Autolink100

Its not good down there is it. The original car park was too small so they closed that one and moved people to an even smaller one. Trouble is I believe the site is operating way above it's capacity and badly needs expanding. Have you seen they are even storing cars at the Hop farm now

I took some out a couple of months ago with the AA. They were they only company I could find offering business cover for trade plates but they were not cheap. I already had Auto Aid for me and the Mrs.

He says, lighting the blue touch paper and walking away.

I used to sell quite a few to people in Europe and here's why. The rules were (and maybe still are) that if a car had been previously registered in a EU state, it could then be registered in any other EU state. It was a doddle to register a Pick Up here in the UK, much easier than say France or Germany so if they bought one here that was UK registered it was much easier to register over there. It was very difficult to register a US car in France for example if it had come directly from the US but much easier if it had been registered here first. There was lot of work to do apart from all the shipping and customs. Anything from the US had to go through a conformity test with the ministry which used to be called an SVA test, then you had to MOT it and finally register it. All told it would normally be around 3 months from buying in the US to having it ready to retail over here and sometimes quite a bit longer if you missed a shipping date etc.

I used to import a lot of cars and trucks from the states. Going back about 15 years I was probably one of the biggest UK importers of American Pick Up trucks. The best seller was the Dodge Ram but I also bought in F150's, Chevy's, Hummers and a few Mustangs. Back then the exchange rate was over $2.00 to the pound and it was worth doing. As the exchange rate slipped back it gradually became not worth doing and it eventually reached the point that I could earn more money out of something I bought at BCA. The last thing I bought in was a bright yellow 2012 Camaro Bumblebee look alike that I was stuck with for over a year and ended up taking money back. I think I had about £25K tied up in it and didn't earn a bean out of it so that was the end of it for me. The problem with a lot of American stuff is that you have to sit on it and wait for the right man to come along, I bought in a brand new Chevy SSR once and had to sit and look at it for two and a half years!. To say it is a niche market is a slight understatement to say the least and most of the big players who were at it when I was have disappeared and moved on to other things with the exception of a firm called 51st state Autos but the guy obviously has the money to burn as it's mainly pretty lumpy late gear that he deals in. It's a real shame as I have some fantastic contacts over there and still have auction access but for me $1.30 to the pound just doesn't make it worthwhile.

I called our rep yesterday and asked to have this taken off our account as a couple of our cars were showing a mileage discrepancy. He called in today and I asked him to show me how I can do normal paid for checks like we used to, he called the office for advice and was told it is no longer possible. They will remove all options to check a vehicle if you choose to opt out. Not a problem as we have an HPi account but surely a bit silly on their part. He was fuming and reckons they didn't think it through or trial it properly before launch. Now who'd have thought such a thing.

Its along way to go with a brown envelope, he's in Penzance, I'm in Kent! The warranty is not with Mitsubishi UK, it's administered for them by a warranty company

Its a 2015 with 39,000 miles! I did look up the small print online and it does state this quite clearly, Mitsubishi dealer servicing only but I will have a go. We do a lot of these and it's a fairly common problem, they are probably the most troublesome of all the pick ups but good sellers.

It looks like he's well known in town as a pain in the arse and a couple of workshops have said they don't want to get involved. I'm going to get it back and sort it but it's a right ball ache. It's under a Mitsubishi approved warranty but they are wriggling out as it's had a non Mitsubishi service, Typical

Guys Can anyone help with this? I have a bit of a drama on the go with an L200 I sold a month ago to a guy down in Penzance. It has had a head gasket let go and I am trying to find someone in the area who can take care of it for me. As we are in Kent the guy is understandably reluctant to get it back to us and I don't want to force the issue if I can help it. Just looking for somebody decent who won't have my pants down. Thanks

Its s great product, there is no doubt about that, however it is very expensive IMO. Its £125 per month per license so if like us you have 3 computers in the showroom it will set you back £375 per month! and they don't haggle. We switched to Autosales and it costs us £40 per month, we can run it on as many computers as we wish for that. It's not quite as shiny as Dragon but does everything that we need it to.

We had one a couple of years ago with a knackered box at 32K miles. An impulsive online buy at BCA without reading the Assured report! It wound up costing me £1400 and I think that was a cheap job by an old boy we know who works out of a lock up.

We moved from Dragon to Autosales last year because they were simply too dear for us. Autosales is not nearly as functional or user friendly as Dragon but it does the job for us for a lot less money. They are also great to deal with and the support is excellent. We were with Dragon for about 17 years but I don't think they gave a toss when we moved on. They don't seem to want to make any concessions for smaller dealers like us and they charge you an extra license for every PC that you want to use. With Autosales you can run it on as many machines as you need to and only pay the one monthly fee which is based on the number of cars that you add to stock each month so smaller dealers pay less. You know how it is with some companies, they want everything their way and if you don't like it you can piss off! That's how Dragon are. Think of them as the Autotrader of the DMS world.

Cheers for the input guys, I have been flat out today but will have a chat with him tomorrow and try and give him a hand

Was speaking to a good pal of mine yesterday and I'm wondering if anybody has been in the same position and can offer some advice.He was telling me a tale of woe regarding a parking fine. He has just received a bailiffs letter stating that if he doesn't pay them £300 they will be coming round to seize goods to that value. Apparently it's already been to court and an order has been issued but the issue is that he has never owned the car in question, never received a parking ticket for it and never received any court correspondence. The first thing he's ever heard about it is this letter from the bailiffs. My initial though was it must be a scam however he reckons he's spoken to the bailiffs who confirmed everything and told him it's up to him to prove he's never owned the car!. He also spoke to the local council that issued the ticket (Brighton and Hove) and they confirmed that they issued the ticket and that they got the info from DVLA that he was the owner at the time. He was telling me about another trader that we both know who had similar and wound up paying the money as it was such a ball ache to sort out. Sounds like a total nightmare, Where would you start?

Well, it had a new MOT a few days before going down there so certainly don't think there would be any issues about it being roadworthy but as to being driven more than about 2 miles, that's another matter. It was also "sold as seen" so no engineers report or mechanical description. It's an interesting subject, I found this online from the CAB https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/Documents/Advice%20factsheets/Consumer%20Affairs/c-buying-at-auction.pdf

I was gloating But I was gloating prematurely as I don't have the cheque yet Let me get the cheque banked and then I will come back and gloat properly

Our man is down here in Kent but there are loads of people offering repair services for these units on ebay

We had a similar issue a while back with a Touareg. Wouldn't boot past the splash screen. Took it out and got it repaired by our radio guy, £250 if i remember correctly

You are correct and believe me I am keeping everything crossed. I thought twice about posting this and in hindsight I think I might just take it down. You never know who's watching

Edited

That's interesting, have you got a link to an example? I 'd quite like to get something done for our videos

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Bob Turner ( RJ Turner) he works from a unit literally a stones throw from BCA Paddock Wood but I believe he does quite a bit for Beadles in Sidcup and he is always up and down collecting stuff from them. His work is top notch and he usually turns stuff around pretty quickly.