Cup 430 price in Europe

[CRM82]

I did some math to compare net price of Cup 430 without optionals in UK, Germany, and Switzerland. 

UK £99,800, without VAT £82,500

Germany €127,500, without vat €107,142, in GBP £94,000

Switzerland CHF 146,000, without VAT CHF 135,561, in GBP 102.310

To make the conversion I took the rates at end of November 2017, that as you can see below are not far from those of today.

On end of November
Euro GBP 1.14
CHF GBP 1.325

Today
GBP Euro 1.14
GBP CHF 1.337

As you can see in Germany it costs £12k more, in Switzerland £20k. This is quite ridiculous in my opinion... do you understand why there is such difference between UK and EU?

Would it be possible to get a LHD Lotus from a UK dealer? Maybe that's the way to go...

Anyway, I will stay with my 380 Cup for now.. but I don't like to pay more than what it actually costs.

[BAS]

Usually there is a difference in pricing even when you compare prices for Porsche for example (play around with the configurator for UK and Europe). Not sure how big of a difference it is though.

Edited March 25, 2018 by BAS

[Bravo73]

44 minutes ago, Cristiano said:

Would it be possible to get a LHD Lotus from a UK dealer? Maybe that's the way to go...

It should be. Under European law, you should be able to order any European model from any European dealer. When the exchange rate was the other way around, lots of UK car buyers ordered RHD cars from Continental dealers. 

However, you might find that a UK dealer very resistant to the idea because they won’t want to jeopardise their relationship with the factory. 

@Trevleg might be worth contacting. He recently bought a LHD GT430 on UK plates. 

[BAS]

When I initially wanted to order the 380 Cup I started shopping around and emailed a UK dealer and asked them if I can order a LHD version and export to Kuwait. The answer was yes and they said it would cost an additional £1500 to do that though. Even with that it was way cheaper. 

I ended up getting it from my dealer after negotiating. From my experience you can do it as I've been told. Though you would have to pay for the VAT and then claim it back. Another thing is that you would have to take care of shipping on your own. I guess they didn't want to implicate themselves with selling to a region they are not authorised to.

[CRM82]

1500 for LHD could be OK (assuming they also fix the light so to be OK with LHD country regulations).

In general, I am OK to buy in my country at say £2-3k more on a 100k car, but £20K is just ridiculous...

Consider that the dealer also earn a lot on the net price, so it is really not necessary to increase the price so much.

[NANO]

It will be necessary to add 7.6% - 8% of the CH's VAT, customs clearance, transportation, preparation and testing / matriculation ... it is clear and I am FULLY AGREEING WITH YOU that you will be, even with all this, under the £ 20K

[CRM82]

7 hours ago, NANO said:

It will be necessary to add 7.6% - 8% of the CH's VAT, customs clearance, transportation, preparation and testing / matriculation ... it is clear and I am FULLY AGREEING WITH YOU that you will be, even with all this, under the £ 20K

Note that I compared NET prices, to make it fair. VAT is a tax and goes to the specific country.

For transportation: UK-CH is around 1000 miles... Good to break-in the car - then first service and you are ready to go!

Also, I am pro to buy cars in local country to help economy and dealers BUT, £20k is by far above that threshold... Think about it: cars come fully made, what work they have to do apart from putting an order in the system and a bit of chatting.. again 3-4% of profit on top of the UK price I can understand 8n CH, but 25% NO.

Edited March 26, 2018 by Cristiano

[Guest]

The Uk price is just ridiculous for an exige.

The UE price is crazy madness.

 

 

[Swiss380Cup]

For Switzerland you have to factor in the CO2 tax on vehicles which can be quite expensive

[CRM82]

True, but dealers practically do not pay it, as they average over many cars with lower CO2, so it does not justify the official price.

For a private it can be expensive, but you can get on lists with other privates to get a very big reduction.

[Swiss380Cup]

You're right, averaging is ok for larger importers but for smaller operations it can be tricky especially if you specialize in high end sports cars... but the price of cars and a lot of other products in our country has always been a rip off due to the control of some exclusive distributors which try at all cost to protect their monopoly.... long story...

[CRM82]

Fully agree.. AMAG is the first one in my black list.

But I think it is important to talk about this. You know: if we don't even protest about a problem, how can we expect that it gets solved! For instance, Lotus should consider that would sell many more cars here, if the price were aligned to UK (with a small plus - understandable).

[Swiss380Cup]

You're right, a few years back when I was still into Porsches, I had an issued with FVD Brombacher which forbid you to buy Porsche parts directly from their german site and redirected you immediately to the swiss site with higher prices. I announced this case to the WEKO, but they told me that they didn't have any legal ground to do something about it..... it's a group internal policy and doesn't come under the jurisdiction of the cartel legislation..... groups can do whatever they want without problems, especially having price differences between markets.....  the only way is to import cars directly and you get back to the initial discussion we had. At least some more prominent manufacturers did something with extended warranty or "free" options.... this was done, because as major brands everybody was talking about it, ..... Lotus selling few cars in Switzerland there's not much chance that they will do something about it, but go after our wallets.....

Here's an excerpt (unfortunately in french...) of the answer I got from Weko. They're really reactive and take seriously any queries or questions you have..

"Pour revenir à votre question, FVD-Brombacher GmbH et FVD- Technik GmbH sont, avec toute vraisemblance, deux entreprises économiquement liées. C’est-à-dire, elles font partie du même groupe d’entreprise. Or, la décision de ne pas donner la possibilité à un client suisse de s’adresser au site étranger et vice-versa est une décision intégralement inhérente à une stratégie du groupe. Dans une situation pareille, le secrétariat de la Commission de la concurrence n’a pas la compétence pour agir car les conditions légales ne sont pas remplies."

[CRM82]

Sad story...  

I don't know this Brombacher (is for tuning or original parts?) however Porsches prices in Switzerland are crazy.. for sure, if one day I will decide to buy one, then I will purchase it aborad, even with CO2 tax is much cheaper.

On my Audi S3 I wanted to change original brakes (that were poor) with Movit 370x35 and 4 pot calipers. Problem is homologation in Switzerland. TUV is not valid here, you need DTC or FAKT. Both initially asked 12000 CHF, then after 1 year of emails  and negotiations I managed to get it for 2500 CHF... and all that to put MUCH BETTER AND SAFER BRAKES! 

In Italy we have also an "association" that oblige people to buy services that they don't need, at higher prices. It is called Mafia.

[Swiss380Cup]

Well, all thèse groups are a real mafia...... they control their markets very tightly...I have a very good friend who's imported luxury véhicules from Europe, the USA, etc, into CH. When the CHF dropped in value, there was a big advantage, but since he bought his vehicles from official dealers, at some point the large groups threatened these dealers that if they found one of their vehicles in CH they would reconsider their dealership contract.... so the mafia, we know where it is, in Münich, Stuttgart, etc. etc... they want to be able to decide their prices on all their markets on their own..... It would need a rebellion from the dealers to change that, but since they're afraid to lose the dealership they say nothing.... and in the end WE PAY the price......