Hopeless AM dealer
Discussion
razbox said:
Is it just me or is the AM dealer on Park Lane hopeless for everyone? After getting several things wrong last year with my AMV8 delivery, they now say that I didn't register my interest in the Roadster (I did), and that I can't have one til 2008.
Completely useless
Completely useless
Surely when you put a letter on intent in you received a written reply of some kind? I know I did. Anyway...have certainly only heard bad experiences about said dealer from other Aston owners.
razbox said:
Ashok said:
I assume most of their customers walk in off the street and buy a car without giving it much thought. Enthusiasts, especially those looking to negotiate, are probably better catered for elsewhere.
Can you suggest a better dealer? thanks
I can't recommend Adam Adamou enough at Stratstone Amersham - he does what most businesses would love to do, but don't know how to.
The way I have been treated by him and his dealership has meant that the next car I buy does not become a choice between them and someone else, they are the only choice - bear in mind that my local dealer (Lancaster Cambridge) is only 10 miles away I choose to visit Amersham (70 miles away). I do not mean to knock the Cambridge dealer (I did just buy a 997 from their Porsche dealer next door) as I have no experience of them, what I would say though is that I have never, *ever* been treated like this by any business never mind if it was a casr or anything else.
Example - I go to speak to him about the trip to Le Man this year - I turn up in the 997 - it's filthy - no question, he takjes the keys from me, takes it round th back and gets his service engineer to clean it - inside and out. I don't what to go into details about the number of things like this he has done with no prompting, but suffice to say that I actively like to go to the dealership and do speak to him about all things automotive not just Astons.
chumley-warner said:
I can't recommend Adam Adamou enough at Stratstone Amersham - he does what most businesses would love to do, but don't know how to.
The way I have been treated by him and his dealership has meant that the next car I buy does not become a choice between them and someone else, they are the only choice - bear in mind that my local dealer (Lancaster Cambridge) is only 10 miles away I choose to visit Amersham (70 miles away). I do not mean to knock the Cambridge dealer (I did just buy a 997 from their Porsche dealer next door) as I have no experience of them.
Chumley, Adam sounds like a top man,love your car cleaning story, service like that is rare these days, but give Martin at Cambridge a chance as you haven't tried them, I am not one to recommend dealers lightly, but I can see why they won best sales dealer nationwide in 2006!
The dealership is light years ahead of the Porsche garage next door in terms of sales(even they are Lancaster group as well, different ethos all together!), buying an Aston should be a special experience & it is if you deal through them!
. When we returned from Le Mans last year, they had completely cleaned my nephew's M5, which they would store for him while we were away. It looked like new again.I won't name and shame them, but I had a deposit on a Vantage with my local AM dealership for getting on for 3 years and they were terrible. This time last year I was due to have a test drive of their demonstrator, only to be told a day or so before that their salesman had written it off! These things happen I guess, but it was 3 months before they got a replacement, and then a week or two later the boss took it down to the south of France for a couple of weeks, and then sold it when he got back! So still no demonstrator. A few months later they eventually "borrowed one from a friendly customer" and I finally got a brief drive.
Late last November they phoned me to say that I could spec the car for a March build. I asked for a factory visit and they said December was booked but that they would get me on the next visit, hopefully in January. I phoned at the end of December to no avail, but when I rang at the end of January they admitted that they had forgotten about me and that the next visit in February was fully booked. They also said that I'd now be looking at an August build. The 2 months that they'd forgotten about me meant an extra 5 month delay (due to Roadster production), which would mean missing most of the Summer and getting one of the last 2007 model year cars.
Up until then their turnover of staff meant that I had never spoken to the same person twice. However things improved with the latest salesmen, who was more helpful. A late cancellation meant that he squeezed me into a factory tour last week. He also offered me what seemed a good deal on a pre-specified car, to make up for all the previous problems. However I visited a few other dealerships and found out that it was actually no better a deal than I could get anywhere else. And when the car turned up it had different coloured seats than he'd promised. He also made some other claims whilst trying to sell the car that were more Arfur Daley than Aston Martin. When I pulled him up on them he said that I'd misunderstood him. I would have liked to have given him the benefit of the doubt, but I'd had enough of the dealership as a whole by then and asked for my deposit back. I am now deciding whether to get a pre-specified car or to wait for an August build or later (for MY2008). Either way it will be from a different dealership.
Apologies for the long story, but when I saw this thread on hopeless dealers I felt that I had to let people know that you shouldn't expect good service just because you're dealing with Aston Martin. They have bad dealerships just like any other company.
Having said all that, the factory tour that was organised and jointly guided by the latest salesman was absolutely superb, so at least they can do something right. Eventually.
Late last November they phoned me to say that I could spec the car for a March build. I asked for a factory visit and they said December was booked but that they would get me on the next visit, hopefully in January. I phoned at the end of December to no avail, but when I rang at the end of January they admitted that they had forgotten about me and that the next visit in February was fully booked. They also said that I'd now be looking at an August build. The 2 months that they'd forgotten about me meant an extra 5 month delay (due to Roadster production), which would mean missing most of the Summer and getting one of the last 2007 model year cars.
Up until then their turnover of staff meant that I had never spoken to the same person twice. However things improved with the latest salesmen, who was more helpful. A late cancellation meant that he squeezed me into a factory tour last week. He also offered me what seemed a good deal on a pre-specified car, to make up for all the previous problems. However I visited a few other dealerships and found out that it was actually no better a deal than I could get anywhere else. And when the car turned up it had different coloured seats than he'd promised. He also made some other claims whilst trying to sell the car that were more Arfur Daley than Aston Martin. When I pulled him up on them he said that I'd misunderstood him. I would have liked to have given him the benefit of the doubt, but I'd had enough of the dealership as a whole by then and asked for my deposit back. I am now deciding whether to get a pre-specified car or to wait for an August build or later (for MY2008). Either way it will be from a different dealership.
Apologies for the long story, but when I saw this thread on hopeless dealers I felt that I had to let people know that you shouldn't expect good service just because you're dealing with Aston Martin. They have bad dealerships just like any other company.
Having said all that, the factory tour that was organised and jointly guided by the latest salesman was absolutely superb, so at least they can do something right. Eventually.
Edited by Ian67 on Wednesday 14th February 21:05
Ian67 said:
I won't name and shame them, but I had a deposit on a Vantage with my local AM dealership for 3 years and they were terrible. This time last year I was due to have a test drive of their demonstrator, only to be told a day or so before that their salesman had written it off! These things happen I guess, but it was 3 months before they got a replacement, and then a week or two later the boss took it down to the south of France for a couple of weeks, and then sold it when he got back! So still no demonstrator. A few months later they eventually "borrowed one from a friendly customer" and I finally got a brief drive.
Late last November they phoned me to say that I could spec the car for a March build. I asked for a factory visit and they said December was booked but that they would get me on the next visit, hopefully in January. I phoned at the end of December to no avail, but when I rang at the end of January they admitted that they had forgotten about me and that the next visit in February was fully booked. They also said that I'd now be looking at an August build. The 2 months that they'd forgotten about me meant an extra 5 month delay (due to Roadster production), which would mean missing most of the Summer and getting one of the last 2007 model year cars.
Up until then their turnover of staff meant that I had never spoken to the same person twice. However things improved with the latest salesmen, who was more helpful. A late cancellation meant that he squeezed me into a factory tour last week. He also offered me what seemed a good deal on a pre-specified car, to make up for all the previous problems. However I visited a few other dealerships and found out that it was actually no better a deal than I could get anywhere else. And when the car turned up it had different coloured seats than he'd promised. He also made some other claims whilst trying to sell the car that were more Arfur Daley than Aston Martin. When I pulled him up on them he said that I'd misunderstood him. I would have liked to have given him the benefit of the doubt, but I'd had enough of the dealership as a whole by then and asked for my deposit back. I am now deciding whether to get a pre-specified car or to wait for an August build or later (for MY2008). Either way it will be from a different dealership.
Apologies for the long story, but when I saw this thread on hopeless dealers I felt that I had to let people know that you shouldn't expect good service just because you're dealing with Aston Martin. They have bad dealerships just like any other company.
Having said all that, the factory tour that was organised and jointly guided by the latest salesman was absolutely superb, so at least they can do something right. Eventually.
Late last November they phoned me to say that I could spec the car for a March build. I asked for a factory visit and they said December was booked but that they would get me on the next visit, hopefully in January. I phoned at the end of December to no avail, but when I rang at the end of January they admitted that they had forgotten about me and that the next visit in February was fully booked. They also said that I'd now be looking at an August build. The 2 months that they'd forgotten about me meant an extra 5 month delay (due to Roadster production), which would mean missing most of the Summer and getting one of the last 2007 model year cars.
Up until then their turnover of staff meant that I had never spoken to the same person twice. However things improved with the latest salesmen, who was more helpful. A late cancellation meant that he squeezed me into a factory tour last week. He also offered me what seemed a good deal on a pre-specified car, to make up for all the previous problems. However I visited a few other dealerships and found out that it was actually no better a deal than I could get anywhere else. And when the car turned up it had different coloured seats than he'd promised. He also made some other claims whilst trying to sell the car that were more Arfur Daley than Aston Martin. When I pulled him up on them he said that I'd misunderstood him. I would have liked to have given him the benefit of the doubt, but I'd had enough of the dealership as a whole by then and asked for my deposit back. I am now deciding whether to get a pre-specified car or to wait for an August build or later (for MY2008). Either way it will be from a different dealership.
Apologies for the long story, but when I saw this thread on hopeless dealers I felt that I had to let people know that you shouldn't expect good service just because you're dealing with Aston Martin. They have bad dealerships just like any other company.
Having said all that, the factory tour that was organised and jointly guided by the latest salesman was absolutely superb, so at least they can do something right. Eventually.
Thats absolutely shocking and although you should never name and shame i think a county would help us all avoid a similar mistake, sorry to hear about your woes
Thanks, but there are so few dealerships around that giving their county would be enough to identify most of them. I won't name and shame for all the reasons that PetrolTed gives in one of his sticky threads on the Website Feedback forum. I just felt it was worth mentioning so that other people don't assume (like I did) that because it's Aston Martin then you're guaranteed to get good service.
And to be honest I also wanted to have a bit of a moan about all the problems I'd had, and this forum seemed a good place to do that. Telling most people about the troubles you're having whilst buying an Aston Martin doesn't usually elicit much sympathy! But hopefully you guys are interested, and may also benefit from hearing about my experiences.
And to be honest I also wanted to have a bit of a moan about all the problems I'd had, and this forum seemed a good place to do that. Telling most people about the troubles you're having whilst buying an Aston Martin doesn't usually elicit much sympathy! But hopefully you guys are interested, and may also benefit from hearing about my experiences.
Edited by Ian67 on Thursday 15th February 05:24
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