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The nightshade blue looks exactly like the photo’s in one light and more green in another. It’s very metallic.
Any chance you could post some photos Tim? I absolutely love the colour as depicted in the brochures, but those I’ve seen photos of so far (two different ones on Autotrader, both with multiple photos from different angles) bear no resemblance to it whatsoever. I’m struggling to think that even in sunlight it would change to be like the brochure, but I’d love to be proved wrong.
I’d be pretty miffed if they extended everyone’s leases for 6 months just because we are in lockdown for one month! I should think that for every person for whom that’s good news there would be ten for whom it would be bad news. Extending your lease though your own choice is fair enough (and very easy to do) but unless we go back to a full blown prolonged lockdown (like the one we had in the Spring) then I fully expect Motability to honour the contract that we entered into and change the car at 3 years.
Funnily enough, I had to call the AA out to my daughters 2015 Ford Focus for the same reason. She only uses it once every few weeks now and it has the original battery. The car has stop start technology (although never used) and, as a result, a replacement battery would be £264. Ouch. On my other daughters previous Focus (without stop start technology) the new battery was just £120. The chap said that the original battery is still OK if used regularly and if we bought a new one we would have the same problem in 6 months time. Of course, it’s all progress ?
Welcome Glos Guy, the colour is most likely their new green just photo shopped, when dealers reopen I’ll be having a look at the new Tiguan and compare it to the new 5008 before we decide on our next car
I think you are probably correct about the photoshopping as the only other explanation would be that it’s a colour that hasn’t been released in the U.K. yet but, either way, it seems very foolish to do that. Anybody ordering a Nightshade Blue car thinking that it will look remotely like the colour in the brochures is going to be massively disappointed. From the photos I have seen it’s not even close.
Thanks Rox. I agree that test drives are the best way, but it’s just not that practical at present. I think I could get away with it in a few months time (as we can order from the end of March) but for now I’m just keen to hear how those who are currently running our shortlisted cars are finding them, especially if they are wheelchair users.
I know that, without doubt, the 3 Series Touring will be the best car for me out of my shortlist and the others don’t even come close to it IMO, but if my wife struggles to get in and out of it then it will have to be eliminated, hence why I have four SUV’s on the list.
I agree with your comments about colours on the Tiguan. That’s why we chose grey as it makes the plastic skirts invisible. The R-Line looks stunning in white but white on other Tiguans makes them look like the bargain basement models due to the grey plastic – even on the SEL. As for value, I would agree that the new R-Line is now very poor value compared to the Elegance, but if the 2.0TSi 190PS Elegance 4WD Auto turns out to be £2,499 (as predicted) then that’s an awful lot of car for the money. I added quite a few options on our 2018 SEL that are now standard on the new Elegance (but not on the R-Line). If the 3 Series doesn’t work for my wife I can see us getting this but, as I said previously, as a car lover who has owned dozens of nice cars and driven hundreds of different cars of most makes and models, the Tiguan just does nothing for me!
Thanks Brydo. Although I haven’t posted for ages I still look at the site from time to time as it remains by far the best place to get news, information and deals on the Motability scheme IMO . My wife’s motability car renews at the end of Q1 (if we renew) and therefore I shall be looking more often. In fact, I’m going to start a thread on that, as I could do with some advice from the knowledgeable and friendly posters on here. What did you end up doing? Last I recall you were extending the lease on a Volvo XC60 but were considering a Mazda CX-5 and then even a Tiguan, although I know you weren’t initially keen on them.
Even if a car has done 60k after 3 years, Motability will not take the car off you and leave you immobile, even if your new car is delayed by several months after your current lease expires.
As I say, the only time mileage is considered is if you don’t want to order a new car and prefer to extend the lease on your current car by 1 or 2 years.
To confirm, the 3 years contract starts from day of delivery and not when the previous lease expires, so it’s always 3 years. Motability will always let you extend the lease of your current car if your next one is delayed. The mileage only becomes an issue if you want to delay ordering a new car and extend the lease on your old one.
As mentioned, Auto Headlights won’t solve the problem as they have to be set to Auto and lots of drivers turn them off!
I would also encourage others to write with their own words and points. From my experience, when people get bombarded with copied letters it tends to irritate the recipient rather than achieve a constructive outcome.
Oh dear. Here we go again.
I have been sad enough to watch the full 6 hours or so of the Parliamentary Select Committees sessions on Motability and it does nothing for my blood pressure. In summary;
The MP’s still don’t get that disabled drivers pay for the entire cost of the lease (more, in fact – see 2nd point) through sacriced PIP (circa £9k over 3 years), plus AP plus cost of options. Frank Field and others (John Mann being the worst) still keep banging on about the cars being funded by tax payers money. Many of the MP’s questions demonstrate that they simply do not understand how the scheme works, yet talk (incorrectly) as though they do.
Motability customers pay, on average, £1k more than the actual cost to Motability Operations of the cost of each vehicle lease. This has barely been mentioned and should, in my view, be the focus of how customers should be provided with better values through lower AP’s.
Brydo makes a very good point that the benefits of every single Motability Operations employee is excessive in the extreme and way out of step with the commercial world these days, let alone the third sector, and all of this is paid for by disabled drivers. This wasn’t mentioned once. All they focused on was the CEO’s salary.
The final point, and one of the most concerning, is how out of touch Lord Sterling (Motability Chairman) is and how appallingly he comes across. The guy was great when he was in his prime running P&O, but is 20 years past his sell by date and comes across as a doddery old fool who holds Motability Operations to no account whatsoever. The relationship between the charity (Motability) and the commercial business (Motability Operations) is cosy beyond belief and the latter is simply not held to account by the former. Until this is fixed (and I have no confidence that it will be under Lord Sterling’s tenure) there will be nothing more than tweaks, not the wholesale reform that is so desperately needed.
I would echo that, as far as I know, head room in the front and rear of the Tiguan and Allspace are identical. They certainly seemed identical to me when I sat in them side by side and as they are the same car with one just stretched a little I cannot see that they would be different. I am 6ft 2 and with the drivers seat set for me I can sit behind with tons of leg room. Like Philjb I would imagine that someone had been playing with the seats as the rear ones roll forward and back by quite a bit. We would have appreciated the extra boot space of the Allspace but, unlike the standard Tiguan, the load floor is quite a mess with the 3rd row seats (which we would never use) folded as they don’t sit flush and I would have found that a complete pain getting the wheelchair in. Also, the Allspace was only available in SE Nav (now Match) trim and I really hate the front of those models as the dreadful standard headlights ruin the look of the car IMO, plus there is a vast improvement in standard kit when you get an SEL or R-Line.
JS – I think that the two year thing is exclusive to VW’s. I would think that your Hyundai should be fine for a 12 month service. During PDI checks, new VW’s are configured to one of two servicing regimes. One (which they tend to set for private customers) requires a service after a year, the other (which Motability insists on) doesn’t require a service visit until 2 years. I only know this from having our last Tiguan set (in error) to the annual service and booking it in only to be told on the day that they couldn’t service it for another year! When I took the new Tiguan in for its first AdBlue top up recently (the car is 6 months old) they told me that it won’t have its first service until 2020! I much prefer the ‘variable servicing’ on BMW’s that tells you (via iDrive) when inspections, oil changes, front and rear brake pads etc are all due and recalculates the dates / mileage based on your usage and component wear. Very clever.
Re Tiguans, Motability only permit the extended servicing (every 2 years). Our last one was configured for annual servicing (in error) and when it went in for a service Motability refused to do it, so it was a wasted journey. The new model we have now is the same. Won’t go in for a service (or even oil change) for 2 years. Seems wrong to me.
Heaven forbid that Motabilty drivers should be allowed a free choice. As you should know by now, you can’t have what you want, only what you are allowed. So, add brand discrimination to the unwarranted price caps!
I think that Brydo makes an excellent point. JLR are indeed shedding jobs citing (primarily) the drop in sales of diesel and major problems with the (ginormous) China market, yet many Motability customers would find their cars (SUV’s in particular) ideal for their needs.
It was only a year or so ago that many of us got excited to see JLR adverts for the Range Rover Evoque joining the scheme, only to find out that Motability then changed the criteria for inclusion on the scheme and the car never appeared. In this instance, it was Motability who stopped the car joining the scheme, not JLR (see first post in this thread). Personally I would have had some reservations about getting an Evoque (having test driven one at length on two ocassions and being underwhelmed with it) but I was hoping that the Discovery Sport might make an appearance as it’s in the same price range.
As an aside, even though we live almost 100 miles from the nearest JLR factory, they use the M5 here to test their new cars when in development and I have often seen heavily disguised cars on test runs, usually first thing in the morning to avoid the ‘snappers’. A month or two ago I saw a small SUV on test. It was covered in the black and white masking tape so difficult to see what it might be, but I would put my money on it being an even smalller Jaguar SUV than the two models currently on the market. I’m sure that would be a popular vehicle on Motability!
YJIM – I’m not sure that I understand your question, but if you mean that the description for leather trim (which is stupidly expensive, but does include a power drivers seat with 3 position memory, which is configurable to different keys / driver profiles etc) also mentions, for example, the fact that the seats are heated (which they are anyway on the SEL and R-Line Tech with cloth trim), then no, you don’t get any money off. It’s called marketing spin and many manufacturers are guilty of it!
I am pleased to say that we have never come across the aggression or malicious damage issues that others have described when parked in disabled bays, which is a relief as we have no choice but to use them, as I need the space at the side of the car to get the wheelchair alongside in order to get my wife out of the car. In fact, we have been known to have to abort a visit to some locations when no disabled spaces are available – a problem which I suspect will occur more often with the expansion in eligibility criteria for blue badges which undoubtedly will not be accompanied by a comparative increase in the number of disabled spaces.
What does concern me when I do park in disabled bays is the appalling standard of driving (and particularly manoeuvring) of many elderly drivers who may have received a blue badge due to conditions that come with old age, rather than lifelong disability. I’m afraid that my elderly father fits that category. As he has aged, his spatial awareness, speed of reaction, flexibility to turn around to judge around the vehicle etc etc have all deteriorated significantly and he can make a hash of the most simple parking manoeuvre.
It makes my nerves bad when these folk arrive next to me, especially if we are in one of those poorly marked disabled bays without the full criss-cross markings between spaces. At the doctors recently an old lady arrived in the space alongside us at such speed I was amazed that she managed to stop and as she alighted I noticed that all four corners of her car were badly dented. Needless to say I was extremely relieved that we left the car park before her.
Discount on optional extras is usually quite possible to achieve. When we ordered our Tiguan from Marshall’s we got £500 off the AP plus around £100 off the optional extras – but we did spend £2,800 on extras, so it wasn’t much of a percentage.
When I reflected on it afterwards, given the total outlay (AP plus options), I think I could have negotiated £600 off at a local VW dealer and saved the trek to Oxford (as I had got 10% off previously), but neither of the two VW dealers closer to where I live deserve our business so I didn’t want to go to them on principle!
Prices always relate to manufacturers on the road prices. Actual prices that you can achieve yourself from dealers or brokers have no relevance whatsoever although you are of course correct that Motabilty Operations will get significant discounts from manufacturers due to being the biggest fleet operator in the U.K. probably in the region of 20-35%, with the majority being at the higher end of that scale.
The price caps that Trev mentions in his first post above apply to the entry level model for any car that appears on the scheme BUT once a car qualifies, other models of the same car can appear up to £35k (auto) and sometimes just above, allegedly only if they have extra features that disabled drivers would find useful (this is in fact nonsense, as they allow virtually all cars of the same model range up to the £35k, but we won’t complain about that) . I did explain this in detail when it was first launched in response to many questions like this, but I can’t find it – so I will explain using two fictitious cars. First of all, VAT is irrelevant. All Motability cars are VAT exempt but the caps refer to regular on the road prices inc VAT.
Car A. The entry level model (let’s call it the S) is £28k manual and £30k Auto. It therefore qualifies to be on the scheme as a qualifying car. As it qualifies, the SE and SEL models, which go up to £35k can be included.
Car B. The entry level model S is £29.5k manual and £31k. In this case, it matters not a jot that this model and the SE both fall under £35k, NONE of the models of this car can appear as the entry level (the ‘qualifying car’) is above the price cap.
Does it make sense? Of course not, but it’s to satisfy the Daily Mail etc so that Motability can quote a price cap and say that the only cars that are above this price are on the list because they have extra features that are useful to disabled drivers, which is not true but helps dilute the criticism rather than, as they should do, tackle it head on and explain that Motability customers pay the FULL cost of the lease (plus £1k per car on average – although they deny it) through sacrificed PIP and AP.
I’ve made a small donation to help Trev (one of our great moderators) on his way and encourage others on this fantastic forum to do the same.
Trev – read your story on the site – truly inspirational. I wish you all the best.
Just checked and you are quite right. A few weeks ago the 2.0i X drive disappeared off the BMW X1 price lists (not just Motability, but the official BMW documents) and was replaced with an S drive model, which was previously unavailable. Now both appear. Very confusing. Pleased to hear that you are getting the 4WD version. If I’d ordered one I’d have been pretty hacked off getting a 2WD.
Out of interest, have those of you that have ordered a 2.0 petrol X1 recently been assured that you are still getting the now discontinued 4WD version or the new version which is only available in 2 wheel drive?
Forgive my ignorance, but what’s an AR1 form? Is it a regular PIP renewal or something resulting from the latest legal challenge?
My approach with PIP matters is to provide as much information as you possibly can and challenge if you don’t agree with the result.
I spent over a week of evenings working on my wife’s PIP application when she moved over from DLA. She was awarded high level on both aspects (quite rightly) but only for 3 years. Many people would be happy with that, but I submitted a mandatory reconsideration in response, asking what medical evidence they were using that might indicate that her condition (which is incurable and progressive) would be any better in 3 years time when at best it would be the same and most likely she would be worse. Within a few weeks she had received a revised PIP award with no end date and an ‘earliest possible review’ in 10 years time. We didn’t even have to go to appeal.
