection?), so at least Ross was spared the ignominy of being challenged face-to-face regarding these matters. Finally, to pre-empt the sadly-predictable response that I'm likely to get from the proprietor, this isn't a case of sour grapes whatsoever. I had done my due diligence on the vehicle and was prepared to negotiate upon price in order to reflect these glaring inadequacies in the vehicle. Everything has its price (even a broken and dangerous vehicle), but I would have been more than willing to walk away. I only hope that the new purchaser has done their due diligence, as it seems WMG certainly haven't.