FAQs

What Car? Is now a one-stop shop to purchase your new or used car. We display the prices that our approved dealers will accept, ensuring that you will find a fair price for your chosen car. Our service takes the hassle - and haggle! - out of buying a new car by ensuring that dealers commit to a price up front. The prices you see listed on our website - which often include a significant saving on the Recommended Retail Price - are the prices you will pay.

We partner with manufacturer-approved, franchised car dealerships from all across the UK to ensure that you can find a fair price, from a local dealer, for your chosen vehicle. All of our registered dealers commit to our Dealer Charter that promotes best practice within the trade, ensuring that you will not get any nasty surprises when you are completing your purchase.

If you cannot find the exact vehicle you are looking for listed on our website, do not worry. We have a dedicated team of experts who will be able to put you in touch with a dealer who will sell you the car at What Car?'s Target Price or less. Simply fill out the contact form on the website and we will put you in touch with the dealer who is relevant to your purchase.

We never share your personal details with dealers before you have chosen to contact the dealer about a specific deal on a specific vehicle. You can browse all deals within the system anonymously, although we do perform a search of your location based on your computer's IP address for the purpose of showing deals local to you (although you can also adjust your search location by inputting a postcode). When you see an offer that tempts you, you can contact the dealer yourself using the phone number shown on the website, or fill in our contact form which will allow the dealer to contact you by phone or by email - we’ll send your name and contact details to the dealer at this stage.

Using the What Car? website is free and you will not be charged for using the car buying service. You may be requested to pay additional delivery costs if you live beyond a certain distance from your chosen dealer. Your dealer might also offer additional optional accessories for your vehicle, or service plans for ongoing maintenance. You are under no obligation to accept such offers, and our approved dealers are regularly audited to ensure that their pricing of optional extras outside the scope of the website service remain fair and competitive.

Yes. Our car buying service puts you in touch with manufacturer-approved franchised dealers. This means that, when a sale is completed, you will receive the same UK-wide warranty as if you had visited the dealer in the showroom.

All of our listed vehicles, like the majority of JAPAN dealership car sales, will be ordered directly from the factory, individually specified to your requirements. This means that lead times can vary depending on the make and model purchased, where the car is being built, and whether there is a current production run of that vehicle already in progress (many factories operate a batch production process, so different models will be manufactured in batches on the same factory production line at different times). A typical delivery waiting time is 12 weeks, although your dealer will confirm the likely waiting time before you complete your sales agreement.

Your dealer will ask you to pay an up-front deposit when you confirm that you intend to purchase the car. This will reserve your vehicle and enable the dealer to send through the relevant production notes to the manufacturer. If you are purchasing your car using a finance plan, you’ll start paying your monthly payment upon delivery of your vehicle. If you are making a full cash payment up front for your car, the balance of payment will be made upon delivery of your new vehicle.