bobfalcon

Waiting for 2013 pricing to order a '13 A4 P+ in Pennsylvania. What has been the experience of recent purchasers on dealers charging or adding an "Advertising fee" into the negotiations? I helped my wife buy a C-300 this summer, and MB's numbers were exactly $500 higher than mine, and found it was due to the advertising fee. I told them that was their cost of doing business (that I shouldn't pay for that), but they didn't back off until said I was ready to leave the dealership to "research this issue further." (It's always easier to be a bit nasty when it is somebody else's car.)

What have your experiences been like? Are Audi dealers plugging the advertising fees here?

Bob

precinder2

I believe this is region-specific. All the dealerships in my area charged an advertising fee (around $200). I bought my car at invoice so I didn't bother trying to negotiate. My guess is that if they're already offering to sell for invoice or less, it would be tough to get them to budge.

gat821

Yes, seems normal to have it. When I was itemizing what invoice price would be, this was the difference as well. Edmunds, if I remember right, doesn't capture this fee, while truecar does. I did end up using the supplier program, so didn't need to worry about it.

snagitseven

While your dealer may have waived the ad fee, there is nothing in the supplier program that prohibits the dealer from charging (or attempting to charge) it or other costs like registration, inspection and even "prep". Like everything else, these things (except the registration) are usually negotiable.

Also, Audi reimburses the dealer 50% of the supplier discount so actually the dealer is footing the bill for only a discount of 3%, not 6%. This presumably should leave some room for a further negotiated discount. (Dealers will usually try to resist this though).

As for ad fees, they are always charged by Audi to the dealer on every car. They are a real cost above invoice. However, it's also true there may be other incentives by Audi to the dealer, i.e. volume rebates, flooring subsidies, etc. that come and go. It's hard to determine what these are on any specific vehicle at any given time, however.

gary135r

This is one reason why (besides aesthetics) that I will not let a dealer put their dealership sticker on my auto. Unless they want to take another thousand of the negotiated price. Why advertise them for free?

Moviela

The invoice and the dealers cost is two different animals. There is probably only one guy at each store that knows the real price of the car. It is in the region of $2,600 below invoice that the dealer actually pays for the car. With everyone having access to the invoice price, several other pricing tricks have been added to make the stealership richer. One is the so-called advertising fee. The only time a dealer gets really pays for this is when sales are well below average. The manufacturer forms areas for group media buys and every dealer pays about half the bill. If you sell a lot of units, it is small money, but if you fall short the cost per unit is higher. Other credits offset this, such as the "look & feel" money, low interest loans on the building, and tax rebates from the counties. The factory pays for inspection and first service, and there are always incentives for meeting and beating sales quotas. Some receive more allocations for desirable high profit cars, others get free leases, trips to Hawaii, and flooring interest buy downs for great numbers.

One of my favorite thefts from your pocket is the "destination charge." They will have you believe that is the charge to deliver the car to the dealer, and it cannot be waived. Folks, delivery over the ocean, marine insurance, inland freight and insurance, and dealer preparation is all included in the MSRP. It is simply a charge at destination. It goes right into the dealers pocket, every dollar. It was designed by some sharp pencil boy to even cheat the salesman out of a commission percentage because the charge at destination is deducted from the commission calculation sheet.

Almost every Audi sold has some "trunk money." It is called holdback by most manufacturers. It is used an incentive to get dealers to move units. By keeping some of the invoice aside until the unit is sold, the factory can adjust to market conditions by increasing or decreasing the holdback due the date the car is sold. I know, I know, Audi says they do not pay holdback to the dealer on their cars. That is true, Volkswagen pays it.

If a dealer insists on showing these deceptive devices on the purchase order, agree and back them them out of the price of the car. That includes the non-official document and DMV fees. Tell them them you have a "check" fee equal to their fees, and back that out of the vehicle price too.