At the end of the day it's down to the ethics and the morality of the dealer and they are all different. I accept that a lot of the old school dealers that started off as small family business started off with huge amounts of customer service. They had to do this to survive - and possibly get over the stigma attached to the brand eg, Toyota in the 70's and Skoda in the 80's - and many of them still have this culture flowing through the business.
However, on the flip side there are plenty of big chain dealers out there and the aforementioned smaller dealers who had to "go large" at the behest of their manufacturers (or who have seen management and staff changes through old age) and as soon as they start seeing volume of customers as the primary profit generator rather than generating customer loyalty and hence repeat business, that is where it all goes bums up for the punter.
In the early 70's my neighbour - a well to do bloke - had an Austin 1800 and replaced it yearly with another and another and another gradually upgrading as he went on. This was not because the car was particularly good - it wasn't - but they weren't that bad and the point was the dealer did give a monkeys and always made him feel like he mattered. This all trucked along nicely until BL told the dealer to "upgrade" it's franchise to push their exciting new-era products rather than the older BMC stuff. They expanded the showroom, diluted the customer service and things went down the crapper, much as they did for the manufacturer themselves much a few decades on. He went and bought a new BMW 316 2-door in 1978 and was once again welcomed by a dealer that cared (it was very much a developing marque back then). I dare say that most BMW dealers now are in the same position as my neighbour experienced with British Leyland in 1978, and were he alive he'd probably be looking at a Kia.
The point is all dealers are different and in my own experience they love you until the ink has dried on the purchase order and the cooling off period has expired on the finance, then you are yesterdays news. If you want another car off them thats great but if not no great worry as there'll be another punter along in a minute. How many dealers honestly ring customers 2 months in and check they are happy with their purchase, and keep them "warm" through the lifecycle of the car?
I once took my then new MX5 to a dealer in Mansfield (now closed) for a service as the dealer in Nottingham I bought it from had shut it's doors about 6 months before. About half a mile from the garage I was overtaken by a ballistic Mazda Demio - not what comes to mind when you think of ballistic is it - cutting in and out of traffic on the dual carriageway and bouncing off the limiter at each shift. I'd like to say I was surprised when it pulled in to the service car park of the dealers and a spotty yoof wearing Mazda overalls got out but that would be a lie. I just went in to the service reception and told them that I was cancelling my service as I did not feel confident that they would treat my car in the same manner I would, the service managers response was "it's only a car mate, it won't hurt it".
The whole "warranty" thing is little more than legalised blackmail anyway. As DCM says, a car is just a collection of bits, its the info that has the value and in many cases even that is just good ol' common sense. If I have a choice I'd rather have my car serviced by a non-franchised "independent" who has 20 years experience and a good name in the area rather than a fly-by-night-cheap-as-chips outfit or a main dealer who can plug in a code reader to an OBDII port but hasn't got a clue what tappet clearances are. As long as they use manufacturer parts and specced fluids I'm happy.
I shall spare you the saga that took place when I tried to get a "dealer only" part for my '94 Mini from the just upgraded Godfrey Davis Rover dealer. "Mini? Nah mate".
Just my two penneth.
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