Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

[Wayne M.]

Maybe not purely a technical question; just curious. Does picking up your new car at the assembly plant save the delivery cost to dealer ?

Part 2: Is it true that if a Canadian buys a new GM product in the U.S. and drives back to Canada, GM Canada will not honor (honour) the warranty ?
These questions arise as I'm interested in the Chevy Volt, and have visited a few dealers here in Alberta (aka Oilberta). Seems to be a flat $1600. delivery fee, irrespective of location. On a Volt discussion board, an Ontario resident who lives but a 30 mile drive south (ie. back to Ontario) of the Hamtramck Michigan Volt assembly plant gets shafted.

[Steve L.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

Go on the C7 forum on the corvette forum website. This has been discussed. As I understand it, A US dealer will not sell you a new car with an out of country drivers license. They will always ask for a license. Some Canadian snowbirds have both an Ont. and Fl license and a US address. So they could buy a new GM car in the US. These forums have indicated that a US warranty will not kick in unless the car has 10K MILES (not KM). I haven't looked into this but state tax must be paid, then the CDN tax and the boarder but I don't know if you get reimbursed for the state tax. Also, the price difference for a C7 is apparently only around 5% not the 20% is used to be. Currently CF forum dealers are charging MSRP but I suspect that in a yr or more, US dealers will discount, whereas CDN dealers will still charge MSRP or more. This is my understanding so far. The delivery charge is still charged if you pick up the car at a dealer or at the factory( museum delivery). This is apparently a Union demand. It is around $1000. So you don't save either way. I you pick up at the museum, you will get a better dealer prep. But there is an additional charge for museum pickup. If you pick up at the museum, you might as well get a factory tour. You can also watch your particular car being build for an additional charge.

[Terry M.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

The delivery charge is still charged if you pick up the car at a dealer or at the factory( museum delivery). This is apparently a Union demand. It is around $1000. So you don't save either way. I you pick up at the museum, you will get a better dealer prep. But there is an additional charge for museum pickup. If you pick up at the museum, you might as well get a factory tour. You can also watch your particular car being build for an additional charge.

Regarding the origins of the "flat rate" new car delivery charge.
Nice try Steve, but you have been listening to the wrong source for your information. The Unions had nothing to do with it.
New car dealers through their trade organizations (a skeptic might call them "big business," but I would never do that) petitioned Congress for the flat delivery rate in the later 1950s or early 1960s. Their motivation was that the system then in place based the delivery charge on actual delivery costs. This put dealers close to the vehicle manufacturing point at a competitive advantage relative to those at a significant distance from the point of origin. Congress bought (pun intended) their argument and here we are.

Now aren't you glad that some of us are old enough to have lived in those times? I once owned a 1950 Buick that was bought by residents of a Chicago suburb from a dealer in Flint Michigan just to save on the transportation costs.

Unions and big business are responsible for many things, but let's give blame or credit where it is due.

[Michael J.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

That is as I understand it too Terry. I was questioning it when I took NCM delivery of my 2012 ZR1 (and paid the additional "option" charge for this), and I still had to pay the dealer the base delivery charge. They told me, "it is in the law, sorry".

[Tom H.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

That is correct. You pay the full destination charge weather the car is shipped to California or across the street. Plus you pay the museum delivery fee.

[Michael W.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

I thought you guys would jump all over Wayne trying to talk him out of buying a Volt.

[Edward S.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

God Bless GM - double dipping it's the American way.

[Steve L.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

Michael, somebody has to buy a volt. Great idea until you have to replace the batteries. It will be interesting to see what value a volt will have when the batteries are done. Your 73 will be worth a lot more than a battery dead Volt.

Terry ,thanks for straightening out the union thing. My memory is going these days. What you said was discussed in the other forum but I'd forgotten it.

[Michael W.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

Great idea until you have to replace the batteries. It will be interesting to see what value a volt will have when the batteries are done. Your 73 will be worth a lot more than a battery dead Volt.

Lends a whole new (double) meaning to the word re-volting.

[Terry M.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

God Bless GM - double dipping it's the American way.

Actually the law redarding uniform delivery charges applies to all new vehicles sold in the USA, so neither GM nor any other vehicle manufacturer has any choice about their delivery fees except for setting the dollar amount.

[Michael J.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

I hate to say it, since I will probably be bashed here, but the delivery charge tacked onto a very expensive car even if you don't incur and pay extra for an NCM delivery, it just smacks of typical dealer markups and gouging....JMO.

[John H.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

I hate to say it, since I will probably be bashed here, but the delivery charge tacked onto a very expensive car even if you don't incur and pay extra for an NCM delivery, it just smacks of typical dealer markups and gouging....JMO.

Michael -

The dealer has already paid GM the amount of the shipping charge - it's part of the dealer's invoice price from GM; when you buy the car, you're just reimbursing the dealer for what he has already paid GM to ship it to him. The dealer isn't "tacking on" anything - he pays the established Uniform Freight Rate on every car he sells.

[Michael J.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

Michael -

The dealer has already paid GM the amount of the shipping charge - it's part of the dealer's invoice price from GM; when you buy the car, you're just reimbursing the dealer for what he has already paid GM to ship it to him. The dealer isn't "tacking on" anything - he pays the established Uniform Freight Rate on every car he sells.

OK, let me then put it more precisely then, it is thus GM gouging customers on a very expensive car. No matter how you apologize for it, it is a cost that is not incurred that a customer gets charged for, am I right?

[Terry M.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

Well let me put it this way: It costs in fuel to haul the car, or any car, to the dealer. I understand the driver gets a fee for unloading each car, The driver is entitled to pay for his time enroute, and lodging if the trip takes more than a day. There is maintenance and repairs to the truck. Who is supposed to pay for all that?

Certainly it could be rolled into the price of the car, making the car more expensive, but regardless of how you slice it someone has to pay. If you expect the dealer or the car manufacturer to pay, the cost will just be passed on to the customer anyway -- as ir is now. We do not know if there is a mark-up on the stated delivery fee, but we wouldn't know if that fee was buried in the manufacturing costs either.

To be clear: I am not defending the system. I think it could be made more transparent, but someone is going to pay those costs and both the dealer and manufacturer are in business to make money. That leaves only one source for payment of these costs.

[Michael J.]

Re: Bowling Green delivery (stiil exist) ? Drive it Home ?

I have no problem with fees being charged for actual service costs, that is what makes America great, profit is good on costs for service and costs actually incurred. My objection is when the dealer/GM (as you say the dealers are the ones who wanted the fees enshrined in law, but John says it is actually GM who gets them all) get to charge you for delivery costs($975 in my case) that are actually NOT incurred when you pick up the car in BG and are charged $490 for NCM delivery in addition. In some law statutes, being charged for something you don't get is called fraud, but not at GM it seems. Yes, they could bury that in the mix that is your window sticker costs, but since they break it out as though it is an actual incurred cost, I object if you do not receive it. That is my beef, OK, my rant is done, I know GM could care less what a long time customer thinks of their practices.