Well in short it's not going well.....
I have recently been very taken by the new Mercedes CLA.....I think it is a beautiful and very classy looking car both inside and out.
I have done a lot of research into the models and my original choice was the CLA 35 in Sun Yellow, but after a lot of thought I decided that I couldn't on point of principle accept the scandalous higher rate of road tax which the premium trim spec model breaches the threshold by only £130.
I then decided on the CLA 250 in Jupiter Red which has a 224 bhp engine in top spec Premium Plus trim. This model is very well equipped as you would expect including panoramic roof, but is £4k cheaper then the lower trim spec CLA 35.
I checked Carwow and got my 5 offers, of which one was Mercedes Glasgow so within easy travelling distance.
Their offer was not the cheapest but still had a healthy 8.7% discount, so I decided to pay them a visit last weekend while I was in the area for a social event with my girlfriend. We were in her car so my S3 was tucked up at home in my garage.
We arrived and I asked for the person named on the Carwow quote. First of all he checked stock cars and said there are no 250 models available and offered me 220 or 200 models, to which I said no because coming from 300+ bhp with my last 2 cars I do not want to drop down to 190 or 162 bhp. He said in that case it would need to be a factory order and the Carwow quote price would not be valid.
I knew this was not correct because all Carwow quotes are based on factory ordered cars, but I played along and asked him to give me a price to change including my S3 trade in. He said he could not place a value on my car without seeing it, so at this point I realised I was wasting my time and left....but e-mailed a complaint later.
The manager subsequently phoned me and said they would honour the Carwow quote for a factory ordered car and also gave me an estimate of what they could offer as a trade in - "£26k - £26.5k".
Now my S3 is totally immaculate and is worth £28k on a trade in all day long, so I declined his offer.
Fast forward a week to today and I visit Arnold Clark Mercedes in Dundee. There is some sort of event happening and everybody is busy, so I end up speaking to the manager and tell him I am looking to buy a CLA 250. His first words are "I've never seen one of them" and he had to look up the price list to find it. He is only familiar with the 220, 200 and 180 models. He is actually quite dismissive of my choice....saying that they are not popular/nobody wants them....so they will not stock a car they cannot sell.
I find it hard to believe that there is no demand for the 224bhp model, but he reminds me that he knows best.
He also derided my personal choice of buying a car outright with cash rather than on PCP. I said that I think the PCP bubble is about to burst....but again he reminded me he knows best and we agree to differ.
The upshot of the conversation was that if I wanted a factory ordered CLA 250 it would be 2020 at the earliest....so naturally at this point I left.
There is one more Mercedes dealer group I can try......but it's not looking good so far.
I have recently been very taken by the new Mercedes CLA.....I think it is a beautiful and very classy looking car both inside and out.
I have done a lot of research into the models and my original choice was the CLA 35 in Sun Yellow, but after a lot of thought I decided that I couldn't on point of principle accept the scandalous higher rate of road tax which the premium trim spec model breaches the threshold by only £130.
I then decided on the CLA 250 in Jupiter Red which has a 224 bhp engine in top spec Premium Plus trim. This model is very well equipped as you would expect including panoramic roof, but is £4k cheaper then the lower trim spec CLA 35.
I checked Carwow and got my 5 offers, of which one was Mercedes Glasgow so within easy travelling distance.
Their offer was not the cheapest but still had a healthy 8.7% discount, so I decided to pay them a visit last weekend while I was in the area for a social event with my girlfriend. We were in her car so my S3 was tucked up at home in my garage.
We arrived and I asked for the person named on the Carwow quote. First of all he checked stock cars and said there are no 250 models available and offered me 220 or 200 models, to which I said no because coming from 300+ bhp with my last 2 cars I do not want to drop down to 190 or 162 bhp. He said in that case it would need to be a factory order and the Carwow quote price would not be valid.
I knew this was not correct because all Carwow quotes are based on factory ordered cars, but I played along and asked him to give me a price to change including my S3 trade in. He said he could not place a value on my car without seeing it, so at this point I realised I was wasting my time and left....but e-mailed a complaint later.
The manager subsequently phoned me and said they would honour the Carwow quote for a factory ordered car and also gave me an estimate of what they could offer as a trade in - "£26k - £26.5k".
Now my S3 is totally immaculate and is worth £28k on a trade in all day long, so I declined his offer.
Fast forward a week to today and I visit Arnold Clark Mercedes in Dundee. There is some sort of event happening and everybody is busy, so I end up speaking to the manager and tell him I am looking to buy a CLA 250. His first words are "I've never seen one of them" and he had to look up the price list to find it. He is only familiar with the 220, 200 and 180 models. He is actually quite dismissive of my choice....saying that they are not popular/nobody wants them....so they will not stock a car they cannot sell.
I find it hard to believe that there is no demand for the 224bhp model, but he reminds me that he knows best.
He also derided my personal choice of buying a car outright with cash rather than on PCP. I said that I think the PCP bubble is about to burst....but again he reminded me he knows best and we agree to differ.
The upshot of the conversation was that if I wanted a factory ordered CLA 250 it would be 2020 at the earliest....so naturally at this point I left.
There is one more Mercedes dealer group I can try......but it's not looking good so far.
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