If you own a car recalled for the ignition problem, GM will let you buy most GM product at employee prices. The only Chevrolet vehicles you can’t buy at employee prices are the Camaro Z-28 and the Spark EV, for instance. A 2014 Impala LS without options has an MSRP of $27,670. The employee cost is $25,843; Invoice with delivery charges is $26,421. Just an example. If you happen to own a Cobalt, even one built after they stopped using the faulty ignition switches, you still qualify for the program. We own 2 Cobalts from 2009 and 2010 model years. One of my daughters will look at the Cruze and Malibu since she is in the market for a car. Buying a car for almost $600 under invoice plus incentives on top of that is a pretty good deal, and there is no dickering. I think it is a good idea, even though many of today’s owners can’t take advantage of it.
You don’t honestly think they’re not going to make a few grand on these cars, do you?
Besides, I would not want to buy another car from a manufacturer that knowingly and with forethought delivered mine and thousands of others with a serious safety problem. And for them to pretend they’re giving me a special deal by “allowing” me to buy another car from them for an “employee price” is, well, insulting!
Sorry Jt, I think it’s a scam.
Buying a car for almost $600 under invoice plus incentives on top of that is a pretty good deal, and there is no dickering.
I bought a new Toyota Highlander a couple months ago for $700 UNDER invoice.
Where’s the special savings GM is offering?
I too generally buy my vehicles for hundreds of dollars under invoice. The trick is that the invoice price is not even near the actual price the dealer ends up paying. That gets highly discounted through discounts, accounting sleight-of-hand, and dealer incentives that never get printed on the invoice. And, frankly, I know I’ve never paid less than the dealer did, and I have no problem with a dealer making a fair profit.
All GM is offering IMHO is another sales scheme. You paid for a good car, you should get a good car without having to buy yet another. If you have two years paid on a five year loan and have to take yet another five year loan out and buy yet another new car to get a safe one, which you should have gotten the first time, how have you saved money? And does that really make sense? What if three years later GM admits that the new new car they sold you is unsafe and they knew it… will you then have to take out yet another loan on yet another new car to get a safe one?
That’s all?! A measly $1827 is the discount they give to their employees? That stinks if you ask me. I used to work at a place that offered all their employees and immediate family the opportunity to buy cars through their volume discount plan at local dealerships. The price we paid was set at $100 over the dealer cost. No haggling. I bought a brand new Grand Marquis for my dad. The sales manager handled the transaction since there was no commission involved. It was well over $5000 off the MSRP…
Obviously, the dealership was still making money with dealer holdbacks and so on. So the idea that they would offer such a stingy deal not only to their employees but to attempt to entice people to upgrade is astounding to me. $2000 off the inflated MSRP?! Get lost.
“We sold you a POS deathtrap that we knew was faulty. In apology, you may now give us slightly under MSRP for another car that may or may not be a POS deathtrap.”
Sorry if that sounds harsh, but GM (and others for that matter) has pulled this “let’s not fix the potentially deadly problem because it will cost too much” crap before. I don’t really see “Gimme another 25-40 grand for another car” as an apology. More like a marketing ploy to sell cars.
That is precisely all I got for the fuel tank…uh-hem…’‘recall’’ years back.
They weren’t going to FIX anything ! Just sell you a new truck at a …’'discount ? ‘’
Employee pricing my ash !
They should be buying the dang car or at least half and eating a great deal of the cost…NOT still profiting from the sales of replacement vehicles .
My late uncle was a retired GM executive (Pontiac) and I believe his discount was in excess of $700 per vehicle. I checked with my aunt and she said it was around 20% but that seems way high to me. Does anyone know what the real discount is for GM retirees? I’m just curious. I know they give a discount to military veterans and retirees but I don’t have that number either because I don’t buy new vehicles anymore. I’ve had major problems with Ford, GM and Dodge but I would never buy a new vehicle on a plan like this. No thanks. BTW…I’m not loyal to any one brand and will never be. There are some that I will never purchase though and they are mostly European brands.
Rebates are included, too, on vehicles that have them. So it’s often more than $600.
Mountainbike, you’ll never buy another Toyota, will you? They not only stole their hybrid technology, they sold millions of cars with defective acceleration systems, and may not have solved all the problems yet. They paid $1.4 billion to stop the criminal trial filed against them.
“They not only stole their hybrid technology…”
Here’s a good take on the origins of the Prius hybrid system:
The only real difference I can see is that the Prius drives the planet carrier with the I/C motor (vs. electrically in the patent) and the Prius drives the sun gear electrically (vs. with the I/C motor in the patent).
My brother had a GMC pickup truck that had the fuel tank mounted outside the frame rails. General Motors offered to give a bonus on a trade-in so that GM could buy the GMC and Chevrolet trucks back and get them off the road. When my brother ran the numbers, he wasn’t getting a good deal at all. He held onto his GMC for a number of years after that until he found an F-150 at a good price, and sold the GMC to the son of a neighbor.
Now, I’m not sure how unsafe these Chevrolet and GMC trucks really were. I had a 1950 Chevrolet pickup truck and the gas tank was in the cab right behind the seat. Many pickup trucks in this time period had the gas tank in the cab. The one exception was the Studebaker pickup truck that mounted the gas tank under the truck.
GM does not ask the buyer to trade their car in. It is a straight up sale if that is what the buyer wants.
I ve had the opportunity to buy old trucks, in good shape, with the gas tank in the cab. I could not talk myself into it. just too risky in my opinion
Jt, since you’ve singled me out personally to respond to, let me say I’ll never buy another Toyota. I’ll never have to. Because the one I own is going to run reliably for me for the rest of my life. I just had mine state inspected this morning and the mechanic even came out to tell me that he was amazed at the excellent condition of the car.
I myself spent time yesterday under a friend’s high-mileage 2002 Corolla repairing an exhaust joint, and hers was in great shape too. The only problem was a bolt holding the V-clamp between the header pipe and the cat converter had rotted through and the clamp came loose, causing an exhaust leak. A new “doughnut” in the joint, a new clamp, and the car was back in great shape. And she didn’t even have to buy a new car at an “employee discount”!
Try one and you may suddenly realize that never having to be hoodwinked by the type of offer you’re posting about is far, far better than having to decide whether to accept it or not. If you insist on being in love with GM no matter what they do, all I can say is “may God have mercy on your soul”.
Happy motoring.
PostScript… if they stole hybrid technology, they apparently stole it… and made it successful… from someone who was incapable of themselves making it successful. Who’d they allegedly steal it from again?
This GM employee pricing program to drum up sales proves one thing . . .
GM has not changed
This is the same kind of thing GM did BEFORE Mary Barra was CEO
This employee pricing is just another attempt to get on our good side, and hopefully we’ll forgive and forget
Chrysler started the employee pricing thing as I recall a few years ago. Their quality has been poor for years.
And I like all the Toyota apoplgists bad mouthing GM. It’s good fun. And I didn’t say GM did nothing wrong, just that they are trying to provide an out for some people that own the cars with the ignition problem that still own them and don’t want to drive them. Of course it is marketing. They are allowed to market their product aren’t they?
I own a 2005 Accord with 126,000 miles on it and have not had a single repair; only maintenance. Maybe I would be a Honda apologist if they stole hybrid technology, tried to cover up their problems, or did something else worthy of a civil or criminal suit.
And I like all the Toyota apoplgists bad mouthing GM. It's good fun. And I didn't say GM did nothing wrong, just that they are trying to provide an out for some people that own the cars with the ignition problem that still own them and don't want to drive them. Of course it is marketing. They are allowed to market their product aren't they?
WOW…Have you actually READ the comments…How the heck did you come interrupt the posts that way??
We have every right to bash GM for this marketing gimmick. No one has is making any apologist remarks for Toyota or Honda. Why do you say they have.
This whole GM problem just goes to show they have haven’t changed. Sure Toyota and Honda have had problems…but NOTHING like GM. And what GM is doing makes me believe that they just don’t get it…and possibly never will. Our good hard tax dollars LOST.
ford is looking pretty good right now
Jt, nobody here is apologizing for Toyota or bashing GM. The “opportunity” that you started this thread with is IMHO a scam designed to pretend to be nice to those who bought a GM with the ignition switch problem while actually selling them another new car. That’s all we’re saying. It was you singling out me for my criticism of this GM policy that brought Toyota into the conversation. I only responded.
Relax, Jt. You posted a GM “opportunity” that the majority think is only another sales scam. Nothing more, nothing less. It ain’t personal. Besides, Mike’s right, we have every right to “bash” GM for this policy. They’re “hoodwinking” their customers again.
Hey, you’re the one that proudly announced the GM policy to the forum. You gotta be willing to take the “hits” from those that disagree. If you can’t take the heat… don’t publish the post!
It seems to me that what the other car companies have or haven’t done is immaterial. This discussion is about GM, its lousy, dangerous product, the coverup of that product, and its ham-handed attempt to look like the good guy in its reaction to being caught, when in fact it’s just another crass money grab by a company that knowingly, secretly, again, put dangerous vehicles on the road rather than fix the design flaw properly.
Whether Toyota did the same thing or not doesn’t make what GM did any more excusable. That line of reasoning strikes me as sounding like a man on trial for murder saying “Yeah, I killed the SOB, but Steve Avery killed that girl and since he did it it shouldn’t be wrong for me to do it!”