GreenGiant

Auto Trader recorded £133.1 million operating profit from £255.9m turnover in the 12 months to March 29.That's 52%. If that doesn't make you choke on your Hobnobs, I don't know what will.

Which is something the general public seem unaware of, mostly.

For payment of the appropriate diagnostic fee, I hope?

As a follow up, I've just seen this: the Samsung Safety Truck Camera on front, wirelessly transmitted to screen on back. Fantastic!

Once lent a car out for a weekend test drive (manufacturer campaign). Customer asked if he could use it to take wife out for dinner. No prob we said, enjoy the car and the meal! He brought car back on Monday, 620 miles later, and said it was nice, but not for him. In the passenger door pocket was a menu for a Chinese takeaway 250 miles away. He knows how to treat a lady, eh? Test drives are 2 hours max now. That's plenty of time to see if the seat's comfy.

Just a quickie this time (ooer, missus!) and apologies if it sounds a bit like a Viz magazine Top Tip. Mr Lorry Driver - your truck is fitted with a 56mph speed limiter. So is the truck that you are trying to overtake. You are both going flat out and are on a two lane dual carriageway (A419 north of Swindon, for those who care). You can't go any faster. He ain't slowing down for you. The approx 200 cars behind you can go faster than both of you. Give up and get the *%@k out of the way please. That is all.

Had a couple of days thinking time and, originally, I wasn't going to bother, as their supercilious arrogance towards their customers shows no sign of waning. But then I thought as I'd been a little vociferous recently, perhaps I ought to contribute. So I've shortened the questions list down from a few dozen to just a few: So that we (your customers, remember?) can show due respect for your opinions and ideas, can either of the two gentleman give us an idea of their knowledge and experience within the Retail Motor Trade? (You know, years in Showrooms, workshops... finance dept... auction house...valeter...... anything?) You see, Management & IT Consultancy, Digital Marketing and other nebulous fripperies are all well and good in the City, but down here in the real world, at the pointy end, we buy, sell and fix Motor Cars. There is quite a large gap between us and whilst you get very irritated when uninformed smartar$es like me tell you what to do, the reverse of that is also very, very true.I seem to remember that, some time ago, an Open Letter was written to AT on this very forum. I know you saw it, so why did nobody in a senior position in your company have the decency to publicly respond to any of the points that were raised?You don't have to look very far to see that you have an awful lot of very dissatisfied customers. As the vast majority of your enormous profits is generated from your online offering (ie us), why do you persist in ignoring their complaints, or are you now only interested in keeping the Shareholders happy?How much did each of you make, personally, from the flotation of your Company?Finally, a quote from an article in Marketing Magazine 3 years ago:Jonathan Williams, Auto Trader's recently appointed director of consumer marketing, said: "With this campaign, we hope to strengthen the relationship we have with our customers and shift the consumer perception of Auto Trader as being just an online marketplace for buying and selling used and new cars. "We're proud of Auto Trader's rich heritage in helping people find the right car for them since 1977, but that's not all we do... But it is, however, all that we pay you to do. Why do you not get this?

*cracks knuckles and raises one eyebrow....*

As promised... Firstly, I know how the Motability scheme works. This is not what I have an issue with. My problem is the random (but mostly poor) quality of the cars we buy from them at the end of their lease. Or at early termination. Occasionally, we will have delivered to us a pristine, well-maintained, low mileage, quality car in a good, saleable colour that will require some prep before going on display and we will sell that car. Jubbly. We will have purchased that car via the MFLDirect website, where many, many thousands of cars are offered for sale to us in the Trade. We will have checked the history, spec, price (especially price, which is always slightly more than we'd like it to be), and, according to age and mileage, we will have a rough idea of what we expect it to cost us to prepare. Especially as the car is located at one of the MFLDirect refurb/preparation centres, so there can't be too much wrong... What we don't expect, however, is for the car to turn up with both bumpers scraped on all 4 corners, all 4 alloys (probably diamond-cut) ripped and gouged, bird crap damage to the paintwork on the roof, trolley dings down both sides, the inside stinking of wet labrador (or stale p*$$. Or both), the handbook pack missing, only 1 key, the panels in the boot scraped and scratched and something unidentifiable, but definitely organic, stuck in the carpet. The last time it was cleaned was the day before it was handed over when new. The delivery driver(s) will have had their breakfast in it (unfinished) and it will have mysteriously done 150 miles more than the distance from collection to delivery. Overnight. So, we take a deep breath and complete the online complaints form to MFLDirect to obtain some kind of recompense for the car being not exactly as expected. Only to get a phone call 4 days later to be told that all of those 'issues' are within their acceptable guidelines as it only needs a few 'smart' repairs, the service history is available online and other stuff is normal Used Car Condition. Oh, and the handbook pack can be purchased on Ebay. Probably from the same place the car came from... So the small prep and straight on the front expected now looks like 10 days and £600. Trouble is, the car doesn't meet our acceptable guidelines. So, what can we do? We need the stock and when they are good, they are very, very good, but when they are bad they are s*ite. MFLDirect haven't the time, manpower or the will to tighten up the inspection process so we just have to suck it up. Or do we?

Do you think all those punters (and we all get them) live together somewhere, sharing their collective wisdom and inter-breeding to keep producing more and more unrealistic, over-entitled, members of the f**kwit family? Maybe we could sneak up on their Special Place one night and brick up all the exits from the outside. Then we could contact them very early one Sunday morning (via Facebook, obvs) and tell them we're going to make a special journey to let them out. And then not turn up. And then, maybe, do turn up two days later. With my next door neighbour, who's a fishmonger, so he knows a lot about bricks. And then kick the walls, ring somebody who is apparently paying for the job and then tell them it's not what we wanted to do, really, and we're going to knock a wall down somewhere else instead. And then badmouth them all over SoshallMeeja. And then report them to Trading Standards. And Watchdog. And maybe go back the following weekend and throw eggs at the wall. Just a thought. I think I need to take my tablets now...

I feel for you bro'.

Just got in from CDX15 (Great event, guys. Very interesting and informative) and put on the Women's World Cup game England v France. Lo and behold, we have the 'pleasure' of an ex-England player as a pundit. Don't know her name, but OMG, does she ever shut up? On and on and on and on and on and on about everything we've just seen. Any tiny gap in the proper commentary and in she comes with another meaningless drone. Does she not realise that sometimes silence is OK? Is she paid by the word? If the objective was to try and get more people watching women's footy, then they might have just won me.... and lost me. I can't listen to that drivel for hours on end.

That's OK Umesh, I don't expect everyone to follow my senile ramblings or understand what I'm wittering on about. I certainly don't expect to be agreed with. It makes sense in my head though. MFLDirect? It's your turn next...

OK. Option 2 it is. We all pay more than enough money to Sky/Virgin/BBC/netflix/whatever and the fundamental question I keep coming up with is this: Should it not be a prerequisite for anyone, whose well-paid job it is to speak publicly to the nation and beyond, to have more than a working knowledge of both the language and also the subject they are banging on about? In other words, when watching sport, I am sick of listening to ex-pros (not just football, but they are by far the worst culprits) destroying the language and making right regal prats of themselves by talking complete blx about something that I have just seen happen with my own eyes. Frankly, the examples are far too numerous to list, but the ever-creeping virus of illiteracy and buffoonery is spreading. We've even got BBC newsreaders embarrassing themselves now, the bar has slipped so low. (FYI Auntie, there is a fundamental difference between bought and brought - eg The next 2 World Cups have been bought and the culprits will be brought to task over it. You see? Buy. Bring. It's not hard.) I could not care less what Denno/Trevo/Marko/Stevo/lano/Allo/Allo think, just because they once appeared as a sub in a Capital One Cup qualifying round replay. I certainly don't think I should be paying extra for it. The solution? Well, in keeping with the spirit of the game, the fools that make all the mistakes should be sold to another TV company for stupid amounts of money and their line managers should be sacked.

Many moons ago when working in North London, I sold a van to a Mr Ronald Sole. Didn't think anything of it until I addressed the envelope of his 'Thank you for buying a car' letter. The best is yet to come...

Got a choice of 2 for tomorrow's spleen-venting MFL Direct and quality of cars purchased (or lack of...)Non Motor-related, but now the footy season is all but over, why do TV companies employ half-witted, illiterate ex-players as pundits?Any preference anyone?

That's three in a row this week - 'No shows' on firm appointments. Appointments made by them, at times to suit them, on cars they called us about that were exactly what they needed. Appointments that I confirmed with them the day before. All three 'customers' were under the age of 30. Coincidence? Or shall I bang on about the current, disturbing trend towards lack of respect and consideration for others these days? The misguided sense of entitlement to whatever you want, whenever you want, how you want and to hell with the consequences? Nah, I'll just suck it up and be assured that I probably didn't want them as customers anyway.

Hmm As I thought. I'll move on.

​Not if all buyers had to register first. As you do at a 'closed' sale. And the fact that there are 'closed' sales prove that the auction houses are actively and knowingly selling to the public via all their other sales!

Echo Echo Echo Echo echo

Selling a car trade to trade is one thing. And the boundaries are clear. But selling trade to retail is, surely, another?

...asking me if I want to 'Join Trusted Car Buyers before a competitor does' Anyone had any dealings with them? And is it worth a look?

I hope you stuck an extra hour's labour time onto the Seat woman's service bill.

Not actually going to rant this week, just putting something out there for discussion that has been simmering for a while and has potential rantage value. So. British Car Auctions owns webuyanycardotcom Manheim are largely involved in wewantanycardotcom Both BCA and Manheim sell cars to both Trade and Retail customers. BCA and Manheim sell cars 'owned' by webuyanycardotcom and wewantanycardotcom So, therefore, are they not selling their own stock to both Trade and Retail customers (albeit hidden under the umbrella of an auction)? Question: If this is the case, should they be liable, as we are, to comply with all of the relevant legislation relating to these 'retail' sales? I'm specifically thinking of Sale of Goods Act (or whatever it is called this week), provision of Warranties, Advertising Standards, goods being 'as described', fit for purpose, comebacks post-sale, Treating Customers Fairly, FCA if applicable and anything else that hides behind a tree waiting to trip us up and cost us a fortune. None of this seems to apply to them, so why not? They do exactly what we do: buy a car trade, sell it retail, but are able to avoid all of the barriers we have to jump over. Doesn't seem fair. Over to you...

and that's my point. It's 2015. What happened to transparency and accountability? This just seems like a 'make it up as you go along' free-for-all. If there was clear uniform information about what the legislation is, who is enforcing it, where, when and how it will be enforced and what the penalties are, I'd be OK with it and just jog on and get the hump with something else. But I don't see that.