NEWS

IF you’re knowingly undervaluing a customer’s part-exchange, you’re losing out.
Glass’s says word-of-mouth reports about silly offers on part-exes are hitting car dealers hard.
Some are even said to be offering below-scrap prices for perfectly decent, but old, cars. Such shortsightedness is leading some people to be venomous in their portrayal of dealers – adding the spread [...]

HOW important is the motor finance industry to you? Very important, reveals a new study.

It finances a third of all UK consumer car purchases - and more than a half of all UK car registrations.
That’s why 167,000 jobs are supported by the industry, and proof of how vital finance remains to our businesses, despite the [...]

CAR Dealer can reveal the MINI SUV!

Set to be shown at next month’s Paris Motor Show, the ‘concept’ part of this model’s Crossover Concept tag is something of a misnomer.
For here is, essentially, 2010’s MINI Cross.
A little larger than a Clubman, the concept shows how the chunky, tough-looking but urbanite SUV can be made compact [...]

ONE car certainly seems to be selling – and it’s a model nobody’s even driven yet!
Ford has confirmed over 1000 orders have been placed for the new Focus RS, the superhatch that arrives early next year.
Although pricing and other details remain sketchy for now, enough punters have been convinced to hand over cash deposits to [...]

GETTING into the contract hire and leasing business, given the increasing numbers of customers drawn to the idea of fixed price motoring?
Then new data from leasing website contracthireandleasing.com will be of interest.
The site has revealed its most popular searches over the last 30 days – and the brand coming out on top? Audi.
Indeed, second most [...]

BCA reports that average used car values fell 3.7 per cent in August alone.
That represents an average loss of £200.
It is also means the average value is now well below the £5000 benchmark: it currently standards at just £4765. July saw values just dip below the threshold, and August has reinforced that fall.
Performance against CAP [...]

CUSTOMERS will be encouraged to keep their car within the Kia dealer network for routine servicing, with a brand-new scheme.
This, boasts the company, is through a monthly payment, potentially costing the same as a Chinese take-away.
The Kia Service Plan is, in essence, a monthly payment scheme. Customers can choose how much they pay, building reserves [...]

RAINWORTH Skoda has joined in the celebrations of Rebecca Adlington’s Olympic success.
The Mansfield dealer sponsored a homecoming celebration – which saw over 18,000 locals join in.
Double Olympic gold winner Adlington did the traditional open top bus ride, before watching reruns of her victories to a firework and confetti display, something that later made national [...]

VALUES of some three-year-old cars have crashed by a third – in just a year.
And overall, reports HPI, prices of 36-month models are down by over 23 per cent in the last 12 months.
Year-old models are also dramatically down, by nearly 18 per cent.
What’s to blame? The economy, says HPI – although the situation isn’t [...]

IT’S an auction with a difference.
This Wednesday (10 September), BCA Birmingham will host its latest London Hackney Carriage sale.
In other words, a black cab auction. Although colours of the LTI models also include blue, yellow, green – even pink…
Entries range from a 1998 X1 to a 2007 TX4 with a few thousand miles on the [...]