A few weeks ago I was invited to give a presentation to a group of
small business men and women. I rolled up to the meeting with my
Sony Vaio under my arm to be met by the chairman of the meeting who
was fiddling with a projector that looked as though its previous
owner was probably a cinema. I asked where I could connect my Sony
with PowerPoint presentation on it. “You can’t do that I’m afraid,”
was the response from the chairman who was by now under the table
entangled in what must have been enough wire to reach Spain.
“Haven’t you got your presentation on a stick?”
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Did he say stick? I thought, and shrugged. In the meantime
a spotty young waiter who had obviously listened to every word came
over with his cheese and pineapple nibbles and whispered, “He means
a memory stick”. I shrugged again. He pulled out a keyring on which
seemed to be a miniature version of every tool known to man,
including, it would seem, several ‘memory sticks’. Within seconds I
was looking at my presentation on the projector screen, the little
smartarse!
I quickly ushered him back to the nibbles so that I could take full
credit as the chairman emerged from under the table.
SME ignorance
My presentation was well received by all in the room, but not one
of the 30 or so companies represented in the room used leasing to
fund their cars and vans. During the question and answer period I
found the level of ignorance and misunderstanding about car finance
to be frightening. They all seemed to take advice from either their
accountant, their bank manager or friends/colleagues, none of whom
seemed to be experts in vehicle finance. Interestingly, not one
took advice from a car dealer. Many had discussed finance with
dealers but they had all gone off and checked what they were told
with others. So it seems rather strange that the FLA has chosen the
training of dealership staff as its first initiative in the
education of the public and small businesses, especially as I have
yet to meet anyone who trusts a car dealer.
Frankly I feel that it is the consumer that needs to be educated
and not by a car salesman who has an incentive to sell the customer
into one of their products, especially the one that makes them most
profit! Time is running out as lenders try to stitch up customers
with loans that look like HP agreements but without the legal
protection. Prime customers are sold into sub-prime products and
Personal Lease Purchase agreements are sold as if they are PCPs
with a guaranteed residual when the final payment isn’t
guaranteed.
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By GlobalDataIt won’t be long before all of this starts to boil over and the
government is forced to take action. To believe that the dealers
will be the saviours of the industry is to believe in pixies! The
FSA is just round the corner, you have been warned!
Graham Hill, chief executive, Graham Hill Automotive
Finance
