How to buy a car

If you’re looking to buy a new car, your local dealer’s showroom seems the most logical place to start – and it probably is – but AutoeBid has a few recommendations to take on board before venturing into the lion’s den. It is important to be ready to face the enthusiastic car salesman who will be only too keen to make sure you walk away with his choice of car, not yours.

1. Be prepared

When visiting the showroom for the first time it's always a good idea to be fully prepared: make sure that you leave yourself enough time to have a good look at the model of interest, time for at least a thirty minute test drive as well as enough time for the salesman to answer any questions you may have afterwards. Remember to take your driving licence, both parts if it is the new style as salesmen will sometimes use any excuse to stop you from driving.

2. Confidence is key

Take control at the beginning of the process by letting the salesman know that although you are in the market for a new car and are close to making your final decision you will not be making that decision today and will need to consider all your options before finalising anything. This way the salesman will do his very best to help knowing that what he does today may help influence your decision his way. Be prepared to answer some of the salesman's qualifying questions, at this stage they are pretty harmless and are a part of the process required before they let you out for a drive. Be as honest at this point as you can as they may refer to your answers later...

3. It's your test drive

Every salesman will have their own route which they prefer. The length of your test drive is normally determined by the salesman deciding how likely you are to purchase the car: let the salesman know that you would like to try the vehicle on a variety of roads to really make sure you get a good feel for the car and are comfortable behind the wheel. It's your test drive make sure you are completely satisfied before returning to the dealership. Remember it's a big decision and costly one if you don't get it right.

4. Closing the deal

It is at this point that the salesman will use all of his skills and sometimes "tricks" to keep you in the showroom and try to get some commitment from you for the time he has spent so far. Common tricks include offering a hot cup of coffee knowing full well that you'll have to let it cool down before drinking it!
Don't feel at this point that you owe the salesman anything; remember he is only doing the job he is paid to do. Now is the time to expect the questioning to become more direct, they will do their best to pin you into a corner and make you believe you are getting the best deal right there and then and that it's a one time offer never to be repeated. Reiterate what you said at the beginning about not making a decision then and having to consider all your options before making your final decision.

5. Just before you go

Just before they let you go most dealers will have one final attempt at keeping you by offering that little something extra they held back; this just goes to show that they weren't offering you the very best deal in the first place.

If you mention buying on-line or through Auto eBid to the salesman, they will most probably bombard you with reasons not to use our service (after all they want to secure your sale and sometimes will do anything to get it). The most common reasons given are as follows:

• "The car will be an import": This is not true unless explicitly requested in your auction – and there are only a handful of cars (mainly performance cars with long delivery times) where you can request an imported vehicle.
• "They wouldn’t be able to service the car": All UK main dealers would be required to offer full servicing and warranty support under the terms of their franchise with the manufacturer – and in fact they make a good profit from servicing and warranty work, so their after-sales department will be happy to assist you with this.
• "The car won’t have a warranty": All new cars come with a warranty and it will be exactly the same warranty for any UK car supplied through Auto eBid as from your local dealer – ie. valid throughout the UK. This is normally at least 3 years (with the exception of a few makes).
• "You will never actually see the car": Your car will be supplied through a UK main dealer – so it is sourced in the same way as it would be from your local dealer. That means that if your local dealer can get the car, your supplier through Auto eBid will also be able to get the same car.
• "We can get you the car more quickly than if you buy online": Auto eBid’s reverse auction sends your order to dealers across the UK – so if there is a potential supplier somewhere who has the car in stock, they are far more likely to be able to deliver within a shorter delivery time than your local dealer.
• "Impossible, we can’t even buy the car for that price!": Because the dealers who generally bid in the auction work on the basis of volume sales, they can often purchase the vehicles at lower prices than some other dealers and then pass on these savings to you. By pre-registering cars, suppliers can also offer even greater savings.

Even some of the dealers who participate in Auto eBid’s reverse auction regularly use these excuses to stop their customers from using our system: they’re all part of the sales tactics which you can avoid by going straight for the auction and by-passing the negotiation stage!