Here's how to get an early delivery for popular newly-launched cars

Try to book the car in a group or assure the salesman of more bookings of the car from friends and colleagues in case they are able to provide early delivery.

BHPian drsachin recently shared this with other enthusiasts:

My last experience with hyryder tought me how to deal with dealers. If you want the delivery of car early for a newly launched car in great demand and you are not among the early bird bookers who have booked immediately after bookings open , you need to be smart and follow certain tricks.

1. Always book with atleast two dealers. For example use first dealer to book the variant and colour of choice. Be flexible with the second dealer with regards to both. Keep visiting both the dealers and engage with sales executives to judge the number the number of deliveries they are doing everyday( For unknown reasons some dealers manage to get better inventory than others)

2. Use the booking time to look for a decent bank for loan disposal. Engage with atleast 2-3 banks and negotiate for cheapest interest rates. And ask them to provide pre approved loan letter. In my case I managed to get pre-approved loan from both IDBI and PNB bank. IDBI at 9% and PNB at 8.75% green EV car loan. Presently even government banks are very aggressive with loan disposal. Always engage with banks who are ready for loan disposal in just 2-3 hour or at max 1 day after pre approval. Most banks would be ready to send lower staff to your work place even at far of distance to complete paper work( Dealers are happy for early deliveries to buyers who have ready arrangements for finances).

3. Take adequate number of test drives and check cars both on bright Sunny day and in the night. Some colours such as T green and black look good in day light and white look good in night. I was dead against black as I consider it a safety hazard at night time specially on streets with poor light and secondly a study was published some time back that black colour consumes almost 30% more fuel in summer time. Buying an EV in black colour is extremely stupid decision when you are already struggling with range anxiety. (These things will help in making informed decisions in a quick time when dealer inform about availability of different colour/variant then then one you booked).

4. Although doing PDI before making final payment is advisable. But in newly launched cars with great demand chances of PDI failure is low, so you can take a risk of making payment immediately on allotment while the car is in transit. Most dealers now a days want payment and Invoicing when the car is in transit itself so that they are assured that new car can be delivered immediately on arrival to the stockyard. You can still do PDI when the car arrives at the showroom. Ask the dealer to allow PDI immediately on arrival to stockyard before the dealer PDI so that you may check the car while it's stickers are still on. You can still refuse delivery in case the PDI fails as long as car is not registered. Invoicing while the car in transit actually helps you too as is explained in next point.

5. Have a good rapport with the salesman and never engage with stupid talks of "Expensive insurance" or "Not buying ceramic coating/PPF/accessories" before the car allotment. Once the car is allotted to you and invoiced the dealer cannot refuse delivery to you. At this stage you can now negotiate for insurance/ceramic coating or deny it altogether. Of cource at the time of invoicing make payment only towards the car and accessories that you are sure you are buying and make the payment of insurance and other stuff only at the time of delivery. Anyway most dealers will not ask for insurance payment before delivery as the insurance prices keep fluctuating.

6. Try to book the car in a group or assure the salesman of more bookings of the car from friends and colleagues in case they are able to provide early delivery( Salesman personal incentives depends on booking targets they have achieved).

7. Booking time can also be utilised to look for insurance quotes from outside direct with insurance company and their agents. Try to look for insurance quotes from companies which have tie-ups for cashless claims with the car manufacturer in question. For example Toyota dealers don' t have easy settlement of cashless claims from "Tata AIG".

In case of Hyryder, I had booked the car almost two months after the booking started. At this time I was told that I will be getting delivery a good 6 months after my booking by most of the dealers of the area. The car was in great demand at that time. I had booked in red colour with black roof in "G Variant " as it offered most value for money. Kept checking with both the dealers that I had booked. Kept pressuring both in a nice way. Do visit physically every week. One fine day within a month of Booking while I visited one of the dealer. The salesman immediately came up and said that they can allot a blue car with black roof in top "V Variant" which is in transit. New prices were announced and there was going to be price rise after just 1 week. So either I agree to top variant at launch prices. Or I buy " G Variant" in increased prices( Almost 50000) whenever it's available. Suddenly the difference between top and mid variant for my case is now just 50000 from original 1 lakh. So now Top variant seems more value for money. I agreed and transfered money to dealers account.

When the car arrived at the showroom I did the PDI and then started negotiated for the insurance. Quoted price originally was Rs75000 for Rs 19.19 lakh car. Dealer came down to Rs 55000/. I finally bought insurance from own agent who provided insurance from Reliance including all the addons which dealer was providing @ Rs 41000. I even convinced dealer to provide me free Accessories worth Rs 8500/( 3D Floor mats, Dicky mat, mud flaps). Free Accessories with newly launched high demand car, good na ha ha . I also bought few more accessories at this stage worth Rs 8000.

Now in case if Windsor. I had a test drive at dealer "X" in 6th November. Booked white colour in exclusive variant. Dealer suggested that white colour and mid variant I might get early delivery. I kept checking with the dealer for almost 25 days. Realising that dealer is not getting much allotment.

I enquired from another dealer "Y" who seemed to get more allotments. By this time MG had announced price raise from January onwards by almost 3-6%. I booked at the second dealer on 10th December who suggested to book " white colour in essence top variant for early delivery. He assured 99% chances of delivery before price rise.

I kept following with both dealers. On 29th december I got a call from dealer Y that a green colour Essence variant is cancelled by a customer so they can allot it to me. My family immediately rushed to the dealer, who suggested that they can allot me this car only if I can ask bank to disburse loan within a day. Of course I had pre approved loan so this was not an issue. My banker ( PNB) completed all the formalities even on Sunday and were ready to dispense loan amount next day after my green signal. I wanted to do PDI before loan amount is dispensed. But next I was told that the original buyer has now agreed to take delivery and already transferred money to dealers account in the night itself. But he checked that they have a excess number of T Green cars in transit one of which they can allot to me. But for launch price and free 1 year charging offer I had to get invoicing done before 31st December itself. I agreed and gave a green signal to banker to transfer amount immediately. In next 1 hour the amount was transferred and car was invoiced on 30th December.

Now when the car arrived at the showroom, i again decided to get insurance from outside instead of the dealer. The quoted price from dealer was Rs 75000 from Digit company. I managed to get insurance directly from Royal Sundaram, a better company, and this included more addons than what dealer was providing( Unlimited cashless, RTI including registration, Battery protect which covers all aspects of electric vehicle, consumables, keys,tyres and numerous others) @ 54000/.

The car arrived on 6th January, i did the PDI while it still had fresh stickers all around, got the insurance done. No free Accessories this time. Purchased accessories worth Rs23000 from dealer at this stage. I got the delivery on 9th January at launch prices and with free charging offer. No bribes to the dealer.

Now to the question which others have asked. Do MG dealers jump queues for some customers. No they don't they are quite fair in their allotment. I can say this for sure is because I received a call from dealer X two days back on 16th January 2025 that the car which I have booked on 10th November is allotted to me and it's in transit. I smiled and asked him to cancel it now that I have received delivery from other dealer in Noida. He immediately suggested that it must be T Green in Top variant as the other dealer of the area has received excess green stock in top variant more than they have actually received bookings for. Since last two days he is pressurizing me to send official cancellation confirmation through WhatsApp so that they may allot it to next in que. They can't allot it to anyone before my official cancellation message.

So this confirms that the MG dealers dont jump the que. But yes there is one area where they have some leverage to play around. That's the area of cancellations and when some dealer receives excess stock of a particular variant or colour. This is where good rapport with salesman helps.

By the way T green is a brilliant colour which looks great in day time. This is the colour that i always wanted.

Hopes this detailed post helps. Thanks.

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