Why Valley Auto World Volkswagen is not Member of the TrueCar Dealer Network

Aug 31, 2015

At Valley Auto World Volkswagen, we acknowledge that customers are the life of our business. With over 50 years of experience in selling and servicing automobiles in Fayetteville and surrounding areas, we take pride in delivering pleasant, hassle- free transactions to each and every customer and potential customer.
TrueCar.com, like other lead based buying services, has a business model that we at Valley Auto World Volkswagen believe exploits negative consumer perception associated with car buying experience. TrueCar claims to deliver a transparent and anxiety free transaction while displaying what others are paying for the automobile being considered. In our opinion, this is not simply the case.

A registered TrueCar dealership determines the price that the customer sees when searching for an automobile on the TrueCar network. Therefore, the price seen by the customer is not an actual average price for the automobile being researched. When the consumer selects an automobile from the TrueCar portal, their information is sent to three TrueCar dealerships (based on the location of the search) that are registered within the network of dealers for the brand of automobile who ae registered as TrueCar dealers. Now, instead of the local dealer receiving customer information, three dealerships will receive that information via TureCar’s customer portal. The customer now has three times the risk of information like names, addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses floating around or being stored in databases that may not be properly secured and maintained. At Valley Auto World Volkswagen, a top priority is the safeguarding of our customers’ information.

Every transaction resulting from a TrueCar inquiry is a cost to the dealership. The standard fee from TrueCar is $299.00 per new automobile sale and $399.00 per previously owned automobile sale. Valley Auto World Volkswagen would prefer to pass this savings on to our customers rather than paying a third party for information. Additionally, in order to bill for their charges, TrueCar requires dealerships to transmit all vehicle sales information such as customers’ name(s), addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, dates of sale transactions, and vehicle identification numbers to TrueCar in order for invoicing to be processed. This customer information includes each customer that purchases a vehicle from our dealership within a given time period (from the beginning of the month through the last day of the same month). Thus, the information includes all customers who have purchased a vehicle, not just the ones who purchased using TrueCar. Valley Auto World Volkswagen maintains the philosophy that sharing sales information on all sales does not serve the best interests of our customers, especially those who did not intentionally send their information through TrueCar.
In March of 2015, a complaint was filed in New York District Court by dealers of that state, claiming that they were victims of false advertising and unfair competition. A copy of that complaint can be viewed here: http://www.autonews.com/assets/PDF/CA9867539.PDF

If you are a TrueCar customer, Valley Auto World will honor any and all reasonable offers from TrueCar. We have served Fayetteville and the surrounding area for over 50 years, long before buying services were established. We take pride in offering a pleasant buying experience to each and every person who enters our doors or visits our dealership in search of an automobile.