New car price increase after signing contract

AlexMarch

Hello, I was wondering if anyone had any advice on this situation that my mum finds herself in. She ordered a new car in November 2021, paying a deposit of £1,000, and was told it would be delivered in February 2022. Due to understandable reasons, namely the war in Ukraine causing supply shortages for car parts, the delivery date kept being pushed back. Now, the company is saying it will be end of July 2022 - however the company has said that she will need to pay an additional £2,000 for a different specification of car, because the original specification of car is not available anymore. If she doesn't pay the additional amount, the contract will be cancelled and the deposit returned. I checked the terms of the contract, and it seems that they can cancel the contract (and return the deposit) if "the Manufacturer ceases to make the model or specification of goods you have ordered". I find it hard to believe that the company can't make a similar specification of car that doesn't attract such a large price increase - but not having any inside information on car specifications, I will find it hard to argue that! My mum needs the car, so is reluctant to have the contract cancelled, but also finds the additional £2,000 hard to accept. Any advice greatly appreciated - thank you.

CKhalvashi

The only options as I see them here are to re-negotiate the contract (assuming all the steps in the contract have been followed by the dealer so far) or to cancel the order.

Is there not an ex-demo unit available at a reasonable price at the moment (these are starting to appear again).

We are waiting 6+ months for new vehicle deliveries at the moment so it's definitely not a normal situation in general and her experience will be definitely nothing out of the ordinary.

pinkshoes

How is the car she ordered different to the one that is £2000 more? 

If they are saying they cannot get the parts to build the cheaper spec model, then they cannot produce what you paid for.

Either negotiate (say £1000 extra not £2000) or cancel the order and buy from elsewhere.

IS there any specific reason why your mum NEEDS this car? Can't you just go and buy a second hand car from elsewhere?

The_Fat_Controller

If the particular specification of the car is no longer in production then all the dealer can do is apply what is in the contract.

You don't need any "inside information", the model, specification and price will all be on the original order and finding an historic brochure from the time of the order should be possible.

Just compare that with the latest version.

sheramber

pinkshoes said:

How is the car she ordered different to the one that is £2000 more? 

If they are saying they cannot get the parts to build the cheaper spec model, then they cannot produce what you paid for.

Either negotiate (say £1000 extra not £2000) or cancel the order and buy from elsewhere.

IS there any specific reason why your mum NEEDS this car? Can't you just go and buy a second hand car from elsewhere?

It is not necessarily shortage of specific parts to be the reason for io longer producing a specific model of car.

Car manufacturers stop production of models and bring in updated models regularly to be competitive with other manufacturers.

molerat

All new car contracts going back as far as I can remember have a MRP increase / spec change clause - happened to me in 1989 !. Nothing new or unusual.  If she doesn't like it she can walk away, there will be a queue to buy it. Dealers don't need to negotiate any more.

Money_Grabber13579

Would this be a Mini by any chance? Mini have stopped producing cars with manual gearboxes and so for anyone who has ordered one, they will either have to pay for the upgrade to an automatic gearbox instead or have their order cancelled. An automatic gearbox is significantly more expensive so if that’s what it is, £2k probably isn’t unreasonable.