Hi All,
After many months of research and reading many threads on this forum I have finally taken the plunge and ordered a Q5. As this was my first new car purchase it certainly was an interesting ordeal and thought it may be handy to give some feedback on the overall experience.
First off was the test drive at Stockport Audi, luckily they had a 2.0 TDI S-Tronic in to test, which was the one I was interested in. Following the lovely 1 hour test drive, I returned to chat to the dealer with my mind pretty much made up to discuss figures. Unfortunately the dealer seemed less than keen to take my money. He commented on how good the car was and was then happy to take the keys and see me on my way. It took me to pretty much spell out to him that I wanted to buy one. After going through the various spec and options the dealer noted that they will prepare a quote for me. So their quote was list price no discount and a 6 month lead time. I then proceeded to contact other local dealers, all with the same response, no discount and 6 month lead time. Some local dealers did not even bother to return my phone calls / e-mails to provide quotes. I then contacted a number of brokers such as ukcarbroker.co.uk and bettercardeal.co.uk, both could offer some 9% off the list price with ukcarbroker.co.uk offering a 6 month lead time and bettercardeal offering a 9 month lead time. To see if one local dealer could get anywhere close to these figures I popped in to Cheshire Oaks Audi. The staff there were really helpful and much better than many dealers I had previously contacted; however, they could not get anywhere near the broker discount, saying that brokers get massive discounts due to bulk orders etc. The dealer did try to scare me off the broker method, saying that my delivery date will be pushed back and back, customer service with the selected dealer will be poor and should I have any warranty issues, then I have to take it back to where the car was originally purchased. Having read many reports on this forum on going the broker route and a good friend purchasing a TT via a broker I decided that all will be fine. So it was to be the broker step. I contacted the broker to confirm my order, they were really helpful and clear on the processes to complete the order. I paid my broker fee and within a few days the Audi dealer contacted me to confirm my order. Deposit was taken with the Audi dealer and all costs and delivery date confirmed. The broker fee was taken from the total car purchase cost as this was paid by the dealer. The only initial issue has been the dealer not being that great in getting back to me with my queries on various issues on the order, i.e. confirmation of sport suspension, issues of purchasing the sound pack etc. But overall they have been at hand to answer my queries. Still a while to go, but fingers crossed all will be grand.
