Acubed.co.uk and Lmc Associates - Legimate?

jolly77

piggeh wrote:

jolly77 - How do you inspect vehicles? Is it done by a third party? Who owns the vehicles which you're selling on?

Not sure how to answer this without exposing the inner workings of my company which i think i'm entitled to keep secret from business rivals.

however i will say this,
Vehicles are inspected by experienced buyers from the motor industry who are buying vehicles all day every day and with the greatest respect to all know what they are looking at more than the average man on the street. The vehicle is then subject to further inspection by trained and experienced motor mechanics. vehicles are valeted to showroom standard and delivered by transporter.

We only buy from large ex-lease companies and re-marketing companies but it depends on the vehicle. A 3 year old vauxhall astra will probably come from motability where as a 12 month old renault espace will come from renault finanical services(renault uk's leasing scheme)
This is so the vehicles are 1 owner, main dealer service history, warranted mileages and can be inspected as they came off the road without any refurbishment being done to them.

We dont buy from private individuals or other motor traders mainly because the vehicles could have been refurbished(painted, etc), mileages are not warranted and could have been mechanically fixed up just long enough to get them out the door.

hope this helps but as i said i'm nervous about exposing the specific workings of my company

piggeh

I'm just curious as to why:

ACubed makes no claim of ownership of vehicles listed on our web site and all vehicles and images remain the property of their respective owners.

From the sounds of it, you are acting as an intermediary agent and purchasing vehicles once you have allocated it to someone? I say after, because you state you dont need to store cars, and the address on the website is a domestic address?

I don't have any qualms if you're an agent, especially as you don't ask for money until the person has their car and even then are willing to accept a cheque. Doesn't sound so bad to me as people can always cancel the cheque if they find out the car is duff in the first few days of having it. Given they are a couple of years old, they have been warranted anyway so are probably ok.

jolly77

piggeh wrote:

I'm just curious as to why:



From the sounds of it, you are acting as an intermediary agent and purchasing vehicles once you have allocated it to someone? I say after, because you state you dont need to store cars, and the address on the website is a domestic address?

I don't have any qualms if you're an agent, especially as you don't ask for money until the person has their car and even then are willing to accept a cheque. Doesn't sound so bad to me as people can always cancel the cheque if they find out the car is duff in the first few days of having it. Given they are a couple of years old, they have been warranted anyway so are probably ok.

Your very close, however the companies we buy from dont sell to the public so we're not intermediary agents, closer to factory direct. What i found with traditional car sales is that you can have 6 cars, same make and model but still not have the right colour or a mileage that suits their budget. So we take a specification and a budget and present a vehicle to the customer that matches(we always deliver), if they like it they can buy it.

If you think about it and understand it fully it really is a very simple idea and saves money and hassle for the customer but like a lot of simple time saving devices when you push the button complex things have to happen in the background.

And yes the postal address is a private address, all my customers know exactly where to find me, i like to be honest in my dealings.

piggeh

Sounds like a reasonably good business model tbh.

jolly77

piggeh wrote:

Sounds like a reasonably good business model tbh.

Thx, its still early days but over 80 vehicles delivered so far and not one rejection so we must be doing something right

daveo_1978

I was looking for a certain car, these guys advertise on eBay & elsewhere so you will come across them...
but I didn't have a great experience using them.

No money changed hands at all so I certainly wasn't ripped off, its just I went to them instead of the car being delivered & the guy who's based in the office had the worst customer service Iv ever seen! All I got was attitude, name calling amid other rude comments and was finally advised to get off his property. All for no reason.

From what I know of them they are a legitimate company, the guys I dealt with were in fact very helpful, just the one bloke in the office cost his colleague a sale.

anewman

Thanks dave0_1978 - customer accounts of their experience with a company are more valuable than any claims the seller may make.

They do sell on Ebay http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/acubed_vehicles/ in their defense they have 100% positive feedback, but with only 62 comments. However the seller did receive a negative over a warranty issue, but they mutually withdrew the negative rating. An e-mail address in the listing offers details of the problems.

Note however the only feedback based on a car sale in the past 3 months on Ebay was a 1989 ROVER RANGE ROVER TURBO DIESEL BLUE for £620 http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110145627427 There is no feedback relating to any of the nicer cars during this period. The other auctions were for *purchasing* land rover bits.

jolly77

Hi all,
Ebay feedback only relates to part exchanges that have been sold via ebay auction system and yes as you can tell i'm a land rover fanatic. Items listed as classified ads arn't feedback related and customers buying from these ads can't leave feedback due to the fact that ebay only allows users to email the vendor and can't control the transaction in ebays usual way. Thats ebays way of doing things and not our choice i'm afraid. Classified ads cost about 1 pound per vehicle per month, where as by their auction system would cost about 10 pounds to list and then the sold commission on top......very expensive and only cost effective for the odd part exchange hence the feedback for px's only.

I am currently looking into daveo's experience and will take steps where required.

james_mullan

HiIm new here but have interested in this thread about acubed. I have just placed an 'order' with acubed for a ford mondeo tdci zetec s. placed a £250 deposit on tue/wed. I have always been in contact with a sales person from acubed and dont seem to be a problem upto now. car has now gone for valet and should be ready soon.after reading these threads i had become a bit concerned about this and about losing £250 and hope someone has got any updates on this company. This particular car didnt have a picture but obtained the registration number. What do you thinik i should do, go back to my credit card company and get my money back or let it run and see wyat happens. Im in two minds at the moment. I have emailed the sales guy surrounding my concerns but has not yet got back to me. Anyone with information or guidance would be appreicative

james_mullan

Good Afternoon All.

Well this is an add on to my questions yesterday. The company have now phone this morning and said the car is ready for viewing. Have been given the choice to either come and view at there branch or have it delivered to view.

As i only live in Telford, i have decided to go and view the car at there branch. All seems good up to now and any worries i had dont seem to be there any more. Providing all is well and the car is what i expect it to be, the car is as good as sold. I have had a reply to the concerns i have had and have been told there is no reason for any concern. At the end of the day i have paid by credit card so if there is a problem, i can always get the credit card company to refund my money.

Will update when i have viewed the car and hopefully purchased

James