Autoquake Part Exchange, AVOID.

dnewpix

Autoquake have recently begun part-exchange when buying a car from them. But, don't hold your hopes up. I spoke to them by phone at length about part exchanging my 10 yr old SEAT ALHAMBRA 89,000 mls, fsh, above average tidy in and out, perfect drive 1.8 20 VT, with an £11,000 car of theirs. They told me that my car would be worth around the £1500.00 mark.
However, when I drove all the way down to Southall for my appointment they came out to me 15 mins late, kept me waiting for two and a half hours and then produced a 'grease monkey' called Declan who said that they valued my car at £50.00.
My car was last serviced only a couple of weeks back by the same VW specialists in North London who have cared for my last 4 cars over 25 years. Yet, this Declan chappie managed to find at least 2 potentially serious mechanical faults, along with a myriad of minor stone chip, tiny paintwork imperfections etc that he said would make the cars value at ''minus £400". Yes folks, really I should pay them £400 to take it off my hands... But, no. As a good will gesture they were willing to allow me £50.00!
My point is, they say they offer a fair trade-in price "Guarranteed". Go on, look at their website. But this is utter BS and you should really be able to smell it for miles. Any scrap dealer up and down the country would be delighted to take ownership of my car, for much more! I wasted a days work, and had to get my 5 year old picked up from school at cost just so these people could prove to me that they are just like I thought they would be.
I must admit, most of the people waiting around there for the 'great deals on offer' looked like 'victims', if you know my meaning. Save yourself the aggro. Push your car into the Thames and get a bicycle.

Kilty_2

Welcome to the motor trade :rotfl:

I'm sure if I phoned any dealer right now and asked for a part ex price without them seeing the car they'd price it high to get me there.

alcan

Yes, but they wouldn't use the phrase 'guaranteed' and they wouldn't go from £1500 to minus £400. Welcome to the Autoquake experience.

Kilty_2

alcan wrote: »

Yes, but they wouldn't use the phrase 'guaranteed' and they wouldn't go from £1500 to minus £400. Welcome to the Autoquake experience.

One person's "fair" is another person's "unfair" - so if I say I'll give you a fair price guaranteed then I mean I'll definitely give you what I consider a fair price.

ASA are going to hammer Autoquake once they have power over the web though imo

MrRedundant

Of course they would.

They may have told the OP £1,500 but anyone with half a brain would know fine it was a ploy and a 10 year old Seat would be worth far less. The OP is having a laugh if they expected £1,500 for that.

Also Alcan you seem rather against them; bitter ex employee or competitior?

dnewpix

Mr Redundant, some 10 year old SEAT's are certainly worth a lot less than 1500. But, them some of them are really quite nice and are worth at least that. But, probably not to you, especially if you are an employee at Autoquake..

MrRedundant

dnewpix wrote: »

Mr Redundant, some 10 year old SEAT's are certainly worth a lot less than 1500. But, them some of them are really quite nice and are worth at least that. But, probably not to you, especially if you are an employee at Autoquake..

I am not.

A look on autotrader shows plenty of these cars for between 1k and 2k therefore trade in value would be less than 1k.

The fact is trade ins always act like this as a dealer doesnt want the hassle of shifting a 10 year heap no one will want.

alcan

Mr Redundant

I'm not an ex employee or a competitor - can you guess what I am??

Yes, I'm a CUSTOMER.

I had a horrendous experience with Autoquake in late 2010, and in the spirit of consumer feedback I am now telling the world what I think.

By the way, everything that dnewpix says about the Southall depot is exactly my experience too.

I've said it before, but it's worth repeating. If you go to their Southall depot, get the full name of the person that deals with you. Don't accept just first names, acronyms or nicknames. Ask for ID to make sure. Then look that person up on Facebook. Try it, you will be appalled at what you see.

By the way, to give an idea of trade in, I recently traded in a 2000 X reg Astra Club auto in not very good condition for £1100 against a newer Vxhall for a family member. So expecting £1500 for this SEAT in question sounds reasonable to me.

And I'm sure that Mr Redundant is NOT an Autoquake employee, as they would NEVER post fake comments on review sites. . . .would they???