Long time since I posted, but always reading the messages.
Looking at buying a car from the above, anybody had any dealings, especially in negtotiating price?
Thanks
|
I guess it would be difficult to get a realistic response to your question if naming and shaming isn't allowed.
A friend of a friend bought a Puma from them some time back and she has been very pleased with the car. However, many years ago, before they got the main site in Crawley, their reputation wasn't that great, especially with their customer service if people had aftersales problems. They may well be better now.
A lot of their cars were imported and looking at their website just now it still looks like this may be the case ( a lot of Irish plated Picasso's for example) so it would be worth checking that the vehicle you are looking at is UK spec etc if that bothers you. Also linked in with this it would be worth checking the warranty as if it is an import it may not have the same warranty as a UK supplied car.
I would think that the price you see is the price you pay, in fact there may well be an extra 'admin' cost on top, so worth checking that out.
Hope this helps
|
From what I have heard they are certainly no worse than any other car supermarket and they certainly do a lot of business in Sussex/Surrey.
What I would say is that if you are after a Ford, don't overlook Ashington Automobiles - prices are very competitive there and they are good people to deal with, and no "admin" charges.
|
I had never heard of Ashington Automobiles so I ran a quick Google search. The first entry was a press release from West Sussex Trading Standards. It seems they are some very good guys as they are one of six traders to receive 'Buy with Confidence' certificates from West Sussex County Council Trading Service.
tinyurl.com/38sexn
--
Roger
A fine is a tax for doing wrong. A tax is a fine for doing well.
|
I've also heard that Ashington Automobiles is good. IIRC they sell a lot of Jersey registered cars, not that that makes much difference.
If you let us know what car you are interested in I may be able to let you know of some good places in that area
|
I've bought several newish Fords from Ashington with no problems. Their prices are very good so margins must be tight and haggling's a waste of time. On a busy day they seem run off their feet with a high turnover - you certainly see their stickers on a lot of Fords in Sussex.
My current car, a SEAT, was bought from Jefferies. Yes it's Irish spec (similar but not identical to British) but was £2000 cheaper than dealer, the trade-in value was good and the car was available in chosen colour within 2 weeks when the official dealer was quoting 3 months.
|
Looking at Focus Estate.
Jeffries have a couple, one a 06 with 7k miles on but thought it was a little too high at £12600
I cant seem to find a website for Ashingtons. Anyone got the address?
Thanks
|
I'm getting reports from readers of excellent aftersales service from www.cargiant.co.uk Things wrong with cars are either fixed promptly or the buyer is allowed to get it fixed and bill cargiant. So cargiant is fully aware of and is complying with the provisions of the Sale and Supply of Goods to Consumers Regulations 2002, which many car dealers foolishly deny any knowledge of. (Note that cargiant is not an advertiser on the site and never has been.)
HJ
|
|
The website is www.ashingtonautos.co.uk and they are currently showing 50 Focuses (Foci?) in stock, although some of these are C-Max
|
|
|
I bought my car from Cargiant and no problems so far.
A few comments on my experience:
lots of choice, but be aware that looking on the website, the cars with no mileage listed have all done over 100,000. It appears their site doesn't show numbers larger than 99,999. When taking into account the mileage, they are generally not the massive bargains they might appear (although still reasonably priced).
no sales *at all* - no-one will try and sell you any car, in any way. If you want to look at a car, you have to ask for the keys, which is straightforward enough. The testdrive is a 20mph 1/2 mile journey round the industrial estate. The only sales effort comes when they try to sell you the warranty and gap insurance. They will try and persuade you that you would be mad not to buy one.
They also asked me about finance, and I said cash. They did ask 'are you sure you don't want a quote, so you can keep money for investments'. No investment would outperform their high APRs! Either pay cash or have a loan arranged.
We spent about five hours there and by the time of purchase at about 5pm they said it was too late to pick up the car that day. The salesman said he thought the brakes felt spongey and needed checking (good service). So I had to come back the next day - no problem for me, but might be for someone else who lives further away.
Seemed like a decent company. I rejected an S40 for having 60,000 miles and only one service, but bought an S80 53 2.5T SE for £7,100 with 54,000 miles and FSH, which seems a good price. It's a decent place for browsing - you can look at a lot of cars (pretty much any model you care to see), and look at the engine, etc., interior, relatively easy, but test drives are a stumbling block.
|
"bought an S80 53 2.5T SE for £7 100 with 54. 000 miles and FSH which seems a good price."
(PLEASE DO NOT QUOTE ENTIRE POSTS)
Seems they are selling these really cheap.
This is the same model as mine, but with 4,000 miles more on the clock, and green rather than blue, but the price is £6,500 against the £7,100 I paid.
www.cargiant.co.uk/cars/detail.asp?Id=327460
The trade-in value is given as
Part-exchange Price:
Excellent condition:
£8190
Average condition:
£7330
Below average condition:
£6480
So they appear to be selling below px value (and I was happy with the £7,100 price). Any idea why they are selling so cheaply?
|
Assuming it's not scratched to pieces (some of their cars are), isn't ex-private hire (58k is a lot of potholed London miles although at this age and spec I'd say it's unlikely) and has proper history then it's an excellent price.
I think CarGiant have a policy of cost plus pricing and/or selling certain cars as special offers. If you haven't found one of their specials then it may well be that they've got it at a good price and have sold it on with their usual margin rather than an inflated one. Fairly often they'll list two very similar cars and the apparently inferior one (e.g., mileage, spec etc) will be more expensive, which is why I think they just add a certain amount to the price rather than working out what they could sell it for.
|
so they bought it for about £6k at auction , and rather than listing it at book value, they just add on a margin.
So logically, these S80s must be going for low prices at auction. Certainly autotrader prices are a fair bit higher for something of that spec.
|
|
|
I cant seem to find a website for Ashingtons. Anyone got the address? Thanks
Here you go:
www.ashingtonautos.co.uk/
I bought my Mondeo off them last June and can't fault the price (£10,599 for 13,800-mile 55-reg Zetec TDCi 130), their service or the trade in I got on my Civic. They even recommended me a competent Ford main dealer for warranty work, which I also use for servicing as they are convenient for work.
As far as I can establish the cars seem to come from the same closed auctions that main dealers use. Mine even had a Ford Direct RAC checklist in the glove compartment - it was just £1,800 or so cheaper than Ford Direct.
|
|
|
|
|
Hi Romeo156,
If you are after a Ford check out Ashington Autos, they are located in Ashington on the A24, not far from Jerrries Billingshurst site.
I have bought two car from them in the past six years with no problems.
They have specialised in nearly new Fords for about thirty years, they could almost be called the orginal car supermarket!
My last purchase in Aug 06 was a 13 month old Focus, 05 plate 1.6 LX with 13,000 on the clock for £7995.
Their website details are: www.ashingtonautos.co.uk
Good luck
|
|
|
