Customer reviews of Ideal Car Centre

By Anonymous on 30 November 2021 | Purchase not verified

Phoned for part exchange price on my car traveled 3 hours to be told oh sorry gave you wrong price total waist of time

Reply from Ideal Car Centre on 26/05/22

We are sorry to hear you are unhappy, but we do not provide rough valuations or valuations over the phone precisely so customers do not end up unhappy like this. The figure you received was an automated one provided by Autotrader, not by us. We are sorry that you were unhappy with the valuation of your car, but upon viewing it and the condition it was not worth the Autotrader guide price which was for a car in good condition

By Anonymous on 08 September 2021 | Purchase not verified

Absolutely shocking service made an appointment to buy a car drove 3 hours which they knew about to get there to be told they had taken a deposit on it Man was rude and smug

Reply from Ideal Car Centre on 26/05/22

We apologise that you are unhappy, and all our staff endeavour to be polite and helpful at all times, however we apologise if you feel this came across as smug as we assure you that was not intended. We inform all customer including yourself that unfortunately we cannot take cars off sale without a deposit and that until we have one anyone can buy our cars and they do tend to sell quickly. You chose to take the risk and not leave a deposit. Also the reason we try to book appointments for customers rather than them just turn up is precisely to avoid this, so that once we sell the car we can contact you to let you know and cancel your appointment which we did, but unfortunately the car sold before your arrival.

By Anonymous on 30 June 2021 | Purchase not verified

Nice guys but completely unorganised. Spent the last few constantly chasing the garage over a vehicle I was interested in. Was wait for some info to get back to me, when I rang them back (few hours later) no reply to my call or texts. Ring again, only to be told that they would ring me back. Several hours later, get a call to say the vehicle is gone. Complete waste of time. Unorganised and complete lack of communication

Reply from Ideal Car Centre on 26/05/22

We are sorry to hear you are unhappy, however unfortunately you contacted us after we had been closed for 5 months due to lockdown and the member of staff had only just returned from furlough. He did not have the information you requested to hand so went away to find out and returned to inform you that the car was in fact now sold. We are sorry that you found this unhelpful, however unfortunately at that present time lockdown and a global pandemic was making operating a business more difficult for everyone and was unprecedented and we had to react to in in ways we were not used to.

By Abby B on 10 April 2021 | Purchase not verified

I bought a 64 plate Polo in February. I was told I had to pay the full up front cost of the car before seeing or test driving it. They were not flexible with pick up times due to many excuses. On the pick up date in the evening of course…Andy arrived extremely late. This was obviously to hide the fact that the car had an extortionate amount of horrendous scratches as if it had been keyed. To which he pretended like he had never see them although he looked uneasy at the fact I brought a torch to inspect the car…considering it was pitch black outside. He said he could get them buffed and deliver the next day for free. A couple days later I noticed the parcel shelf was missing. This took weeks upon weeks of being ignored and having to constantly try and contact them about it. After being lied to about having a parcel shelf ordered for the past 3 weeks, along came multiple, laughable excuses. Multiple phone calls later and constant chasing to get proof, Andy then led me on to try and believe that it was the ‘delivery date’ at the bottom of the confirmation email (the morning I rang to ask if he had done it to which he declined me and text me saying he’d ring me after to tell me) when in actual fact it was the day he “ordered it”. Needless to say after this final conversation I have been ignored and still have not received my parcel shelf to this current day nor a message about the situation. It’s embarrassing customer service. We also have lots of screenshots of messages before the reply is ‘this is untrue’ like most of your responses to customers however, it’s concerning that we all have very similar experiences. Would not recommend.

By Tina N on 29 March 2021 | Purchase not verified

I'd give 0 starts if I could!!!They've made our life hell in the past 3months.My partner has bought a ds3 from them (on finance, thank god for that) on 20th of November. 4year old car advertised with low mileage and great condition.As soon as she had the car delivered,the driver told her that the parking sensors are not working,but we don't have to worry as the dealer is aware of it,and it's a minor problem what can be fixed it 20 minutes.The car was delivered at 8pm in pitch black which assured she couldn't carry out a test drive or an inspection of the car.Upon test drive (next morning)we discovered multiple issues with it (city brake not working,the main computer switching on and off every 2-3 minutes (I am not exaggerating) and displaying different minor faults all the time, and there was no full service history either as they claimed in their advert.Constant lies about appointments being booked, warranty is nonexistent.No communication, terrible customer service.AVOID THIS PLACE

Reply from Ideal Car Centre on 29/03/21

We are sorry to hear you are unhappy, however unfortunately your claims are not remotely correct. You arranged to have the car delivered through YOUR OWN delivery company. It is their responsibility to check the car when they collect it, which they did and signed to confirm the car was as described and had no faults and worked as it should - all of which happened in daylight. You subsequently had a parking sensor fail (a £10 part) and the screen began resetting itself which was diagnosed as a simple software update. We offered to cover this under warranty and booked you into a local garage. Both ourselves and the garage tried to contact you when you failed to turn up but you ignored both of our calls and would not speak to us. You then contacted the finance company to reject the car. We asked you to return the car do we could inspect it to establish the faults and you refused to do so. The car also was exactly as described with history. You refused to communicate with us.

By Mark Paul H on 09 March 2021 | Purchase not verified

Very poor communication, non existent customer service,. I've been trying to buy a car from them, but they wont call back or reply to emails. When i finally managed to communicate with them, they weren't bothered, so i've bought elsewhere thankfully.

Reply from Ideal Car Centre on 29/03/21

We are sorry to receive your review however unfortunately your review isn’t the truth. You enquired several times on our car and we responded by email every time and tried to ring you on numerous occasions. Eventually we spoke to you and could not offer what you wanted for your part exchange. You then messaged yet again claiming you had t contacted us, and didn’t have a part exchange, and that we hadn’t replied to your fresh enquiry, yet when we showed you proof we had replied to all your enquiries including previous ones you denied making, you got aggressive and rude and claimed to have bought a car elsewhere already. At which point we questioned why you had made a fresh enquiry if you had already purchased a car and had no intention of buying ours. It was a very strange exchange which thankfully we have records of all of it. You simply seemed to be looking for an argument and threatened lots of bad reviews such as this one.

By Leanne D on 21 September 2020 | Purchase not verified

I had spent several weeks looking for a specific car, when I came across this one at iDeal Car centre. I rang up to check opening hours to potentially organise a visit. I received a courtesy call a few days later - great service. I had then subsequently decided not to travel to 250 miles but wanted to explore the purchase of the car. The salesman I dealt with was fabulous from start to finish - professions, efficient and knowledgeable. He talked me through the car and sorted out a transfer of the vehicle to my address. The whole process was completed easily and quickly and the car is exactly as explained. Great service, great dealer, great staff. Thanks again!

By John F on 30 September 2019 | Purchase not verified

Absolutely shocking whatever you do do not what buy a car from these people you will regret it it is a terrible company with the worst customer service and the agreement that you'd sign when you buy the car car is a minefield of legal mumbo jumbo which seems designed to make it difficult to return the car I bought a Mercedes from these people 4 over £7,000 and it's been nothing but problems been months in the garage cost a fortune had to claim against the warranty several items were not covered was left without a car for long periods of time I'm then was given a courtesy car that didn't even have any oil in it and was literally falling apart now I have a car that has problems that I can't sell tell I'm out of pocket serious money there's nothing that I can do I can't return the car car don't buy why they also have blocks on their reviews so you can't leave a bad review now they have become attached to AutoTrader I can finally leave a genuine honest Bad review this is all my opinion

Reply from Ideal Car Centre on 04/10/19

Whilst we are sorry to hear that you are unhappy, we are confused by your review. Firstly you bought this car over 12 months ago and you have only contacted us within the first few weeks to complain of an oil leak. This was repaired for free under warranty, despite the car being 9 years old which had done almost 100k miles. You have never had a courtesy car from us or paid for any repairs. There is no 'legal mumbo jumbo' everything is transparent and you have never once asked to 'return' the car or even contacted us at all. After that we have heard nothing from you except several negative reviews on various different websites. As for your strange claims about blocks on reviews, people have been able to review us on multiple platforms ever since we have been open with no blocks on any reviews as you must be aware as this is the fifth negative review you have left us on various different sites, despite never attempting to contact us to make a complaint or have any issues resolved.

By Mark S on 21 September 2019 | Purchase not verified

Avsolutely fantastic service from Ideal. Friendly team and no pressure. Went up to purchase a car which was lovely and being prepared but ended up purchasing my second choice. They went above and beyond to help me secure it. I woudn't hesitate to purchase from Ideal again in the future and would recommend then to anyone. Thanks Ideal Team.

By George H on 27 August 2019 | Purchase not verified

Very Please with my new car, I highly recommend this dealer because the staff are friendly and trustworthy and have been true to their word