Sunday, March 23, 2008

Salesmen, Do We Really Need Them?

Yesterday I posted about being very frustrated about a deal we were trying to make on a new camper.

We were having some problems with what the sales man had emailed me as their offer, and what they were saying over the phone when I called to accept the offer. This is what the salesman said in his final email, which I received before I called him to accept. "Dean, I apologize, I made a typo in my reply to your offer. We do have a deal at MSLP $#####.00, we will give you $#####.00 for you trade-in. We will also remove the solar panels from your trade and install them on your Prestige for no extra charge. Again, I apologize for my mistake and appreciate your quick response. M** M****" This was the deal I had made exactly, via my previous email. When I called to accept he said it was not the deal he was able to make and blamed everything on a "Internet kids typo".

It wasn't the best experience at that time. I had some very long conversations with the salesman about trust and integrity and how in this time and age an email is considered a valid document and it was their responsibility to know what they were saying in their communications.

Yesterday they called two times and finally apologized and accepted that it was their mistake, they they were wrong, they met our deal and gave us a bit more. We then accepted the deal. Linda and I were walking away, at that point, based on lost trust with the dealership. When they called and accepted blame and gave us the original deal we had via email, we felt a little better.

There is so much that goes into a decision like the one we just made. Linda and I base so much on trust and honesty that when something gos wrong we have to weigh our principals against the action.

This purchase was a want purchase, not a need purchase. We truly enjoyed our Northern Lite. We wanted the room provided by the slide and of course the rest of the SN was way cool also. If we had walked away from this dealership, it would had made it harder for us to buy a new SR and have it serviced after the purchase. We know we made the right choice on the product, we are hoping that the dealership will be there if something were to go wrong. With that said, we hope to pick up our new Snow River on Tuesday! We leave for Escalate, UT on Thursday and will be there a week.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

We only need them if they are honest.

Sounds like a couple of rough days.

TheBeanTeam