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Arnold Clark Horror Stories


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2 hours ago, kilbowie2002 said:


No he wasnt, he was a shite boss who pretended to have an interest in his staff but couldnt be arsed enough to even realise that every week he asked the same people the same questions. As for the family feel, if you ever had the displeasure of meeting some of his family you'd realise that family feel in this example is not really a good thing.

Was that not just the senility kicking in?

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2 hours ago, kilbowie2002 said:

 As for the family feel, if you ever had the displeasure of meeting some of his family you'd realise that family feel in this example is not really a good thing.

As a nosey c**t can I get an example?

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I've had dealings with them for over 15 years, not Arnold himself, more a certain part of the business controlled by a family member. Hard but fair is always the feeling that I've taken from those dealings. 

It's a massive company based on sales, not many companies like that actually have great reputations, especially in the motor trade.

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I posted much earlier in the thread that I'd gone for an interview with them as a salesman. By half way through the interview we were basically insulting each other and although we shook hands and were all smiles at the end, there was no way they wanted me and absolutely no chance I would work for them. Any time I see their sales guys now I feel genuinely sorry for them.

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Bought a cars from Arnold Clark and Evans Halshaw before and both were utterly awful. Clueless, aggressive salesmen then all sorts of issues with the cars. Not worth the hassle.

Have since bought cars from Volkswagen, BMW & Mercedes and had excellent service from all of them. They generally can't do enough for you.

I would now always recommend getting a car from a 'premium' car garage, if you can.

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A colleague worked in car sales. He worked his way up in a big English chain selling the "cheap shit" - Ford, Vauxhall, Fiats before ending up selling BMWs. For the "cheap shit" as he called it, pressure is on to move quantities. Nobody is interested too much in the profit margins because they're negligible, it's about piling them high and flogging as many as possible. As a result, the salespeople aren't too interested in the customers who are individually worth as little as £50 a time in commission. When he got moved into BMW things changed and they were taught how to cultivate clients. The people who buy the high end BMWs come back again and again and spend fortunes - my colleague reckoned he had one client who had spent nearly a million in the six years he'd been there. He had the client's name in his mobile and once took a call at 2am from him where he was told "Get me a seven series delivered to my cousin as a present next Saturday in Cape Town."

He quit in the end because the pressure cost him his marriage and working constant weekends meant he couldn't get access to his kids.

 

The customer service people at the good branches are highly valued and often paid more than the salespeople - these are the folk that people remember positively.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Looking at buying a car and the likelihood is I'll be going against everything that's been said in this thread and buying from the late Sir Arnold.

Anyhoo (this might seem a bit naive), when dealing with Arnold Clark are they open to negotiation on the sticker price? I'm selling my current car privately so will be going there with a cash deposit and I don't intend taking out any of their shitey service plans or anything like that - simply looking to buy the car and that's it.

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Looking at buying a car and the likelihood is I'll be going against everything that's been said in this thread and buying from the late Sir Arnold.

Anyhoo (this might seem a bit naive), when dealing with Arnold Clark are they open to negotiation on the sticker price? I'm selling my current car privately so will be going there with a cash deposit and I don't intend taking out any of their shitey service plans or anything like that - simply looking to buy the car and that's it.

There's always room for negotiation in there. 10% or so.
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Looking at buying a car and the likelihood is I'll be going against everything that's been said in this thread and buying from the late Sir Arnold.

 

Anyhoo (this might seem a bit naive), when dealing with Arnold Clark are they open to negotiation on the sticker price? I'm selling my current car privately so will be going there with a cash deposit and I don't intend taking out any of their shitey service plans or anything like that - simply looking to buy the car and that's it.

Went down with the lad last week and got £500 off the sticker price on his Ford Fiesta (should've asked for more) but I stuck to my guns and refused to shift. Got the usual back and forth to the manager routine and they tried to palm off an slightly older model too. The salesman in the end was even getting pissed off with the sales manager and was happy to shake on the deal. Got a decent low mileage first car for my lad and was fairly happy with the price.

 

There's always room to haggle, start off with a cheeky bid you never know.....

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6 hours ago, Ron Aldo said:

Looking at buying a car and the likelihood is I'll be going against everything that's been said in this thread and buying from the late Sir Arnold.

Anyhoo (this might seem a bit naive), when dealing with Arnold Clark are they open to negotiation on the sticker price? I'm selling my current car privately so will be going there with a cash deposit and I don't intend taking out any of their shitey service plans or anything like that - simply looking to buy the car and that's it.

Wait till later in the month, if they're nowhere near their target they're more likely to give you what you want.

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Wait till later in the month, if they're nowhere near their target they're more likely to give you what you want.


Was just going to post the same, definitely wait until 4/5 days before the end of the month.
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10 hours ago, tree house tam said:

Wait till later in the month, if they're nowhere near their target they're more likely to give you what you want.

I bought my current car from them, which was pre-registered but only had 8 miles on the clock.  The way it panned out we happened to go in on the last day of August and they were desperate for the sale to go through on August's books before the new registrations came out the following day.  The car I was trading in I reckoned was worth about £3500 on a private sale, so I was fully expecting to get offered about £2000 by AC and have to talk them up.  The took a look at it and offered me £3200 without even sticking it up on the ramps.  As I was also paying the rest off in full I managed to get another £900 off the price.

About a month after I got the car they phoned up asking if i'd had the timing belt changed on the Astra, which I hadn't despite it being due.  So I assume that some potential buyer had asked the question.

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1 hour ago, KnightswoodBear said:

About a month after I got the car they phoned up asking if i'd had the timing belt changed on the Astra, which I hadn't despite it being due.  So I assume that some potential buyer had asked the question.

Surely to f**k a mechanic can look at a timing belt and say if it needs replaced

 

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