Three weeks ago on Saturday 27 October I drove past my local MB dealership, who had an AMG G Wagen for sale for £97,500 on ramps outside the garage. My wife looked it up on her phone to see if it was petrol or diesel and there was a button to click on to request a test drive, which she duly did asking for the following Monday and giving all my details.

I received two 'Do not reply' emails acknowledging my enquiry, which had been passed to the relevant person.

Monday 29 October came and went - nothing.

On Thursday 1 November I received an email from a Used Car Executive thanking me for my interest and asking if I have any questions or if there is anything he can help with???

On Monday 5 November I replied saying that I had originally requested a test drive.

On Tuesday 13 November I received a reply apologising for the delay and asking if I was available over the weekend. I replied later that day asking for 10am on Saturday 17 November - no reply.

I ring the dealer at 9:30am on Saturday to check if my test drive has been scheduled and the car taken off the ramps, but he's not answering his phone, so I leave a message with the receptionist.

At 10:05 I get a call saying that he had replied to my email confirming the test drive, but had checked and his email hadn't been sent, but would I like to come down as the car is ready to drive.

I arrived and after filling out some paperwork he went off to get the keys and suggested that I go and look around the car, which I did, only to notice that there was condensation in the headlamps and one Pirelli tyre with three Dunlop tyres - not very impressive.

I asked about the headlamps and was told they have a demist function and pointed out the mismatched tyres, which he said were incorrect and they should at least match on each axle, but not to worry, as the car would go through a used vehicle check before delivery and the tyres would be sorted, so off I go on my test drive.

Two hundred yards down the road, the dreaded BONG, due to mismatched tyre pressures all over the place - two red and two amber warnings, but he said it would be ok for test drive and reset the warning.

Another 1/4 mile later we pull onto a dual carriageway, so speed increases and bonnet starts flapping, so I pull over and we discover that the latch on the driver's side is not catching, also, with the bonnet up the engine sounds like it's well overdue for an oil change (with 12,000m on the clock) so I politely say I'd like to terminate the test drive and that unfortunately, the car is not for me.

I thought i'd share my experience to show that it's not just JLR dealerships....

Where is a facepalm emoji when you need one?!

I find it amazing how little effort they put into selling cars. Yet people wonder why I haven’t bought a car from them. Not just MB but all sorts.

Red Merle wrote:

Where is a facepalm emoji when you need one?!

Red Merle I think this will suffice

Not just dealers, but joe public aswell.

Spent the last 2 weeks trying to get the misses a cheap run about for work, lost track of the amount of people who don't respond to messages sent via the advert they have posted, even said I had cash to buy there and then.

One didn't even respond to a missed call and left voicemail  Remember:- amateurs built the ark
Proffesionals built the titanic

@nearlee - pm sent