Unless things have changed recently Dealers would have the new price lists the week before. I used to work next to the local Ford dealership and our first five Motability cars were Fords and the salesman I used to deal with would always show me the new price list days before. I also had a close friend who was a salesman at the local Audi dealership until a couple of years ago and he told me they had the new prices in the week before.
I have a hunch that Motability may have instructed manufacturers to tighten up on the release of new quarters lists, probably due to the way that customers understandably ‘play’ the system to take advantage of any price drops or beat price rises. Not that long ago, we used to have sight of at least half a dozen manufacturers price lists before the quarter change day – sometimes more. Recently we’ve struggled to get anything, although I can’t help but wonder that the problem last quarter and this quarter (where we’ve seen virtually nothing in advance) could be partly down to the days immediately prior to a quarter change being a weekend when nobody updates websites.
I have very good relationships with a couple of dealers and they tell me that they now get nothing before we do, and I’ve no reason to doubt them. I was also at the Motability Big Event on Friday and spoke to a lot of staff from different dealerships. They were frustrated that the show was on just a couple of days before the next quarter as they were quoting prices that would expire on Monday. Those that I asked if they had any info on Q3 (not just on prices, but cars that may be coming on or off the scheme) all claimed to have no info whatsoever and seemed quite frustrated about that.