A day in the life of a Car Dealer

Arthur Daley is what comes to mind for most people when thinking about Car Dealers, but thankfully its not as exciting as his dealings.

Lets take you through a day in the life of Aghalee Vehicle Services.

Today should be busy, we are completing two sales started earlier in the week, and we have a few potential customers calling out to us. Its first of the tax month so we're hoping to see a few drop ins as well.

10am - Our two completed sales are already valeted and ready for customer collection, a Citroen Berlingo and a Peugeot Partner. All paperwork is printed and ready for signing.

10.30am - first of the booked appointments has arrived, a gentleman from Lisburn who is interested in one of our used Berlingos - we have a good selection with various years and mileages in at the moment, and we have had plenty of interest in them all.

11am - Our Berlingo customer appears with his trade in, and after a few signatures on his invoice and Terms & Conditions, he is good to go.

11.30am - Lets get stuck into cleaning this trade in - its in really good condition, and thankfully doesn't need much. But we do give all our vehicles a shampoo and a full interior valet to ensure they look their best. We will get this vehicle into our garage for a once over and a service, and should have it up for sale sometime next week. Every vehicle that comes through our doors gets a service and tyre check - we want our customers to receive an excellent quality vehicle.

12.30pm - Second of our Sales customers is here and collects his Peugeot Partner - this was a finance deal and so all the paperwork has already been processed, so its a short visit before he's back on his way in his new van.

1pm - We have a drop in interested in the Mercedes jeep, quick test drive and he's happy enough. Going home to check insurance, looks promising!

1.30pm- Onto the website and social media pages to remove the sold vehicles and update our stock list - a quick look at the insights on each vehicle, and it seems customers from Craigavon are very interested in the two wee used Renault Kangoos - cheap van for someone just starting out maybe??

2.15pm - Back in the yard after a short lunch and its straight onto the Auctions to see about replacing our recently sold vehicles. Small vans are very much in demand at the moment, so we like to keep a good and varied selection in stock to suit all customer preferences and budgets. I've bookmarked a 2021 Berlingo, and a few different Peugeot Partners that are going through later auctions and hopefully will be successful.

2.45pm - Three different tradesmen from Newry, Antrim and up the road in Lurgan have arrived all at once to see our Ford Transit Custom - we've dropped the price on this simply to make room for the smaller Berlingos and Partners that seem to be more in vogue at the moment.

3.30pm - Put a finance application through for the Ford Transit Custom - a recent court judgement has put a hold on these lately, but thankfully most companies are back and running again.

4pm - Bit of admin - sent reminders to all our booked valets for tomorrow, applied for a replacement V5C form for a VW Caddy

4.15pm - Another few drop ins - we are in a great position here, situated less than 10 mins from the Motorway and on the main road from Lurgan to Crumlin/Moira, so we do get a good amount of passing traffic. Again its the Citroen Berlingos that are proving popular, though both the Vauxhall Combos have plenty of interest too.

5pm - Last of the test drives returns and this one puts a deposit down on a used Berlingo - heading to its new home in Armagh, plus the Mercedes customer from earlier calls back to confirm he's taking it- a good end to a busy day!!