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Access Toyota Canada

Discussion in 'Prius, Hybrid, EV and Alt-Fuel News' started by Tideland Prius, Nov 15, 2005.

  1. Tideland Prius

    Tideland Prius Moderator of the North
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    Ok, I'm starting this thread to call on all Canadian users. We're all familiar with Access Toyota, the "nicer way to buy a car". However, as some of you may know, some dealers are enforcing this one price policy. Toyota Canada has already lifted this "Drive-Away Pricing" before Access Toyota was released nationwide.

    It seems the dealerships in B.C., particularly the Lower Mainland are strictly enforcing this rule despite the fact it's been lifted for over a year. This is in violation of the Competition Act. If they are in fact collluding, we must notify the Competition Bureau about this.

    Here's one short thread at YotaTech.
    Access Toyota Pricing

    and here:
    Toyota Access Pricing CANADA

    There's an e-mail in the YotaTech thread. I tried e-mailling but I got a Postmaster Delivery Failure.
     
    #1 Tideland Prius, Nov 15, 2005
  2. kam

    kam New Member

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    It seems to be the same situation here in Montreal. When we purchased our Prius in June 2004, they were still using the "Drive Away" Access Toyota pricing. At that time for the Prius it was something like $50 below MSRP. It really made the process of buying the car straight forward and dare I say almost enjoyable not having to haggle (which I'm terrible at).

    My understanding of the situation now is that the reason the competition bureau first started looking at the Access Toyota program was due to the fact that Toyota Canada was helping the dealerships in each region arrange a fixed price. I think it was their involvment that was potentially breaking laws.

    As a result it was changed and now the dealers just agree to only sell at MSRP. There's no involvment of Toyota Canada in arranging the selling price other than they set the MSRP. This is of course common practice in any retail goods.

    I agree it's annoying not being able to get them to haggle but I'm still on the fence as to whether this is bad or not.
     
    #2 kam, Nov 15, 2005
  3. Tideland Prius

    Tideland Prius Moderator of the North
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    Of course the good thing is that dealers that usually markup won't be able to and thus everyone gets a fair price. I love what this guy from Regency Toyota said "you know, we have this one price thing so that you know, you tell your friend you got $500 off and your friend said you got a bad deal cause he got it for $1,000". I'm thinking to myself, it's not a bad deal cause that just means you can't negogiate as well as your friend or that dealer just so happens to not want to give that much of a discount. The only "bad" deal is if you, the dealer, mark up the price! I got a laugh out of that.

    I know dealers read this forum. Just so you know, your Corolla "guru" can't really explain the differences between the 05 and 04. When he says "the grille goes like this <waves hands around>", that really isn't descriptive. And if he can't tell that the 05 and 04 LE share the exact same wheel design, he shouldn't be the Corolla "guru".

    The fact is, allowing negogiation gives people choice. Otherwise, what incentive do I have to choose a particular dealership? Also, negogiation allow for competition and thus sales. I think they're just getting a tad lazy :p
     
    #3 Tideland Prius, Nov 15, 2005
  4. kam

    kam New Member

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    Yeah, I totally agree. One would hope that it might causes dealers to offer better service to try and differentiate themselves. Maybe that's a pipe dream.

    The sales guy we bought our Prius from called me on my birthday just to see how we liked the car (this was about a year and a month after we bought it). I found it kind of weird but the guy's pretty nice and seems competent. If we end up getting another Toyota I'd probably call him up and to the deal through him.

    The other thing is that there's always a choice which is not to buy Toyota. The problem is they've got good products and know it. In the Montreal area it certainly seems they're not having a problem selling cars. There are lots of new Toyotas on the road (not enough Prii though). So this no haggling doesn't seem to be hurting them.
     
    #4 kam, Nov 15, 2005
  5. Tideland Prius

    Tideland Prius Moderator of the North
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    That's the problem. I like their products but the customer service isn't exactly top of the class. It's more like people want their cars and are willing to do so even if it's MSRP. (hopefully not higher). It'll be hard for me to choose another car cause there are so few that I like such as the 9-3, G35 and that's about it lol. Maybe I'll just scrimp and save up to get a Lexus instead. Honestly, I get treated soo much better even though the salesperson fully knows I'm not gonna get a car any time soon.
     
    #5 Tideland Prius, Nov 16, 2005
  6. jayman

    jayman Senior Member

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    It's not like the games that GM plays: one price if you pay for it outright, a different price if you finance through GMAC.
     
    #6 jayman, Nov 16, 2005
  7. Tideland Prius

    Tideland Prius Moderator of the North
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    lol. Price discrimination eh?

    I'm just curious how this is different from Scion's one-price thing.
     
    #7 Tideland Prius, Nov 17, 2005
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