Derish Posted May 9, 2016 Author Share Posted May 9, 2016 Finally completed the dealer survey today, having left what I thought was my best chance for the end. Turns out it wasn't really. It's the second time I've gone to visit Padgett's, the biggest Yamaha dealer in the area that also does Honda and Suzuki. Last time it was on a technical issue. In both cases they proved to be useless but extremely polite. I know people in the UK like to complain about how bad customer service is these days, but for me as a foreigner it remains one of your country's strongest points. Such was the case here, where they took a few glances at the bike, didn't even ask about mileage, previous owners, etc., and came back to me saying that as it's an import, they're not interested, but thanks for stopping by. I wish every woman that ever rejected me was that polite. Meanwhile, I went on webuyanybike.com and they actually surprised me with a very good offer. I do however suspect it will come down drastically once they see the actual bike and realise it has metric gauges and a few scratched plastics. Unfortunately their quote system doesn't go into much detail before coming up with a number, which I'm sure works in their favour once a customer is engaged to sell and the man with the van shows up with (a bit less) cash. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Derish Posted May 24, 2016 Author Share Posted May 24, 2016 Glad to report it is done. The bike was eventually sold for peanuts, but went to a nice chap with a rich track resume who was looking for a city commuter. I'm quite pleased with it overall, considering how frustrating the whole process was. Apparently old 250cc bikes are about as wanted as puppies after Christmas, or maybe it's just Yorkshire with it's three-months-a-year riding weather. It's definitely not about the price, as I've tried advertising within a 300% range and had equally zero responses. The local dealers were also a hoot. To be fair, most of them said no outright. The few who did give me the time of day offered about 1/3 of the bike's perceived value (I'm careful not to use the word 'market' anymore), and one in particular gave me a nice offer but then backpedaled and cut it by 50% on the day I came to hand it over. Seriously questionable business ethics this one had, although he did manage to remain Britishly polite throughout his attempt of assaulting me in the rear. Webuyanybike.com? Well, apparently not ANY bike. 'We' also don't call back when it doesn't suit us. But 'we' sure do some great advertising, don't we? MCN - special thanks for no less than five scammers trying to contact me through your messaging system, that was £12 well spent! Bottom line - what an effing waste of time. What the hell happened, England? You used to be so biker-friendly. ** rant over, tea time. ** Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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