I hope the National Consumer Agency get in touch with Carzone...

MarkN

Since way back when, Carzone was a one off fee job. You paid 30 quid, until your car was sold. Happy Days.

Today, if you log onto the homepage that is still the case. "Sell your car for €30 says the banner."

Well not quite.

After the initial 30 days have expired (during which time you used to be able to just hit renew and it went for another 30 days..and so on) you are now asked for another €15 to renew your ad.

As of 12.20pm now this is still there. Get your facts right lads. :mad:

niceirishfella

Agreed.....This is misleading and illegal.
Shame on Carzone.

peasant

playing devil's advocate:

how is it misleading? not their fault if you can't sell your car within 30 days?


Granted, it's not crystal clear ...but illegal / misleading ...I don't think so.

MarkN

Eh, when you sign up it doesn't say it anywhere for starters.

And the ad is very misleading - there's no "* conditions apply" for example.

I'm not trying to sell a car, no skin off mine but from someone who works in advertising indirectly, I think it's very misleading.

niceirishfella

it is misleading.......most cars in this "glutted marketplace" don't sell in 30 days.........Carzone only know that too well.

peasant

Well then in that case you might want to contact the National Consumer Agency and see what they think ...

MarkN

And eh I think judging by the fact that every second post here is "my car won't sell.. what price should I put my car up for.. nobody is ringing me about my ad on Carzone.. " then it's quite relevant to this forum and it will show people the price they have to pay because it's not gonna say it on the Carzone site!

Shouldn't have to even explain that to a Mod.

peasant

two separate issues here:

MarkN is quite correct in raising the issue and making boardsies aware of this extra charge that applies later

niceirishfella on the other hand is treading on thin ice by calling it "illegal"

MarkN

Fair enough, sorry for having a go.

-Chris-

I'm kind of glad for this change in policy (although I'm not trying to sell my car on Carzone, so it's easy for me to say... ).

Carzone is FULL of cars that are waaay overpriced, and therefore not selling. It's also full of ads for cars that used to be other cars and the person doesn't want to pay another €30 fee.

By making people pay on an ongoing basis, it'll stop people uploading their '96 Carina E for €19,500 and just leaving it there. Having all those cars up there inflates people's expectations of what their car is worth, they upload their car for too much, then they ask why it's not selling.

Fresher ads makes for more realistic prices and will hopefully help to get everyone's cars moving again.

I think in another thread that someone said Carzone have committed not to charge the €15 to existing ads (as at the date of that thread, anyway). It would only apply to new ads - they're not applying it retrospectively.

unkel

Just to let you know, any ad put up before the change can be updated (by phone) for free indefinitely

Edit: you no longer need to ring them to renew, it can now be done on line too

niceirishfella

peasant wrote:

two separate issues here:

MarkN is quite correct in raising the issue and making boardsies aware of this extra charge that applies later

niceirishfella on the other hand is treading on thin ice by calling it "illegal"

Peasant, its is Illegal to grossly mislead any consumer......thats my point - and i'm on solid ice here.

unkel

I see your point, Chris. It's good for the trade, but not so good for private sales though. Most cars just do not sell within 30 days. I expect private sellers will vote with their feet and move to the likes of adverts.ie, buyandsell, etc.

AudiChris wrote: »

It's also full of ads for cars that used to be other cars and the person doesn't want to pay another €30 fee.

That could be resolved by a "report this ad" button triggering an alert to carzone staff

peasant

niceirishfella wrote: »

Peasant, its is Illegal to grossly mislead any consumer......thats my point - and i'm on solid ice here.

What's "grossly" then ?

This is not a courtroom, but boards.ie, so please desist from making unproven accusations that could land boards in hot water.

If you feel so sure that wrong is being done here, why don't you contact the Consumer Agency and make them aware of the issue and let them do the prosecuting if any has to be done.

Understood?

thebigshot

If you think this is misleading you should read the Lisbon Treaty.

-Chris-

unkel wrote: »

I see your point, Chris. It's good for the trade, but not so good for private sales though. Most cars just do not sell within 30 days.

I'm not looking at it from a trade/private point of view, I think it's a generally good idea - any private car should be able to sell within 30-45 days within normal circumstances. If it hasn't then it's probably too expensive, too specialised, badly described.
I'd love to see carzone's statistics for average number of days that a car is there and (if they could measure it) average price listed vs price sold. I'd say the numbers are shocking.

If carzone can make itself a place where only serious sellers with realistic expectations list their cars, then it'll become a magnet for serious buyers and a reference point for the rest of us. They can't do that under the current arrangement imho.

unkel wrote: »

I expect private sellers will vote with their feet and move to the likes of adverts.ie, buyandsell, etc.

There's a risk of that, but there's also a risk of carzone becoming redundant if placing your car there doesn't result in selling it.

unkel wrote: »

That could be resolved by a "report this ad" button triggering an alert to carzone staff

That's a brilliant idea, someone should suggest that to them. It would clean the place up a lot, and very easy to implement.

ian25

Maybe i'm just reading the advert differantly but isn't it simply stating that you can sell your car online for €30. It gives no guarantee of your car being sold within a given time period, be it one month or two, so i see no reason why the National Consumer Agency would be botherd by it.
You pay your money and advertise your car for sale online.

MarkN

ian25 wrote: »

Maybe i'm just reading the advert differantly but isn't it simply stating that you can sell your car online for €30. It gives no guarantee of your car being sold within a given time period, be it one month or two, so i see no reason why the National Consumer Agency would be botherd by it.
You pay your money and advertise your car for sale online.

If you've ever sold a car on Carzone you will know before you pay that it says you pay €30 until the car is sold.

Point is, someone I know paid 30 quid a month ago, car is still for sale and yesterday had to cough up another 15 quid and was never told about that when they placed the ad in the first place.

johnf2020

Speaking of overpriced cars on CARZONE,,,anybody ever notice people looking for silly money for their trade-ins because they only looked at the first page of their type of car for sale on CARZONE,,,,then the look on their face when you show them the last page on that model---PRICELESS.
Can be up to 3k of a difference:D

Sizzler

I had my ad up there for a good while, tried to renew it just now and they will let me do it as I had placed the ad before April.
Doesnt get away from the fact they need to tidy up their sell you car for €30 mantra!

VH

Maybe people will price their cars more realistically if they know it's going to cost every time they renew. Anything will sell if the price is right. I've sold five cars on carzone and the longest one took to sell was 8 days. The most recent one I sold was gone in 18 hours! If you can't sell within 30 days you're looking for too much.

MarkN

The person I know sent a strongly worded email to their head of new business yesterday over it, I'm wondering have they changed the rules on the basis of that cause it certainly didn't work yesterday anyway.