Things Dealers tell Customers

You probably knew this already (and I'm sure you've read it on here) but most dealerships make as much or more from selling financial services as they do from selling vehicles. That's why people who walk in waving wads of cash usually don't get the great deals they are expecting. A friend who has had the "finance guy" role for many years told me that the mark-up on extended insurance policies is 100%. When they sell one, it's money for nothing - no overhead, no inventory. Ther person who "closes" the deal makes a pretty healthy commission and one of the sales tactics your "extended warranty" fool apparently thinks is efffective is simply to keep on and on and on until you give up. The dollar signs in his eyes making him ignore the normal social cues that his sales pitch was unwelcome. Your "polite refusal", while clear to you, may not have been clear enough to him either.

I haven't admitted this in this thread until now, but... if it helps my ADV brethren out at all - I work at a dealership, and what slarti wrote (above) is true.

I've seen about three or four different tactics used in the Finance offices. Sometimes they offer features that buyers want, and sometimes they don't. Sometimes they sign buyers up for things they didn't want anyway.

I don't want to say too much more for fear of the mafia coming after me, but ... yeah. Educate yourselves.

When I bought my only new car, my sales guy was awesome. His manager was awesome. I paid 'cash' so the finance guy was out of the picture. The warranty guy was relentless, though, telling me how much an ECU for a Mazda3 costs and that I should pay to have it covered until 100k. He kept going even after I said "well, this car is PZEV certified and I'm a Californian buying in California, so the ECU's covered to 150k by the factory..." "umm, er, well, catalytic converters...." "you're batting 1.000 with emissions parts there bro"

My sales guy finally stopped him after I reached for my checkbook to put it back in my pocket.

Motorcycle story: on my LA to Wisconsin ride last month, my TPS decided that 99,500 miles was a good time to start acting up. Typical V-Strom hot-soak = no idle deal. Annoying as shit riding hilly backroads in Utah, but a non-issue on the freeway. I called every dealership within 100 miles of Denver (7 or 8 total) and despite it being a common enough part (also used on Katanas, GSXRs, etc. for ~10 years), not one could get their hands on the part in less than a week. If I wanted the part in ten days, I'd buy it online.

Is it that common for dealers not to stock parts? I guess I'm spoiled because before I had Japanese bikes I had an oilhead BMW and my local dealer was A&S in Sacramento, who had most things and could get anything in two days.

I bought one off eBay from a breakers in Boise (listed as a Katana TPS; I found it while trying to see if any Suzuki cage TPS was interchangeable by looking at pictures) and had it in two days. Cost $25, the bike idles better than it ever has, and the fast idle works correctly now.

Seems that way to me. Even stuff their service department needs (e.g. valve shims), they may not have units to sell to the public. Or common parts that wear out regularly (e.g. rubber foot peg insets).

Yes, it is common. When they do order parts and/or aftermarket accessories, they usually buy from one or two wholesalers. They tell you it will be a week, because they will only order from each wholesaler a maximum of once per week, sometimes only a couple times per month. That way they spend less on shipping which increases their profit margin.

Shipping times and rates are all over the map. The aftermarket wholesalers have different levels for the shops. It's sort of like Amazon Prime. If you do so much business with them, or meet a minimum order requirement, you get free shipping. Maybe overnight depending on the warehouse location.

As for the manufactures, it gets even more hard to figure out, so I won't try.

As for stocking parts. That's up to the parts/service manager. We stock several hundred clutch/throttle cables and same with spark plugs and oil filters. We also stock common wear items for popular models like water pump seals and carburetor parts. But unless we sell at least 1 every 6 months, we don't tend to stock it. It's wasted money sitting on the shelf.

Doing 1 order a week is stupid as you have bikes to repair waiting on parts and every bike still in the shop is not making the shop any money. The shop needs to get them in, fixed and out as quick as possible.

The dealer ends up ordering the part any way so why bother getting it from the dealer? Usually slower and involves another trip to the dealer.
I don't fault them but things have changed.

Let's see if I can make you understand my (bad) english.
20+ years ago, the local Piaggio dealer used to tell to customer that to kick-start a Vespa you have to have the Vespa on the center stand, stand off the Vespa on its right side and kick-start it with your right foot while facing backward. :huh

Bike Dealers aren't like car dealers. Most bike dealers have to buy their inventory. Meaning the inventory is not on loan like at car dealers. If the bike dealer can't sale the bike, their out of pocket because they can't give it back to the distributor.

If they sell out of inventory, they maybe able to order more of that year model, but only if the distributor has that model in their stock (which the distributor will not have, mainly because they wont keep a "back stock" of anything really). If not, the next order the dealer can place will be for the next year model.

So if the guy is telling you it's his last one and he wont be getting another one until next year; he is most likely being honest with you. This does not mean that he should try and rape you on the price though.

I've stopped going to the dealership for parts for that reason. Unless you want oil, or coolant, or maybe sparkplugs, they're not going to have it. They don't even carry air filters!

I've had better luck at a small, independent repair shop than the dealership. I needed a valve shim, and the dealership wanted to order one. Independent had one to swap. Another time, I was riding a bike that was 20 years out of production, and the independent had a clutch cable in stock.

Dealerships are for shopping for shiny bikes, and accessories, not parts! The internet is cheaper, on my doorstep, and usually much quicker. . . .

GDI

Were they holding a gun to your head? Stand up, walk out and tell the sales guy the deal is off unless the warranty guy leaves. Pay for your new bike and ride it home. Done.

The trick to dealing with people like this is not engage with them, say no and walk away. Being polite is an invitation to them to keep trying. Be civil to everyone, be polite to those who deserve it and don't engage with people who are trying to steal from you.

The reverse of kick starting an LC4

Or a Maico.

Or an airhead BMW.

And in order to make the sale, to keep you from going elsewhere, dealers will flat-out lie to you about how soon your order will be available. Just like they flat-out lie about when your service or repair will be finished.

Waling through service yesterday I overheard a woman complaining that she'd probably not ever buy a __y__ again (the brand we sell) because new cars just shouldn't need an oil change so often / early. She said that her girlfriend bought a __x__, and that she didn't need to change the oil for many months afterward.

I was going to interject upon her initial claim that ___y___ cars weren't good, and that she'd buy something else until I heard that come out of her mouth, and her follow-up reasoning for one other thing. The poor service advisers were dealing with a grown woman who didn't understand simple math, and that she drove more miles than her girlfriend did over the course what I guess to be the same amount of time.

She didn't understand mileage, only time.

I felt it much better to not try to save this customer, instead letting __x___, __a__ or __b__ gain this level of intelligence (as they often do) as a customer.

I'm sorry, but I'm used to a much higher educated customer than that. I'll work with the ones who have an IQ over 90.

Likewise, I've just started to learn that certain attitudes just weren't worth trying to make a deal with. Sometimes walking back to the desk a customer is sitting at, but not sitting down, and saying "Thank you for giving us a chance, we hope you are able to find what you're looking for, but if you don't - we're still here for ya" as a form of "Goodbye" is in the best interest of the dealership on multiple levels.

Did you tell her that the manufacturer recommended oil change interval is likely 2 x or more what your dealership recommends?
It seems a little disingenuous to deride someone's lack of intelligence when that same ignorance is what brings the customer in twice as often as needed for an oil change.

We're typically doing oil changes at 7,000 or 7,500 miles. Don't forget that modern cars have oil life guages in them that monitor the use of the vehicle and estimate when it needs changed. We have some customers who get up near 10,000 before the guage reads that the oil life is at 5% life or so.

I actually had a customer of mine drive 15 miles to the dealership to get the oil changed because her ex-boyfriend told her (actually, insisted) it was time (car only had just under 5,000 miles on it since the last oil change). The service department checked the oil and her meter, and suggested that since she was at 40% oil life left - to bring it back when it hits 15%.

Thanks, Handy, but get with the times. Modern cars and modern oils seemed to be synced with what most of us would consider to be reasonable oil change intervals for fully synthetic oils, and the dealerships are going by that.

If you drive 7,500 miles and start deriding the car for getting close to needing an oil change... you have issues.

Full synthetic, good filter (not fram), 15k between changes, 184k miles and still running strong.

Yeah, a lot of our customers are able to get 10k miles in before the oil meter reads 0 %.

Sometimes 10k and 15k is pushing it for some areas and certain professions, but they have to set the algorithym points somewhere. I'd imagine that if someone was using a vehicle in a high silica environment that they'd know it and change oil and filters more often.