...a dealer who talks utter nonsense?
I went to look at a V70 D5 yesterday at a small local dealers. Looked a tidy model from the outside so I went in and started chatting to the boss. I asked him if it had service history, and quickly enough the service book appeared with some potentially genuine stamps. I then asked if the cambelt had been done, as I knew it was due, if not overdue. To my surprise he claimed it had a camchain and didn't need doing.
Now I know these cars inside out, I've had a V70 2.4 and an S80 D5 and been a regular contributor on the owner's club forums. So I told him this (allowing for the fact that I don't know everything and *might* well be wrong), to which he replied "the S80 is a completely different car to the V70, so that doesn't mean anything". Not true. They even share the same Haynes manual. Like I say, I know both inside out...
Anyway, he wouldn't accept that he was wrong, first of all appearing to try and hide the section in the service book where it stated the change interval (using his squidgy finger) and then going so far as to phone the local Volvo dealer, who unsurprisingly confirmed it was a cambelt. Even then, he tried to claim that this was a first and all the ones he'd seen before had a chain.... !!! I let him have his dignity and moved on...
Well, I liked the car (despite a couple of faults I knew I could fix easily) and considered buying it, but when he offered a "poor condition" valuation on my truly mint Zafira I said thanks and walked away, feeling like I'd been well and truly cheeked. Or maybe the Volvo was dodgy and he smelled trouble from me and so wanted to scupper the deal? I dunno. So I said thanks and left hastily.
Anyway, would you buy from a salesmen who flatly contradicted you? I did try to let the guy save face, and after all, he was trying to sell to me, so should have at least tried to butter me up a little? He also was quite patronising about removing the towbar on my Zafira (suggesting it needed an expert and expensive de-programming), not knowing I'd installed it myself on a Sunday morning, but that's a trifle really.
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