Skoda has vowed to refuse low-profit courtesy car or short-term lease deals as it aims to become the most customer-friendly manufacturer in the UK.
“We’re saying no to business; we’ve traditionally done a lot of bodyshop and short-term rental deals,” said Skoda sales boss Martin Burke. “If we are about building long-term relationships, we have to take a step back.”
“We’ll do 15,000 units of fleet business this year, but much more is genuine long-term business,” he said. “No-one wants to be selling cars at a loss – it’s not the right way to go. The biggest threat to the industry is people dumping cars. There are too many cars and not enough customers, we need to be realistic.”
Burke wants Skoda to take the lead with regard to customer satisfaction, pointing to the company’s retail success that has seen the brand as the only one in the top five of every JD Power customer satisfaction survey to date. “We can do it in the retail side, why not in fleet?”