The dealer is a broker between the manufacturer, us and Mb and the price is agreed by the manufacturer and they get a fee for overseeing the process.
Where as when they order cars themselves and their group and sell to retail customers they make profits as opposed to a small fee.
I recently left the scheme and got my car in 4 weeks. There is nothing stopping you placing a factory order for a car, like the dealer has done or taken delivery of cars that was not allocated but was produced to fill the the production line. Also we don’t know how long ago they ordered the cars and have been waiting for them to arrive, or when they will get more. So it’s not really a surpise to me that they won’t, many are not right now.
I do get that for scheme users it’s unfortunate that the times we in with limited stocks and over demand many are doing this as it makes economic sense for them to do so and are not obliged to sell cars they have bought themselves to scheme users at the price set by the manufactor, unless the decide they want to.
like some do and even offer reductions in ap, although they are very limited right now.
Was they to say you cannot place a factory order but would let a retail customers then that would be discrimination and is one of the many reason why some manufacturers imo are currently not on the scheme at all.