I must say that what I am about to tell you is a little risky because I am a Carmax employee. I had previously been at a traditional car dealership for a long time (23 years) and have seen all the tricks of the the trade, or at least I thought I had until I decided to go to work for Carmax. WOW! As it turns out I didn't know Jack about how deceitful the car business is and how bad customers can really be ripped off. I am only going to give you one example of many that I have found since beginning my job at Carmax which began in April.
Two weekends training camp is what I call it. It's focus is to try to educate you on Carmax policies and how they are different than traditional dealerships. Oh! They paint such a glorious picture of how Carmax is changing the world and how honest and straight up Carmax is. Hahahaha, I know call Carmax, "Satan with A Halo". Anyway!!! One part of the training is being able to take a customer from Greeting them at the door to watching them drive away happily in there new used car. One part of this process is called the Appraisal Process, where I use a computer to explain what your car is worth in the market and to Carmax, well in the training process salesmen train with each other, one being the customer and one being the salesman, then they switch. It's for training purposes and really helps you with resistance from customers and what to expect, but what they didn't count on was me being alert enough to see a Ripoff when one is right in front of me and making the mistake of letting me train with a lady from the Businees Office because the salesmen were an odd number in training. What happened is this: They had a car that appraised for lets say $5000 in the "Buyers Office" but when it got to the salesman's office it had gone down $1000 to $6000. The lady (from the business office) that was training with me asked the trainer where was the $1000 from the the appraisal that is suppose to be deducted to help paying office personnel. The trainer told her that they were not suppose to let new salesman know about the $1000. Needless to say she was very embarrassed. Then about a month later a fellow employee tries to buy a car from Carmax. I saw the appraisal and it said 2003 Mercury Sable $3000 for a used Sable with 60k miles. I told the Salesman to buy it and it was a great buy. When he went to purchase the Sable he was told he could buy it for $4400. Now keep in mind Carmax employees are suppose to be able to buy a car for $300 over what Carmax pays for the cars. This was brought up in a later meeting with the "Buyers Office" who tried there best to not admit it, but finally admitted the situation was not an isolated one and that not all cars had the $1000 markup Ripoff.
What this means is that when you come to Carmax and get your car appraised, it's appraised for $5000, but when it gets to the salesman's office it has gone down $1000. So, every for customer that sells there car to Carmax. $1000 profit goes to Carmax before you even get your offer. I find this a disgusting practice and I have many other stories like this about Carmax. I will have an update to this letter soon.
Thanks, G
0 comments