JLR downtime spans two weeks, Harwoods offloads Land Rover sites, and FCA redress scheme due next year – with Steven Douglas, episode 223

John, reckon you could beat Carwell's Matt Watson in a drag race?

Probably not with any of your stock, James, but I'll give it a go.

Well, John, it's funny you should say that.

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So the more you buy, the more chances you get to race against Matt Watson himself.

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Terms and conditions apply.

Welcome back to the Car Dealer Podcast, where we pick our favourite stories of the week

and ask an industry guest to choose which were the best.

I'm John Ray, and joining me this week, as usual, it's, well, actually, how can I introduce you this week?

Last week, I introduced you as a Premier Automotive electrician.

Well, you could say, I've got one for you, electric car owner.

I can say that, can't I?

It depends. Have the funds cleared from one bank account to another?

No, they haven't actually, but they will be. The finance will clear, I'm sure.

I should probably explain that, shouldn't I?

Last week, we talked about that ridiculous part exchange that I took in, which was, well, I say ridiculous.

It was for a ridiculous price. I bought that Renault Zoe for £500.

And you've been down this week, John. We've had some fun and games with it.

I introduced you to the world of very cheap electric cars, and were you quite impressed?

I was very impressed, actually, for the sake of, I mean, what else can you get for £500 a week nowadays?

It's crazy.

A £500 electric car.

I spent £100 in weight shows last night.

I mean, it's a fifth of the price of the electric car.

Oh, God.

I thought it was very impressive.

I think it was rarity that you managed to get one with the battery actually owned in the car, not owned by Renault.

So if it wasn't owned by you, I think it would be worth a lot less.

Well, I was impressed by James.

It was a 10, 11-year-old electric car.

Sorry, an 11-year-old Renault.

And it all felt tight and brand new.

It's done 80,000 miles, hasn't it?

Yeah.

So I don't think an 80,000 mile, I don't know, 0.9 litre Cleo would feel quite so tight.

Definitely not.

I've been really impressed with it so much so that I've bought it off the company because I needed a sort of third car, which would be quite useful.

It means that Rebecca can use it and I don't have to ride my bike all the time.

So yeah, perfect opportunity.

But yes, yeah, a bit of a bargain there.

Had a bit of a weird one this morning, though.

I plugged it in to charge it up for the first time at home.

And I sat here in front of my computer and my computer started making the weirdest buzzing noise.

And I'm thinking, what on earth is that?

Is the screen's gone wrong or something?

And did a little bit of Googling.

I say I did, you did.

So you know, what about this, John?

You did a little bit of Googling for me.

And it turns out that one of the things that can set off your computer screen's buzzing is an electric car charging.

And I thought that cannot be connected.

So I went downstairs, unplugged the Renault Zoe from the house.

Everything fixed.

Nothing buzzed anymore.

I mean, very, very strange.

I mean, it's quite, I just, yeah, couldn't really, couldn't really imagine that was going to be the case.

So yeah, that's been, that's been quite fun, John.

Isn't it this week?

We've got a video coming out all about that tonight.

Yes, not about your screen.

No, not about screen, about the car.

But I've had a little bit of success car sales wise.

Sold two of those new Jimneys.

They've gone out the door, literally left us.

Both of them, both of the chaps, very, very happy with them.

So yeah, the imports seem to be doing quite well for us.

I'm quite impressed.

Well, I'm trying to encourage you to buy some more.

Yes, some, yeah.

The ones you're encouraging me to buy that are quite strange, aren't they?

Normally.

Yes.

Maybe.

Yeah.

Anyway, what have you been up to?

You've been driving any weird Chinese cars or?

No, not this week.

Although I might be in two weeks time.

That seems to be my life.

Excellent.

You are now a Chinese correspondent, aren't you?

I am.

Yeah.

I don't know how I've managed to wrangle that particular title, but it's just,

there's, you know, like of the percentage of new car launches at the minute,

I think it just so happens about 75% of the Chinese.

So yes, I think that's why.

No, no, I do have a new Chinese car arriving in a few weeks though.

Do you?

Yeah.

Well, it's evolved though.

But does that count?

It may or may not be made in China.

I'd need to check them in.

But yeah, I've got an EX 30 arriving at some point.

So I will.

That is the sort of thing you do, isn't it?

Check them in.

Yeah.

It's a kind of owners group thing.

Anyway, should we stop boring our listeners and introduce our fantastic guests?

I think so.

So our guest this week is Stephen Douglas, director of really easy car credit

and co-founder of Dealerway.

Stephen, thanks for joining us.

Great.

Great to be on.

Thanks, John.

How are you, James?

You okay?

Yeah, very good.

Thanks.

Nice to see you.

I know there's lots to talk to you about, but I think we should probably just sort of

set the scene for those people listening.

I mean, tell us a little bit about the car dealership side of your business first.

I mean, give us an idea of how it's all set up.

Yeah.

So we're a little bit different from your traditional car dealer, I suppose.

And that we don't advertise on Auto Trailer, which is maybe a shock for some.

Because I know Auto Trailer is obviously the leading driver of most Motor Trade businesses.

And it's not something that, you know, would do out of spite or we don't have anything

against Auto Trailer.

It's just sort of how it's sort of come to be.

I did, I set up the business maybe 13, 14 years ago under a different guys.

I'll be honest with you.

You're a traditional Auto Trailer dealer.

And I was selling a lot cheaper cars back then.

I didn't have the money behind where that we've got now.

And I was just getting a little bit delusioned with, you know, what I found was sort of like

the race to the bottom on Auto Trailer.

And I just felt like I was competing on price and everyone was doing the same thing.

And it was just regurgitating all the time.

And I just, I wanted to just be a little bit different.

Look would have it.

One day a finance rep came in into the dealership.

And it was just me running the whole thing, balloting cars, picking cars up, you know,

selling the cars, doing everything really, which I'm sure you're aware about recently

James with the old dealership that you've just recently started.

So I was in a bit of a rush and I was like, I nearly sort of shushed him out the door.

And he says, no, no, give it, give us two seconds of your time.

And he says, we're a new finance company and we're finance people with really bad credit.

So anyways, I heard him out and we had a little go of it.

It's not someone I'd thought about before.

And we sort of done really well out of it straight away.

And the company at the time was called Credit for Cause C4C.

They're not here anymore.

That business model wasn't exactly great if I'm honest with you.

Oh, you've got a pulse. All right. You're approved.

So let's just leave it at that.

So anyway, around about that time, I must admit, I've always been a little bit techie and a bit geeky.

And I started learning Facebook and Facebook ads.

And this was well, well before anyone, obviously it's massive now.

It was well before anyone in the motor trade that I knew certainly was doing that.

And I got really into it and taught myself how to do it.

And we quickly using this one finance company, this Credit for Cause,

and using the new platform Facebook were promoting with the advertising.

We're just skyrocketed.

And I took on a salesperson.

We took on a couple of validers in fast forward two or three years down the line.

We've got a couple of more companies, finance companies involved.

But we went from doing me one man band on my own.

I was probably doing 20 to 25 calls a month.

And we're doing like 90 to 100 deals a month at a start of 17.

And the way we worked it was really dropped over through that.

And what typically you would say is like a finance led dealer.

So we didn't for a long time, we do now, but we didn't advertise cause first.

We didn't advertise cause we're advertised finance.

And it was all done through the Facebook platform, the advertising platform.

And would have like landing pages built with a special form on how long made and,

you know, direct people through the through the advertising flow to put the details

into apply for credit.

And, you know, the hook was, you know, do you have bad credit?

We can help.

And luckily for me at that time, like I say, we had this funder who was

literally just willing to sign the life away on it on any customer.

You know, so the great thing about it was it at the time, this,

this particular funder was, was lending massive, massive amounts on cause.

So we were achieving like 120 to 125% of glasses or cap retail,

whichever was the greater.

So it enabled me to pay a lot more for cause than, you know, your typical dealer.

So obviously back in those days, it was, you know, all traditional auctions.

This was pre COVID.

So there was no online auctions at the time.

And I used to go at the auctions, you know, every other day, I suppose.

And I would literally make a point of standing in the middle of the auction

ring with me, my catalogue rolled up and I would call me bid and stick.

And I would make a point of everyone because I'm quite well known locally,

you know, I've been the motor for me whole life.

And I would make sure everyone knew that I was bidding for these cars.

And eventually they'd say that I would give more money for anyone,

anyone else in the cause because I wasn't on auto trader.

I wasn't competing with everyone else on price.

And I was able to give more money for these cars.

So eventually people got sick of bidding against this because I just

was to keep going and going and winning cause.

So eventually people used to, to come into the auction.

I'd sit and be having a cup of tea or a sausage sandwich or something.

It's easy.

Oh, Steve, you see that, that course are out there.

And I would be like, yeah, God see, can you leave us that one?

And enable this really to sort of have car planche locally anyway,

until this started.

I started having to bid against the telly where it would be seen in Manning.

What have you bought the screens out so you could, you could bid online.

But I was having me cake and internet.

I was getting the cause eventually cheaper because no one was bidding

against us because it was, you know, to them it was pointless.

I was able to, to get this, you know, massive retail valuation back

for the cause.

So when you pair that with the influx of the leads that were getting

at the time, which were buying them for a pound, you know,

for a finance application at the time, it would just grew

exponentially and we had a really good go at it.

And I suppose the company's bank balance grew exponentially.

And then then COVID hit and some of the companies that were

using hit the wall and everything changed and sort of chasing

that fight dream back down to reality now with everyone else.

But we're still working the same way.

We don't use our trailer.

We're not on car gurus.

We're not on motors.

And again, it's not that I've got anything against those platforms.

It's just my business isn't the traditional motor dealership.

We're more like a hybrid of an in-house broker slash dealer.

And fast forward to today, we're sort of down to eight staff

will move premises.

And I'm actually looking to move premises again to be honest.

We haven't really got the facilities that I want, but we're doing

around 45 to 50 deals a month spread across eight or nine

different, different funders who have got direct relationships

in place with all.

But like my team that I've got, they're all literally

the snow car financing side and out, you know, Steven,

what sort of value are you getting above what these cars

would be advertised in order to trade it?

Because are you sort of setting your own price for these vehicles?

Well, we were.

We were.

It's not it's not so much like that now.

I'm honest with you.

The car model is your well aware has changed dramatically

since COVID in the last five years.

And obviously, as we know that the price of cars

have just gone up and up and up.

And the problem that I've had, the funders that we did have

pre COVID are now not there anymore.

Or the funders that were doing large volumes of business

have tightened up the belts, so to say.

And where is and everything's all on affordability

for a customer now.

So where is the funders used to see our rate?

Well, this customer can have seven grand for a car.

I would have a pitch full of cars for seven grand

because their affordability would only allow them

to have seven grand.

But now because the way the car market shifted,

that those, let's say a seven grand focus back then.

Isn't the seven grand focus now that focus is like a nine grand

or a nine and a half grand car.

So these customers that we're still getting approvals

for, we can't find cars for them.

I physically can't make enough margin in the vehicles

and finance commission as well to buy, prepare,

if a vehicle to a good standard to sell someone a car

for that seven grand, seven and a half grand, eight grand.

When we saw what cars have sort of shifted up in value,

what average margins now is more,

sorry, not what average margin,

where average retail value of vehicle now is more like

10 to 12 grand.

And because of that,

the prices sort of level out at that price point

and what, I mean, are we achieving a little bit more

than what you would on all three days?

Yes, but it's nowhere near what we were previously,

what caused a price a lot more competitively now,

but there's still enough margin at that price point

that we're happy with, you know.

Where do you get the cars from?

I mean, it's very competitive out there, isn't it?

I mean, you must spend a lot of your time bidding

and trying to buy stuff.

Yeah, so basically that's my role

inside the business now, that and the market inside.

I'm a full-time car buyer

and I'm sort of chained to this desk,

you know, all the usual suspects.

I was buying a lot of cars out of BCA for a long time,

but I just found I was getting bogged down

with issues on those vehicles

and obviously with the advent of motorway and car wow,

I've dipped me into that a lot.

And we're probably buying 45, 50 cars a month

for motorway car wow

and now obviously dealer way as well,

because, you know, since starting that off,

I've built up a lot of contacts

and doing the dealer podcast that we've done.

I've got a lot of contacts that way,

so we'll buy a few that way.

So that's been good and that's been a good help.

But yeah, basically everything's online,

you know, and we've now got drivers

that were sent up and down the country

picking cars up on the road every day, you know.

The motorway's changed.

It's totally not what it once was, you know,

even five, six years ago.

It's a totally different animal now

and, you know, my days are spent totally different

from what they were back then.

I mean, I still enjoy it, don't get me wrong,

but I do sort of pine for a time when, you know,

I know there is still physical auctions,

but they're just not the same, you know.

I pine for a time going to the auction,

meeting the lads, you know,

getting the gist of what's been going on with everyone.

And I find myself sort of sat here on my own

and not really having anyone to interact with a lot, you know.

It's difficult.

Yeah, no, but it is.

What do you think of those platforms, most of the way,

in Kawa?

I mean, a lot of people buy cars that way.

We buy a lot of our cars that way too,

but it is incredibly competitive, isn't it?

And actually the margins have been squeezed all the time.

I think the great platforms, I really do,

you know, which is why myself and Scott,

which I'm sure we'll get on to,

start a deal away to sort of fill like a gap

that we've seen in that sort of market.

I don't think they're without faults though,

but the problem that they've got,

I think the faults that they've got,

I don't think they can ever overcome them.

The problem that you've got with motorway,

or anything of that like,

is you're relying on a private person, a customer,

who doesn't really know the way around a vehicle

to describe a vehicle to you.

Now, I'm sending drivers up and down the country daily

to 300 mile journeys,

you know, we're based in Newcastle, you know,

from the accent,

and we're sending drivers sometimes to London,

you know, Birmingham, in the Highlands,

in Scotland, they're going all over there,

and we're sending them off the back of what,

all I can see is eight or nine pictures

on one of these platforms,

and whatever's come out that customer's mouth,

and the problem that we run into,

and it's getting more prevalent now,

I don't know why,

the problem that we're running into is we're turning up the car,

and the car's nothing as described,

and then in a situation where

you're paying a driver a day's wage,

you might have paid him a train fare

to go up there, or the fuel to go up there,

and you've got to make a decision

because, yes, you can haggle with the customer,

but not all customers won't haggle

over the price of the car,

but it's like, do I waste

the 300 pound that it's cost

is to send someone on that journey,

and just bring them back,

or do I try and get money knocked off

for X, Y, or Z, for whatever

we've found on the vehicle,

and then, but doing that,

you know, you're always taking a risk,

and then you get the car back,

and you then sort of

you're making your in-house prep,

or, I mean, we haven't gone to in-house prep,

we've got so much work out now,

but you're putting yourself under strain

because the more and more work that you buy

and the horror it is to get the cars up by sale,

we haven't got an endless pot of money

that will just keep accumulating cars

and leaving them there for weeks on end,

we need to turn these cars, you know,

so it's hard, it's a difficult juggling act,

you know, that there's been times

where we've sent drivers all over,

and like I say, we've had to walk away,

and it's cost, I mean, there's been times,

there was a day, three or four weeks ago,

we had three collections,

and every one of the collections was no good,

the cars were totally mis-described,

one turned up and there was no water

in the head of tank,

you know, straight away,

no good, one, the car

was just scratched,

dented, damaged beyond belief,

and very cleverly photographed

by the private person

to not show those issues,

I can't remember what the other one was now,

but it's a big cost of the business

when that happens,

and I know a lot of dealers have fallen off

these platforms because of,

you know, issues like this,

but I don't know

how much we all call wow,

can put that right,

because the more stringent

they are with customers,

the less customers they'll get put their cars on,

so it's a tough one,

and I have recently actually

started buying the odd one from

BCA again, but like you see,

the margins aren't there,

the margins aren't there at all,

that we need, you know, so...

It was going to be my question,

like how do you think they could improve it,

but the one thing that sort of springs to my mind

is perhaps a video walk around

of the cars, I mean,

the Motorway app in particular

asked for these specific pictures

I mean, surely a video walk around

where we can start, pause, zoom in,

would solve some of these issues,

because I'm, you know,

I get cheesed off with turn up at cars

and they're not described, and a lot of the time

it's Joe or I going personally

to pick them up, it is incredibly

frustrated when you send a driver,

because having that negotiation

remotely is really difficult, isn't it?

Yeah, it is, yeah.

Funny you should see that about the video

about three or four months ago,

we started a system where

when we bought a car from one of the platforms

we actually made our own video now

showing a customer how to

make a video, how to send a video

and ask every single customer

to do a walk around of the car

showing all the wheels,

showing the car starting from idle

showing the radio working,

all the windows working, you know,

showing the engine bay

and we're trying to mitigate everything

before we go.

In other instances where customers say,

oh no, well I've already put me pictures on,

you've agreed to buy the car, I'm not doing a video

and we'll just cancel it then, we'll just cancel it

because at the end of the day,

if they're not willing to do a two minute video

and we're willing to send someone 200 miles

then there's a rabbit off somewhere, isn't there?

Yeah.

So we'll just cancel them there and then

and, you know,

it probably does save a few trips

but again it doesn't,

you can get a

video from a customer, you can't keep

going back to that person and say, oh, can you do this?

Can you do this? They just get sick

so you've just got to go with what they send you

and you don't always get it right,

you know, unfortunately.

Yeah, it's definitely tough.

I mean, let's talk about Dealerway

because I was perfect timing

because I sold my first car on it this week.

We had a

little Ford Ka

that for some reason was just

performing incredibly poorly

on AutoTrader.

They were like that from New James.

But

how day John, it was a very nice car this

but just for some reason didn't sell.

I thought perfect first time driver's car

when we bought it in as a park exchange, couldn't sell it.

It was getting towards the top

end of our days to sell.

I wanted to move it on

and I thought I'd try Dealerway.

Uploading it was really simple. The team

are incredibly helpful. You set up this WhatsApp group

and you can share details of the car.

They actually listed it all for me.

Which saved me a huge amount of time

and very, very quick

and easy to do. Sold within

three days for what we paid for it.

We got our money back. I mean, couldn't ask for more.

The guy picks it up yesterday, lovely chap

drove up from Devon and

drove it away.

It was...

I haven't done the review yet.

That's my next step.

I do like the fact that you can review him

and he can review me and you can build up

that trust and rapport.

Give me an idea then.

You're one of the co-founders, you and Scott Sibley.

We've got Scott on the podcast and they're not too distant.

Future's talked about his business.

Give me an idea of where that business came from

and how it's going.

Yeah, so obviously Dealerway

was sort of born out

of the frustrations

of moving

your park exchanges on, I suppose.

And mainly

Scott started

the original Facebook group

that was called Port X Gold

and it was

him moving on

his swappers

and he'd added

local people in the area

that watch radars and dealers and what have you

and he started selling them very quickly

and he was doing that because he was describing them

within an inch of the life

and he'd set up this template

sort of thing.

And that sort of started working very well

and me and Scott are friends.

We've stood in Auckland houses together

for years and years and years and always sort of

talk between me about starting something.

We've got together and because I mentioned before

I'm a little bit techie

I've got an interest in the internet and computers

and software and what have you

we thought we'll come

on off to sort of turn this into a business

because we thought there was a gap there.

We've seen motorway and car wow

and the stuff they're doing with the customer

route reduce stuff and we just thought

there's never really been a trustworthy

platform

that's allowed dealers

to talk to each other

and negotiate with each other and buy and sell

cars amongst one another.

Not one that we feel has been done

properly anyway

and I think a big part of that

is the trust of transparency

in the review system.

So we've

got together and started

set about building the Facebook community

even large and we're allowed other

dealers to post their cars in there

and we changed the name

from Port X school to dealer way

and we grew the Facebook group

over I think it was 13,500 dealers

and

opened down the company and there was lots and lots of cars

getting sold on there and in the background

we sort of developed this

application which has obviously

led to what it is now

it took had I known now

sorry had I known then

what I know now I may not have started it

because

it was a lot more

difficult than I had ever anticipated

just

you know

I had said you know I've got an interest

in tech and things like that

I sort of bit off a bit more

like a chew and you know I'm a car dealer

first and foremost in tackling

you know this

massive platform that we've

come to build it's took a long time

it's took a lot of stress

a lot of money

a lot more money than what would have anticipated as well

a lot of sleepless nights

we've eventually got there

and today dealer way

we've got nearly 3,000 dealers on the platform

buying and selling cars amongst each other

it's free to join

for everyone

the only fees that were charged now

are to the buyer

in the buying fees

only £99 plus fat

is phenomenally cheap compared

when you compare it to any other platform

whether it be a car or a BCM

or anywhere where the fees are

you know yourself

£400, £600 sometimes

so we're trying to keep it

because we are dealers

me and Scott are dealers

we understand the frustrations of dealers

and we're trying to keep it

for what dealers want

I suppose I'll build it for me

really for what I would want

if I wanted

everyone else who was like me

would want the same

luckily it seems to be paying off

we're slowly

we're not at the size of a motor

we're a car now

we certainly haven't had the investment that they have had

but I think slowly surely

it's starting to get there

and we're excited by it

I'm not surprised

what I like about it

is the community feel

it's the trust

dealers inherently do not trust other dealers

take my Ford as an example

I was moving it on because it simply

had been with me too long

nobody ever believes that

nobody ever believes you're moving a car on

because it just doesn't meet

you just haven't been able to sell it

so what I like about the platform

is you can rate each other

and then you know who you're buying from

there's that trust element to it as well

the other thing I found with it

it's like you've put a lot of thought

into how it works

how the bidding process works

how you can make offers and counter offers

that sort of stuff must have been

incredibly complicated to build

yeah

a little bit James

like I said some sleepless nights

we didn't get it right at the start

at the start when we launched it

we sort of soft launched it

it wasn't really where we needed to be

we refined it over time

I'm not a software developer

I don't claim to be I know a little bit about it

but we've had this development team

that have been helping me build it

and I've sort of been the person

because as great as Scott is

dealing in business

and corridors he's not

technically gifted so I've been the one

sort of driving forward with it

and Martin who brought on

is by BDM

he's helped massively

with the project

and it's just even things that you don't think about

you know you see like a page of an app

or a desktop version

and you think right oh yeah that looks fantastic

yeah build it like that do that

and move that here and have this here

and then you get it in your hands

and you scroll down a page and you're like

well how do I do this

and it's like I never thought of that

it's like oh no

and then you get on the phone to develop us

you see this button here can we just put that

like up here and turn it yellow

and do this or whatever and it's like

yeah that's like three months worth of work

it's like oh shit

so it's difficult

really really difficult

I don't think I would get into it again

what sort of dealers are using the platform

and

is it

about selling or is it about buying

it's both

I would say we've got a good mixture

there's a lot of independent dealers on there

there's a lot of

you know

what I would call doorstep us on there

you know people who do two or three cars a week

from home there's a lot of main dealers

on there now which is what we're really

sort of pushing for because that's where we think

a lot of the cars

are going to come from on the platform

especially with the overage stocks

stuff there's car supermarkets

on there there's a good

good mixture now

the problem that we've found with it launching it

is it's like the chicken and egg scenario

isn't it because it's a two sided platform

in order

for the platform to work

both sides have got to be in parallel

so you've got to have the cars on there

because if there's no cars

then you know no one's bidding on them

and you've also got to have the buyers

and sometimes when

at the very start when we start to get it off

off the ground

would get dealers signing up and it would be like

right yeah get yourself on there

and they'd be like oh well there's no cars

we're like yeah I know we're trying

we're just starting and then

what would happen is we'd get other dealers on

oh yeah list your cars yeah yeah

and we'd get loads of cars on the platform

and they'd say well there's no buyers

and it was for a long time

for the first I would say the first

six, seven, eight months it was very difficult

but now we're at a point where

we're snowballing, snowballing, snowballing

and there's a strong stream

of buyers going on there now

strong stream of buyers logging in every single day

and it's in a good place you know

and Scott was telling us

this week how he's made

a real profit centre for his business

I mean his part

exchanges he's making good money out of

yeah he is yeah but the

reason he's doing that is because

he's describing them correctly

you know the thing is

that when you said before

the trust element on dealer way

we've got what we call a forced

review system so when you buy

buy a car of anyone

after you've collected

the vehicle you've got 14 days

in that time

to leave a review

if you don't leave a review for

the seller or the seller doesn't leave you

a review it sort of

it doesn't lock you out of your account

but the next time you log in

it forces you to leave that review

of what happened during that transaction

before you can progress to having a look

around the platform

so over time

your bank of reviews for the cause that you're

buying for the cause that you're selling

grows and grows and grows and so obviously

Scott's been using it

for all of his part exchanges

Scott's a very busy dealer and he generates

a lot of part exchange stock

and he's been getting 5 star reviews

I think he's on 98 so far

so if you're a dealer

you don't know who Scott is

you don't know who really is he car creditor

you don't know who I am

and then you are

down the country you're 300 miles away

and you've seen a car

and let's say it's one of Scott's

and it's like oh yeah I fancy that car

if you look at the exact same car

and dealer X has got that car

and he's got no reviews

or he's got one or two and he's got a one star review

or a three star review

you look at Scott's car which is the identical car

and he's got 98 five star reviews

and his reviews you can read them all

you can see who he's dealt with

who's left on review

you might even know some of the dealers

that have left on review and dealt with

and it just builds that trust

to know that when you do send your driver up

or when you do go yourself

if you're a small dealer you jump on the train

in Newcastle that you know

that car's going to be described correctly

and I think that's what's paying off for him

because we've noticed him

we've got a few other dealers

Simpson's Scorer as well

who are a main dealer that they've really embraced

the platform I think they've sold over a hundred cars

on it so far

and they haven't been on that great deal of time

they're describing the cars correctly

really putting the photographs on

properly

and there because they've built up

this good bank of five star reviews

not only are they selling more cars

but they're attaining more money

for the cars because people trust that

you know what they're seeing on the screen

in black and white is

is correct

and if you compare that to a motorway or a car wow

you can't get that from motorway or car wow

because you're buying

of one time purchase from a customer

who you don't know

whereas you go on the dealer way

and you're dealing with trusted dealers

open down the country who've got

reputations and we're showing those reputations

in the reel

and you know eventually

we'll foresee the platform

everyone having that

you know we've had some rogue

people on the platform who haven't

played ball

had a few one star reviews and we'll just kick them off

we don't want that

we want to build this trust worthy

transparent platform

and it's touch wood

it's working

wish you the best of luck with it

just before we move on to our stories

a couple of questions I'd like to ask all dealers

firstly any cars you avoid

buying

yes

one leader ego boosts

any

1.2 pure techs

a firm favourite

don't buy any GLR products

do you not

definitely not

I'm trying to think if there's anything else

no I think that's about it really

the problem is when you go on

these motorway and car wow platforms

just those vehicles

going out of them

I would say they're the main

power shift gearbox

is the automatic

horrendous

give me the story of the worst ever warranty claim

now you're putting us on the spot

the one that really sticks in your mind

I mean I've had several

going back to the GLR

this wasn't a car

that I'd purchased for sale

it was actually wife's personal car

a range of our sport

about a year ago

she upgraded the car anyway

she's got a new Tesla now

I sold the car

and the car was fine

driven it for a couple of years

got a phone call one day

engine's gone 5 grand later

that's probably the worst one

I've had

so we'll stay away from

GLR product

I'm going to call myself

which is crazy

for punishment

well just before we move on

if anybody wants any information

on dealer way where can they get it

literally just

www.dealerway.co.uk

for the details

you can sign up there

and then on the platform you do need to

provide trade insurance to prove

that you're in the motor trade

so if you have that the harm when you do that

then one of the guys

be straight in touch and get yourself up

you can be on the platform the same afternoon

nice well thank you very much

good to see you thanks for hanging around for the stories

but John we should probably do some

we interrupt this broadcast

for some breaking news

John I don't want to panic you

but the Cardio podcast live

is coming round really rather fast

yes I know that James

because I own a calendar

but clearly you've been not paying attention

how dare you John

if I hadn't been paying attention how would I know

that it's on the September the 24th

in Abandon that we've got the poll star boss

Matt Galvin, Vicky Hart from Waylands

and Alex Bradley

from Small Cars Direct on with us

hmm

well technically it's closer to Didcot

but I'll let that one go anyway

I bet you've forgotten how people can book tickets

no John because on my script right here

it says head to cardinamagazine.co.uk

slash podcast

and people listening to this

can book tickets with the special discount code

PICCANTO

for 10% off

there's a social barbecue after the recording

and plenty of time for a social catch up

with other like minded dealers

we look forward to seeing you there

this is a paid partnership

in association with Dealerway

John guess what

oh god you've bought more ducks haven't you

no ducks John wrong there

I've actually got a new habit

I've signed up for Dealerway

alongside more than two and a half thousand

other rated and vetted car dealers

to sell my trade part exchanges

the site is designed

for dealers to sell their part exchanges

for more money quickly and easily

there's no sellers fees

and buying a car costs just £99

one of the cheapest around

and when I haven't got the time

to list the car myself I can even

watch out them the details and they do it all for me

that sounds awfully familiar

so are you selling all your stock there now

not exactly John

but if I do have a sudden influx

of Kia PICCANTOS

I know where to send them

dealers can find out more

at dealerway.co.uk

we'll be right back

now John I'm really enjoying

how easy it is to pay sellers on car well

I presume you'd rather not pay them at all

no that is true

but now I can do it with car well wallet

you can pay sellers, finance houses

and more instantly

literally in one click

it's secure, easy to use

and gets rid of all the pesky

finance back and forth

it's a total game John

that does sound pretty good

if you want to find out more

dealers can log on to carwell.co.uk

slash partners slash car well

dash wallet

now back to the podcast

so James and I

are going to run through our favourite stories of the week

and at the end Stephen gets to decide

which one of us chose the best ones

and who is the winner

I won last week

which is nice isn't it

sorry 3-2

just remind it 3-2 to me

3-1 to you

but I'll take the extra one

thank you James

I'm going to start with

the rumbling on of the JLR saga

so JLR of course

were hit by a

quite horrible cyber attack

a couple of weeks ago

which has crippled a lot of their systems

or

put it this way they've not been able to turn their systems back on

in a secure manner

so they simply haven't done that

so

the big issue for September of course

because this happened on the 30th of August

is that it stopped all registrations

in September

so if that has actually been fixed

do you know if that's been fixed James

I think some dealers have got a bit

of a work around on it but it's

still very difficult apparently

so that's slowing things down in the registration process

which is not great

we're now half way through September so you can imagine

lots of cars that should have gone out

are not going out

massive parts issues

in terms of ordering parts

all that sort of stuff

but I think the biggest problem

with the company having is that they can't

restart production

so staff have now been told

they can't come back into work

until September the 17th

and I'm assuming that when

JLR say September the 17th

that's a hopeful estimate

you know it's not that they've gone right

we'll definitely have it fixed by September the 17th

because it doesn't quite work like that does it

you know you need to be sure everything's up and running

because they'd originally thought it was going to be a couple of days ago

they'd have everyone back

well as of tomorrow

it's two weeks

of no production of any JLR products

in the UK

and by my maths

and around the world

about all of their plants

right okay

well you're better informed than me James

but you know by my

in the UK

doing a bit of maths on it I reckon that's about 15,000 cars

haven't been built since

this all happened

they do a thousand cars a day

in the UK

so good maths John there

I think that is 15,000

yes

yes I did get an A

and no GCSE maths as you can tell

so real massive problem

we've written lots of stories about this

because it's sort of a developing story

day by day

Business Minister Chris Bryant

Sir Chris Bryant I should say

spoke about this in the House of Commons

on Tuesday

and so much of it seems to be

I mean he basically wasn't able to say anything

more than what we already know

but he was asked

could this have been

a state sponsored attack

and you know he didn't

he didn't say yes he didn't say no

effectively he could say I've had no idea

I can't say who's responsible

can't jump to conclusions

can't say if it's related to the M&S

hack

I'm not going to speculate here in Cardila Towers

which I'm more than happy to do

but it all just seems

you know so much of this

is unknown to the general public at the minute

we don't know

whether there's a

what's the word a ransom

where

style attack where all these people want

lots of money in bitcoin etc etc

what we do know

is that some data

has been accessed

so JLR had to

as these things

happen when you have a bit of data

stolen or accessed by people that shouldn't

have access to it you have to inform

the ICO information

commissioners office that right

so that happened

that was made public so they have

some data has been accessed

but in the grand scheme of things

I don't think data is their big problem

really it's you know the fine

that would be

averaged upon them for losing some customer data

is nowhere near

the issues they're having

with lack of production

lack of parts all that sort of stuff

I mean

what we don't know is what kind of data that is

that's the other interesting thing

you know is it just customer data

is it data about

you know

well I mean they've got tons of data haven't they

it will be data about where parts are in the system

where cars are in the production line

but could it also be

confidential kind of

let's say development stuff

about the cars we don't know

it's all yeah it's all going to

come out in the wash but it's a horrible time

for JLR at the minute isn't it James

I honestly may not mistake

this is quite possibly the most

serious hack the automotive industry

has ever had this is

this is very very serious

indeed and I think the fact that we're not

getting much information at all

says a lot

the detail

you only need to see to see how serious it is

is the production lines are not starting

you know I mean that is

absolutely critical

there is some experts saying that's costing

JLR 5 million

pounds a day in lost profits

I actually think

it's probably the sum will be far

greater than that but you've got

just imagine this I mean you've got all of these

production lines that just stopped

with all of the cars

still in place all of them

have obviously have individual vins you're a fan

of vins John they

all have different specifications

they're luxury vehicles they need

specific parts that arrive from

this huge network of supplies

in the West Midlands who

you need to remember are also affected by this

because you know I wrote about this in my

sub-stack JLR catches are cold

they get flew you know

they very very serious thing

affecting a massive part of the automotive

industry I don't

see this being fixed any time soon

I mean you only have to look back at the M&S

and the co-op you know

those carp shells were empty for a long time

the M&S

couldn't couldn't do home delivery

could they for a long long time and

that's because when you have a hack

like this you have to very slowly

build it back up turning the parts of the

system back on and checking their secure

can you imagine how many

parts and how many different parts

to this JLR system there

are all linked together

that are going to need to be checked

I mean this I don't think

even throwing money at it and JLR

has got lots of that I don't even think

throwing huge sums of money at it will fix

it because it's the time

it's going to take to

get this sorted I mean I was reading

this week that even

GCHQ's National Cyber Security

Centre has been involved in this

talking to the company

and as you mentioned they're not ruling

out state involvement in this hack either

I mean it is incredibly serious

I mean this is one of the biggest stories I think

for the motor trade for years

and you know

I do feel for all of those people in JLR

I mean you've got all of these people sat at home

I mean just imagine the money that

this is costing imagine the bills

this is racking up

not just for JLR but the entire

West Midlands economy I mean

it's very very serious indeed

would you like my

completely unfounded opinion about who's behind it

of course

I don't think it's state sponsored

I think the state sponsored thing has just come from

obviously we've written a story along those lines

but the state sponsored thing has just come from

that question in the comments

I don't personally think

you have to ask

who would gain from that and who would

possibly do it

I suppose you're kind of some nations

in the world who are not remotely

connected to

the way the rest of the world works in terms of capitalism

and so on

I think the Russians are pretty cheesed off at the moment

the Russians are pretty cheesed off at the moment

well

yeah I just

I can't see it I can't see

let's hypothetically say it was China

I mean JLR is quite heavily involved in China as well

I can't see them

it's not really China's style I don't think

there's no unless it's for

you know basically what would anyone gain from this

unless it was theft of intellectual property

and that being the case

well I don't think you would

decide to cause quite so much disruption

as this I think you would

perhaps do it a little bit more under the radar

I don't know

I think it's probably just economically

minded I think it's

a ransomware thing that would be my guess

we'll see won't we

yeah I mean it looks like there might even have to be a bailout

I mean there was for

those companies connected

to the

Sunderland plant during Covid wasn't there

they were really hit

and helped out by the government

and every day that this goes on

these companies are going to be hit

even further I just

I can't see them being able to sustain the losses

I think it's very

very worrying indeed

I was just going to say as well

taking this down to a

used dealer level I mean I wonder what

let's say

Steven has a problem with his Range Rover

what actually happens from our point of view

if we're trying to find a part now

is that all it's a knock down effect

on regular dealers as well not just

franchise presumably

I think so Steven

what have you been following this story

what's your take on it

I must admit James I actually haven't

I've had

me eyes and ears

need even work so I've kept me head

so it's the first time I've heard of it

I'm a bit shocked actually that

that just like a cyber attack

you know like what world

we're living in now we're just totally

just slows down

the whole company in industry

I suppose and you know

those figures that you're talking about they're five million a day

that's just

absolutely crazy

I don't even know

how do you recover from that

I honestly

I honestly don't know

I mean I think it's going to be

very very painful for them and I think

there's talk that it could go on for weeks

I wouldn't be surprised if it goes on for mums

the stress levels

of the people at the top must be

I'm not getting stressed at talking about it

they don't know how to deal with it

yeah I mean

we wish them all the best I think

because I mean that is something very very difficult

to deal with

actually I'll try and move us on

can you have anything more positive that would be lovely

positivity

no haven't got any of that

right

but I'm going to stick on a JLR

theme

and this is news that the Harwoods group

a large family run dealer

group down here near us

has sold five of its Jaguar Land Rover dealerships

to DXB

investments

they are a big Dubai based

business that is very focused

on building

a big retail group in the UK

I saw Mike Jones

formerly of ASC now an automotive

consultant is helping them out

posting about it on LinkedIn today

saying that they are very serious

about building a big

retail business

in the UK and this is the start

of it

but interesting

for me was the fact that Harwoods

have made this decision

they have had a tough few years

just six months ago we reported on

their accounts for 2023

which showed a loss of

11.8 million pounds

and they said at the time that they thought

2024 was going to be

just as painful

and they'd be clocking up a loss last year

we haven't seen their accounts for that yet

I wouldn't be surprised if that's transpired

to be true

especially considering these

sell-offs

it's quite strange to sell

a JLR franchise

you remember

we had Nigel McMinn on this podcast

not long ago talking about how

JLR business would be one of the ones

that you desperately want to have

because they're normally very profitable

so I was surprised

that they're selling five of them

Bays and Stoke, Chichester, Brighton, Crawley

and Croydon as part of this deal

and they've also handed over

authorized repair operations

for BMW, Mini and Volvo

in separate locations

good news is no job losses

are expected they're all going to be transferring

to this new owner DXB investments

and they're going to be

up and running soon

so yes interesting to see some change

in hands there John

and can I slightly just

bring this on to another JLR

story which was a

Lloyd Motor Group buying

a JLR portfolio

I was just about to say James

I think you've slightly contradicted yourself in your own stories here

because you said I think

it's quite unusual to see JLR dealers being sold

and in one week

god damn it yes that's true

but yeah I will

do you not think this sold it off though

because they knew about the same attack coming

quick sell sell sell

Lloyd Motor Group bought three from Stratstone

so yes no I think

it's unusual to sell JLR

franchises I think

you don't see it very often but

maybe they got a very good price both of these businesses

there was

another group of JLR or a selection

of JLR dealers that were sold

a couple of weeks ago as well I was just flicking through the website trying to find them

see if I haven't imagined it

just to contradict me further

yeah exactly what I live for

but

it wasn't a you know

so Harwoods is a local

group you know they've

perhaps they've just decided the time is right

to get rid of them

but the Lloyd Motor Group one

is buying three from Stratstone

and you know it's

that's the unusual thing is when

enormous dealer groups offload things

that's when I start to raise my brows slightly

which I'm still able to do because I haven't had any of your Botox James

but

yeah that's

I'm just saying that's you have appointments

I'm aware of them

um yeah I don't know

I'm not I'm not hugely surprised about the Harwoods

bit but the yeah the Lloyd Motor Group

deals a bit of a bit of an eyebrow

razor for me

but again I also

think you know we've been very nice to JLR

in this instead of having a horrible time

but they've not put their dealers through very

nice times in the last

I don't know two years have they

you know to suddenly rip to make

them all as we've said before

build your gin palaces half Land Rover

half Jaguar and then

what two three years later

go uh yeah you know that

half that says Jaguar on it well

number one you're not going to get any new products

number two um we're not

actually going to let you sell Jaguar anymore

whatever Jaguar becomes a year after we've

stopped making any of them so

I can imagine if you're you've hedged

your bets on selling you know X number

of Land Rovers and a certain amount of Jaguars

um and then suddenly that's ripped away

from you you perhaps will make a decision

about whether you want to continue

to run that franchise

hashtag just saying

I mean maybe it was the suits that they

make them wear with those white trainers

maybe these uh maybe Harwich just decided

they don't want to buy them anymore

well unfortunately my smart casual ensemble

is a blue suit with some white trainers

so I become the JLR employee

JLR salesman

in the main just covered the other day

Steven what are your thoughts on these

couple of sales or JLR dealers

going in general

um

the first I've heard about this

um

absolutely fine

let me retrain the

question would you like

a JLR franchise yourself

no

why not

well I think you've just spent the last 20 minutes

telling this why

why not

I mean I'm not saying

this is why I

I've been driving a nice cherry this week

or I've been driving a nice

Pomoda this week or whatever not I've been driving a nice

Range Rover uh but the amount of coverage

we give Land Rover might in this

regard have some bearing on whether

we're invited on things I don't know

I'll be honest I'll be honest I don't think that was a good

take

hang our hold out

very little bit

moving on

I'm going to talk briefly about

the FCA and the Miss Old

car finance

inverted commas Miss Old

car finance um situation

so the boss of the FCA

the chief of the FCA

Nikhil Rathi has been

speaking to a

treasury committee

about the situation

and what they're looking to do etc

and what it looks like for a redress scheme

um and

he reckons it could begin

next year of redress for

any Miss Old

quote unquote car finance

um they're looking at a period between

2007 and 2020 so that's

about 30 million deals

he says not all claims will

be successful of course

um is once again

urged people not

to keep using these

claims management firms or lawyers or

whatever um who will happily

tell you that you're going to make

four and a half grand back

from that car finance deal you had on

a Ford Fiesta in 2007

he says that is very much not

going to happen in a lot of cases

um you know he he suggests

the redress for most people

if they're entitled to any

he's going to be in the hundreds not in

the thousands of pounds um

which is what we've sort of suggested isn't it really

because you can't I don't think

there's someone um redress

or more

what's the word um

more money than the dealers actually

received in the first place James do you

see this story I did see a story

but I'm I'm not going to give my take on it

I'm going to I just want to get Stephen's

opinion on this you know as a

as someone who deals with finance and

real life dealer what's your

take on this whole finance

commission do you know what it is

when are we going to start making

consumer responsible for their own actions

thank you

that that's my thoughts on it

I mean

you know regardless how much money a

dealer's paid in commission for doing the deal

the customer knows

the customer's signed a contract at the start

knowing how much money they're borrowing

how much money they're paying back how much it's

going to cost them overall how much the monthly

payments are it's just

ambulance chasers it's just PPI

all over again and it's just pencil

push as looking

you know for the next

the next bit of red tape that they want to exploit

I just I think it's scandalous

honestly do

I just I think anyone

that puts a claim in is

just you know

there's no way that every single person that puts a claim

in for missold call finance has been

missold call finance

it's just just a fact

I just it's

ridiculous absolutely ridiculous

and I don't agree with any of it

I kind of I'm with you

because I think

you know one of

there's a degree of safeguarding all right

if someone comes in as vulnerable

perhaps yeah I get that

very few of these

instances I think are that I think it's just

there's an assumption

that the dealer should be

anyone selling anything to anyone should be

giving them the absolute best

price in any situation

and that's where it starts

to get a little bit tricky because someone has to

make some money out of this at some point

I don't know

I don't I don't think people should be

entitled to compensation purely because

they have what was the phrase that was

used in

to regard one of the people in this

one of the three people in this court case

I think it was along the lines of not commercially

sophisticated or something like that

wasn't it yeah I don't think that

entitles you to compensation

another word because you're thick

because you're thick

not even that

but perhaps didn't do

you know five ten minutes of looking

things up to see if they

could find a better deal somewhere else you know that's

I mean what what other industry

is that where you start

a business and you sell a product

and then you've got to have run through all this

red tape before someone buys your product

like are you sure you want to buy this

are you see this cup are you sure

this is the right cup for you

can you can I just tell you

that this cup is one pound forty nine

but there are other cups

there are other cups that you can buy

I just

it's mad it's madness

just because that

because it's a car

a vehicle is a

a lot more expensive than any other

any other product why should it be any different

people are still making

a decision themselves

you know it can't be

put on dealers or finance companies

or brokers or anything to make

you know to make sure that they're informed

and that decision is

best for them why should that be

put on us the owners should be

on the person making the decision surely

if that person

hasn't you know done the

due diligence then

who's responsible for that

I was just going to say

another

what frustrates me as well

I've got on my high horse now

but what frustrates me about this

and there was a news story recently

bit of a BBC

and somebody else investigation into

estate agents

and how can it be that an estate

agent I can walk into an estate agent

and say I'd like to look at that house please

and the estate agents say

sure no problem you need to speak to our mortgage advisor

first and you need to do a

deal with them first

and behind the scenes will not

you know really

introduce your offer to the buyer

until you've gone through

that process and have an offer from them

how can that be allowed

in that circumstance

and dealers get

scrutinized to this level

for car finance I don't

really understand how we can have

those two separate scenarios

I just think it's

a highly

almost slightly overregulated

sector when some have under-regulated

that will be next

it's like the

retrospectively

went back and changed the rules as well

you should have been telling these people

you should have been informing everyone about what commission you were receiving

but that wasn't the guidelines

that were told at that time

afterwards it's like driving down the road

on a

50 mile an hour speed limit

road and doing 49

and then three years later

that road's changed to a 30

miles an hour speed limit

and then you're getting a bill in the post

you were caught speeding will hold on

that was the speed limit

at the time that was the rules

it just baffles me

mad

let me try and wait one more story

because we're rapidly running out of time

can we just talk

a little bit about the podcast live

which is coming up very very soon

on September the 24th

today is the 12th

so we are very soon going to be

in the habit

did you need me to do that maths

thanks John

you might have got an A in maths

I've got an E so thanks for your help

but yes we've written a story this week

about what we're looking forward to the most

which I thought was quite interesting

because what we picked

was very very different so we've asked

those people who are going to be there myself

you John, James Batchelor

Rebecca about what we're looking forward to

I'm looking forward to the fact it's quite so sure

and there's lots of people that you can chat to

in the motor trade

you were looking forward to the fact that I wouldn't

be talking about Kia

Picantos I see here in the

quote you've made

Rebecca I'm going to be looking forward to

so yeah

I mean it's lots to look forward to

on that day tickets are still available

on our website

we've got Matt Galvin who's the boss of Polestar

Small Cars Direct

Alex Bradley he's a used car dealer down

in the New Forest

and Wayland's Vicky Hart

he's also going to be coming along

all three of them are going to be

on the podcast

with us we're going to be chatting to them about

all things and everything

John, we are by which you mean James

we haven't entirely decided

on what we're going to talk about

we will be doing that next week

on Tuesday yep

planning day to come

but yes I am looking forward to it

looking forward to seeing lots of people from the motor trade

to come along and yes enjoy that

BBQ among many other things

so yes tickets still available on our website

so it's sort of a plug but it's also a story

on our website so I've used it anyway

you're very big on plugs today

electrical or otherwise

very good

and there is a link down in the show notes below

of course as I usually say at the end of the podcast

so

I haven't got room for any more stories

so Stephen before I asked

for your verdict are there any stories you think we've

missed this week we should have talked about

not that I'm aware of

I'm honest

lovely

so I'm going to have to ask you who chose the best stories

or which was your favourite story

although

I'm very passionate about car finance

and

let me arise like no

and that story does obviously

trigger a few emotions from me

I did like the story about

G.L.O. in the hack because I wasn't

I wasn't aware of that and I think that's

massive so

that's the one was that also me I think it was

how was you

well done

excellent

yeah don't worry

I won't take it personally but yes

congratulations John well done

thank you very much

well I will take that win and go and enjoy my lunch

so all this left for me

to say then is thanks to Stephen for coming on

today it's great to chat to you

and chat about your business and cause D the way

as well

and I'm sure people will be looking at that

after this podcast and I've had to go

myself not that I'm on the app but I've looked at James's

and I'm actually very impressed with it I must say

thanks very much yeah

really appreciate you having us on guys

have enjoyed it thank you

absolutely pleasure nice to see you

welcome back any time as long as you pit me as a winner

thank you as well to James

for his very informative discussion

about why his screen is buzzing

and

I will work on my anecdotes for next week

yeah

not a lot has been happening has it

and thank you as well

for listening we will be back next week

with another episode make sure you're subscribed

take me notified when that goes live

if you want to check out the stories mentioned

so take a look in the show notes below and of course

you can head to cardiganmagazine.co.uk

to find much more news

besides probably about JLR

and the discount code

for the podcast live event

is underneath as well

and a link don't know why I'm pointing down

because no one can see me unless they're on youtube

anyway thanks for listening

and goodbye

Kia Picanto

Renault Zoe

Ford Ka

Land Rover Range Rover

Ford Fiesta

About this episode

Original notes