Elara

I'm going to my dealer this afternoon to discuss finalities on my car (which he's swearing will get here as soon as the first week of May- not getting my hopes up, but wouldn't that be great??), and one thing I'm going to try and corner him on is the exact price and extra fees they are going to charge me. We've already agreed on MSRP, which the Mazda website says includes destination fee, and I'm prepared to suck up and pay the $189 processing fee. HOWEVER....as I was wandering the lot the other day, I noticed that all their cars had the MSRP listed, and then an added "Delivery fee" of $580. Shouldn't a "delivery fee" be the same as destination charges?

I'm going to ask for an itemized list of just what, exactly, this "delivery fee" includes. I've been trying to locate exactly what Mazda includes in its destination charges, but so far have been unsuccessful. Anyone here know? I'm assuming if I present a list of what I *know* is included in destination fees (I'm assuming transport, unloading, cleaning, dealer prep- I got that much out of our new car reps here at my company) and make them give me a list of what's included in this "delivery fee" I'll find a bunch of the same items, which I'll have to then convince them to take off.

Does anyone else have any suggestions on how I handle this politely without antagonizing the dealer? I will walk if I have to, but I'll be really upset if I do- I REALLY want this car.

thebobman

...from the autotrader.com glossary


Destination & Delivery Charges
The cost of transporting the vehicle from the assembly plant to the dealership. Usually a flat fee passed on to the buyer without any markup.


So they are both supposed to be the same thing. Unscrupulous dealers may not agree, that is why I got an "out the door" price in writing at the time of deposit. Mine was MSRP+tax+tag+$200 dealer prep fee. The DP fee was originally 780, but we haggled, and he came down to 200. I visited 5 dealers, and he was the only one that would reduce the prep fee.


Good luck!!

Wing

Prep fee? That's a new one... just another way to add on more $$$. Pure bull. You should only have to pay MSRP + tax + destination/delivery as marked by the manufacturer.

Admin fees are even a rip off add on, my last car I had no extras besides the delivery.

Toadman

If you've ever worked at a dealership, there's alot more to it than giving you the car straight off the transporter.

$780 is high, but this "prep fee" includes PDI(Pre-delivery Inspection) by a technician and detailing of the car(removing cosmoline overcoat, plastic sheeting, vacuum, wash, etc. The PDI consists of a LARGE checklist of items that must be inspected. Lights, fluids, horn, body, all instruments and switches, test drive to operating condition and check for any leaks. Ang get gas. These technicians could make more money doing 30k services on cars instead of prepping new cars when a transporter rolls in. It's not just the sales dept. doing all the work.

Haggle all you want, but the dealer wants a "perfect delivery" when you take possession of the keys. They get scored on this heavily.

RotaryXTypeSH

I got mine with MSRP, no mark up...and they said even if they do mark it up they would give me the special rate......NO MARK UP:D

Elara

Well, I got all worried for nothing- the "delivery fee" IS the destination fee, and is included in MSRP as a legitimate charge. I was reading their buyer's guides incorrectly or something. I even double checked on some of the other cars in the showroom, and everything is fine.

SO, what I'll be paying is MSRP ($31,100) + a processing fee of $189 (my company charges one too, so I'll just eat this one- it's not going to make or break me) and tax, title, and tags. I also asked for no badging on the car, which was ok with them (I said I'd keep the plate holder on the car for a while), to have no one driving it but me (except for the required tests) and no revving the car over 6,000 RPMS, for any reason. All of which they were fine with. I'll bring it all to them in writing (which they requested) in a few weeks. They're also going to make sure I get the pre-order goodies, whatever they may be. I made my sales guy check again, and my car is apparently scheduled to be built the first week of May, so I'm still assuming June delivery.

In addition, they've also got 20 RX-8s unclaimed, and they said that they're charging MSRP on all of them. So if anyone near Virginia still needs one, let me know and I'll give you their number. This dealer has been unbelievably nice to me.