Beware of Porsche Boxster 24 hour test drive offer

GW65

Bit of a long post, but I wanted to warn you of a potential exposure if you accept the offer of a 24 hour test drive in a Porsche Boxster.

I received a letter from Porsche GB offering me a 24 hour test drive in a Boxster. I phoned Porsche, chose the Boxster S, answered a series of standard questions, and selected a date for the test drive. The person I spoke to mentioned that I'd need to present my driving licence (understandable) and that there would be an insurance excess (ditto). Out of curiosity I asked what the insurance excess would be, but the person didn't know and promised to get back to me.

The person called back later to say that she now had the details of the insurance excess but seemed strangely reluctant to volunteer the information! When I asked for the magic number, I was told that it was £10,000. No, that's not a misprint; I really do mean ten thousand pounds sterling. She then made vague comments about consideration being given to the nature of any damage, etc, but I told her it wasn't worth the risk and cancelled.

Literally 5 minutes later I received a call from my local Porsche dealer to say that he'd seen my booking cancellation, and could he offer an alternative date. I explained that I'd actually cancelled because of the outrageous insurance excess, so he offered to put me on his dealer insurance to circumvent the problem. He also promised to speak to his manager as the insurance excess might put other people off accepting the test drive. I felt it only proper to explain to him that the issue was not that the excess would put people off, but rather the fact that it wasn't highlighted in the test drive offer (meaning that many people would unknowingly take on an unacceptable degree of risk). I declined his offer.

I find it truly appalling that Porsche thinks it is acceptable to offer test drives without highlighting the risk that people are taking on in the event of something unfortunate happening to the vehicle. The experience has ensured I will certainly never consider purchasing a Porsche vehicle. Well done Porsche – a masterful piece of marketing.

Stephen_Leak

GW65 wrote: »

Well done Porsche – a masterful piece of marketing.

Q: Why do all marketing people drive BMW's?
A: They can't spell Porsche.

anewman

If you can afford to test drive a porsche (i.e. you could afford to and would want to buy one), then realistically you can afford the £10k excess very easily. If however you're a saddo on the dole and fancy racing at 140mph on the motorway for a day in a porsche, and have £50 in your bank account, then chances are you can't afford the £10k excess.

Message - only test drive if you are genuinely interested in buying a car.

piggeh

Well - you could insure it yourself for a day I guess. £10k excess & then not telling anyone about it is grossly unfair. No doubt they'd want the work carried out at a porsche dealer as well.

daymo

anewman wrote: »

If you can afford to test drive a porsche (i.e. you could afford to and would want to buy one), then realistically you can afford the £10k excess very easily. If however you're a saddo on the dole and fancy racing at 140mph on the motorway for a day in a porsche, and have £50 in your bank account, then chances are you can't afford the £10k excess.

Message - only test drive if you are genuinely interested in buying a car.

I think anewman is right ,would you let any old person drive your brand new mega expensive sports car without some financial back up? that is the reason for the £10k excess.I remember test riding a £4.5k motorbike and had to sign on the line saying I would pay £1k excess,It was a very careful ride

jaykay1_2

anewman wrote: »

If you can afford to test drive a porsche (i.e. you could afford to and would want to buy one), then realistically you can afford the £10k excess very easily. If however you're a saddo on the dole and fancy racing at 140mph on the motorway for a day in a porsche, and have £50 in your bank account, then chances are you can't afford the £10k excess.

Message - only test drive if you are genuinely interested in buying a car.

Rubbish, that's a 1/4 of the cost of the car!
so you're telling me that if someone was buying a mondeo @10k on a 3 year finance deal, they will be easily able to afford £2.5k excess?

anewman

jaykay1 wrote: »

Rubbish, that's a 1/4 of the cost of the car!
so you're telling me that if someone was buying a mondeo @10k on a 3 year finance deal, they will be easily able to afford £2.5k excess?

All I mean is you should be buying cars within your means. No point having £30k in savings, and looking for a car then spending all your savings on a car. There's more to life than cars.

I can understand someone wanting to drive a nice expensive car for the day that they could never realistically afford to buy though.

peterg1965

jaykay1 wrote: »

Rubbish, that's a 1/4 of the cost of the car!
so you're telling me that if someone was buying a mondeo @10k on a 3 year finance deal, they will be easily able to afford £2.5k excess?

I agree...... absolutely. Porsche are not being totally honest here.

piggeh

I doubt the reason porsche have put a £10k excess in place is to prevent people using it as a sports car for a day. They're not telling anyone about it so it's not likely to be affecting the applications!

plane_boy2000

The reason the excess is 10K is to keep their insurance down to an acceptable level. I also agree that it is unreasonable, however when you arrived at the dealer you would have had to sign a disclaimer / agreement to the terms of the offer and these would have clearly stated the excess. Still not good though, and to be honest I have been in the market, and have spent 35K on cars before but would not have been prepared to take one out with that level of exposure.

anewman

plane_boy2000 wrote: »

Still not good though, and to be honest I have been in the market, and have spent 35K on cars before but would not have been prepared to take one out with that level of exposure.

If you can spend 35k on a car, losing 10k to you is like me throwing away £1.