Any of you had any experience getting them to waive the
"customer service" fee or any of the other crappola?

Okay, through e-mail and phone, sales is giving me invoice for the car
itself, and
of course there are the unavoidables like sales tax, title charges and
destination
charge, but what bugs me are the added crap like the $500-600 "customer
service" or "doc fee" or whatever they dress it up as, and the dealer add-on
ripoff junk (usually well over $500; often $800 or so--"special" coatings or
other such snake oil, overpriced mudflaps, etc.)

Okay, through e-mail and phone, sales is giving me invoice for the car
itself, and
of course there are the unavoidables like sales tax, title charges and
destination
charge, but what bugs me are the added crap like the $500-600 "customer
service" or "doc fee" or whatever they dress it up as, and the dealer add-on
ripoff junk (usually well over $500; often $800 or so--"special" coatings or
other such snake oil, overpriced mudflaps, etc.)

When all this is added up, the drive-out price ain't too great.
Any of you had any experience getting them to waive the
"customer service" fee or any of the other crappola? It appears
from Edmunds that they are getting $500 from Honda this
month just for moving an '08 Accord. Any ideas/feedback?
Thanks!

Space Chimp wrote:
Okay, through e-mail and phone, sales is giving me invoice for the car
itself, and
of course there are the unavoidables like sales tax, title charges and
destination
charge, but what bugs me are the added crap like the $500-600 "customer
service" or "doc fee" or whatever they dress it up as, and the dealer
add-on
ripoff junk (usually well over $500; often $800 or so--"special" coatings
or
other such snake oil, overpriced mudflaps, etc.)

It's simply "ADM" additional dealer mark-up that they call fees like "doc
fee" or "dealer prep" or "closing fee" to make it appear as if it is
non-negotiable. I've never seen a "customer service fee" but they can come
up with all sorts of creative names.

Rather than argue about them, simply subtract the fees from your offer
price. Invoice price is no great deal to begin with on a Honda, so just
add up all the fees and subtract them from the invoice price (if that's
really what you're willing to pay). There is no shortage of Accords.

What state are you in?

"SMS" <scharf.steven at (no spam) geemail.com> wrote in message
news:mz7Ck.1186$ZP4.601 at (no spam) nlpi067.nbdc.sbc.com...
Space Chimp wrote:
Okay, through e-mail and phone, sales is giving me invoice for the car
itself, and
of course there are the unavoidables like sales tax, title charges and
destination
charge, but what bugs me are the added crap like the $500-600 "customer
service" or "doc fee" or whatever they dress it up as, and the dealer
add-on
ripoff junk (usually well over $500; often $800 or so--"special" coatings
or
other such snake oil, overpriced mudflaps, etc.)
It's simply "ADM" additional dealer mark-up that they call fees like "doc
fee" or "dealer prep" or "closing fee" to make it appear as if it is
non-negotiable. I've never seen a "customer service fee" but they can come
up with all sorts of creative names.

Rather than argue about them, simply subtract the fees from your offer
price. Invoice price is no great deal to begin with on a Honda, so just
add up all the fees and subtract them from the invoice price (if that's
really what you're willing to pay). There is no shortage of Accords.

What state are you in?

I'm in GA, Atlanta metro area. Thanks for the feedback guys, it
was educational.

Here's the deal. The sales guy has e-mailed me with drive-out
prices:

'08 Accord EX (black) $23,134
'09 Accord EX $24,043

Keep in mind these are drive-out prices. They sound good
to me. I'm about to go over and take a look, and probably
buy one, unless he hasn't been completely upfront with me.
(BTW, cash sale so no financing, which I mentioned to
him already.)


I've not bought a lot of cars from dealers (mostly beaters) but when I

I'm in GA, Atlanta metro area. Thanks for the feedback guys, it
was educational.

Here's the deal. The sales guy has e-mailed me with drive-out
prices:

'08 Accord EX (black) $23,134
'09 Accord EX $24,043

Keep in mind these are drive-out prices. They sound good
to me. I'm about to go over and take a look, and probably
buy one, unless he hasn't been completely upfront with me.
(BTW, cash sale so no financing, which I mentioned to
him already.)
I've not bought a lot of cars from dealers (mostly beaters) but when I
have bought from a dealer, I bring a calculator. Figure out what I'm
willing to pay for the car, add tax and give THAT to the sales guy. I
don't care if there's $700 in prep, $200 in misc fees, $4300 for a haircut
for the sales manager's dog, as long as the GRAND TOTAL for the car is
equal or less than what I'm willing to pay.

I bought my Subaru that way - they said the $300 doc fee was
non-negotiable, I told them I didn't care as long as the car was no more
than $15k after tax. It came out to $15,080 and that ended up being close
enough

(During the first test drive the clutch was slipping so badly I was
wondering if my wife had forgotten how to drive and she was wondering WTF
subaru did with clutches. They replaced the clutch and called me but now
the price was non-negotiable, so I said, "see ya" and walked. A month
later the car was still there and we worked out a price. But, you have to
be willing to walk.)

I have found that listing YOUR price is way easier than when they start
talking "well it's $387 every 9 days for 18 years" because no two
salesguys ever use the same interval, and I just want to know how much the
damn car costs. Was car shopping with my mom a couple of years ago and
she wanted to look at a new Hyundai Accent (blech) and it took 45 flipping
minutes to answer this question "How much is the sticker price on THIS
car?" Needless to say she didn't buy it...and not just because Hyundai
sucks.

Ray

walks into another office, and stays awhile. Another dude
soon shows. I'm beginning to smell the old-style bait
and switch routine. And surely be, there was a bit
of a problem. The young dude tells me that there was a
misunderstanding and that THAT car (because of spoiler
and pin striping) could not be sold at that price. It was
just a mistake understand. He then told me they could get
an identical car (w/o spoiler and pin striping) from a sister
dlship in about two hours, and when he saw I was putting
away my checkbook and beginning to walk, he added they
would knock off $200 more for my trouble. Truth is,
I don't think that would've been a bad deal for me at all,
but I was so pissed at their tactic of waiting to tell me this
at the very LAST minute that it made it moot, as far as I
was concerned. We walked. Do you guys think I made a good decision?

These tactics really cause me to shun them. Maybe I'm too
persnikity or something, but I hate games like this.

'08 Accord EX (black) $23,134
'09 Accord EX $24,043

Keep in mind these are drive-out prices. They sound good
to me. I'm about to go over and take a look, and probably
buy one, unless he hasn't been completely upfront with me.
(BTW, cash sale so no financing, which I mentioned to
him already.)

Space Chimp wrote:

'08 Accord EX (black) $23,134
'09 Accord EX $24,043

Presumably that's for the V6, or it's about $2500 too high.

Keep in mind these are drive-out prices. They sound good
to me. I'm about to go over and take a look, and probably
buy one, unless he hasn't been completely upfront with me.
(BTW, cash sale so no financing, which I mentioned to
him already.)

Too bad. Mentioning a cash sale was not a good move. Let them assume
you'll finance, up until the last moment.

Amusing about black being cheaper, as it's the same where I am. They'll
advertise "6 in stock at this price" and they'll all be black, an they'll
try to get $750 more for the other colors (and they'll settle for $375, at
least Autowest Toyota in Fremont would.

Too bad. Mentioning a cash sale was not a good move. Let them assume
you'll finance, up until the last moment.

SMS wrote:

Too bad. Mentioning a cash sale was not a good move. Let them assume
you'll finance, up until the last moment.

Why's that? (seriously, why?)

In article <BTSCk.573$4K3.559 at (no spam) newsfe13.iad>,
ray <rollingviolation at (no spam) domain.invalid.com> wrote:
SMS wrote:

Too bad. Mentioning a cash sale was not a good move. Let them assume
you'll finance, up until the last moment.

Why's that? (seriously, why?)

Because if you get the financeing thru the dealer, they make more $ on
the financing than on the sale of the car.