CARVERSAL

    Though, today things are different. People’s behaviour towards new, exciting things have changed. Their patience levels have gone way down, thanks to various obvious reasons! When someone books a car, they are most probably impatient to wait according to the asked period for acquiring the car. And this habit of theirs has turned out to be a Jackpot for Carmakers & Dealerships. Let's discuss it!

    Now, this whole topic of waiting periods is vast and it contains a lot of details about various aspects. So, let's chronologically understand the waiting period of a car.

WHAT ARE WAITING PERIODS?

   Waiting period is a course of time in which the car maker asks you to wait, so that they can produce your desired car. The waiting period starts from the day you book the car.

HOW LONG COULD A WAITING PERIOD BE?

    It depends on what kind of car you have chosen - is that particular car in demand or it isn’t. If it is in demand, maybe, the waiting period will be high and if it’s not in demand, maybe, the waiting period will be low.

For eg : A car like Rolls Royce’s, their cars are not in a high demand compared to a normal affordable passenger car. Though, their waiting period is 6 months. On the other hand, a car like Tata Safari, which has a decent demand in the market compared to a Rolls Royce, the waiting period of that car is about 2 months.

WHAT IS THE SHORTEST AND THE LONGEST WAITING PERIOD OF A CAR IN INDIA?

    The longest waiting period of a car in India was of Mahindra’s Scorpio N - 21 months ( 1.9 years ). This was during the period when it was launched in 2022.

    The Shortest waiting period of a car in India was of Nissan’s Magnite and Renault’s Kiger - less than a month. This was during April - March 2023.

HOW DOES A WAITING PERIOD OF A CAR INCREASE?

    When a car is in huge demand in the market and the particular carmaker is not able to supply the required demand on time, then there happens a backlog of orders made for the car. This backlog could increase every month and if it does, it increases the waiting period of that car.

Now, all this explains us about the waiting period, let’s move on to various reasons which cause them.

LACK OF PRODUCTION CAPACITY

    Most of the car makers are facing this at a major level. Due to an increase in demand for various cars, manufacturers are finding it difficult to produce all of it at once, due to restrictions in their production capacity.

Eg : If a car is receiving 1200 bookings every month, but the manufacturer has the capacity to produce only 500 units of it in a month. Then a backlog of 700 units will be added up every single month. This will ultimately increase the waiting period of that car.

Mahindra’s current state will be a good example too, as their new launches are restricted due to lengthy list of Backlogs.

SHORTAGE OF COMPONENTS

     During the production of a car, a lot of technical and mechanical components are required. And due to various reasons, sometimes there happens to be a blockage in their production. This cuts the chain and halts the production of the car as well. But, if that car is demanded in the market, its demand will never stop which will also not stop its bookings. Therefore, the backlog of booked cars will increase at a pace, even when the production is still.

Eg : Shortage of Chips in 2020. Due to the shortage of chips, many carmakers had to face the pressure of increasing backlog while their production was going at a slow pace. 

Some of the carmakers find different ways to tackle the pressure. The most prominent one is to stop taking bookings of cars.

NATURAL DISASTER OR GLOBAL PANDEMIC

    Natural disaster or Pandemic are the two reasons which neither can be controlled nor can be stopped. 

Natural disaster could create havoc, as it could destroy the manufacturing plant, the transport chain, etc.

Global Pandemic just brings the production to complete halt by restricting everyone to come out of their premises.

Eg : Covid Pandemic.

HUMAN CAUSED ACCIDENT

    If an accident takes place which is caused by a human and is big enough to block the supply chain all over the world or even of a country. It could become the nuclea reason for the paused production.

Eg : Suez Canal incident.

    So, after a long discussion, we finally will jump over the topic we are here for - HOW CARMAKERS ARE EXAGGERATING WAITING PERIODS ON CARS TO INCREASE SALES.

    Well, as they say, where there’s good, there’s evil. Just like when our impatient soul is asked to wait for our car for a particular time period, Carmakers as well as Dealers find loopholes to increase their business somehow. 

Let’s know about them -

Malpractices done by Carmakers →

MANIPULATION OF PRICES TILL THE CAR GETS DELIVERED

    When a car gets launched into the market, maybe its price would attract you if it gives any value of that car. This affordable price might make you book the car, let's say it was at ₹ 6 lakhs ex-showroom. You were asked to wait for 5 months as a waiting period, you agreed to that. 5 months later, when the car gets delivered to you, you see the ex-showroom price increased from ₹ 6 Lakhs to ₹ 6.7 Lakhs. And you have to pay according to what the current charges apply for that car, then it doesn’t matter at what cost you had booked it.

    This is one the most frequently used techniques to earn profit. As the carmakers are not at fault on this one, they openly and freely increase the prices once the product has gained enough audience.

MARKETING STRATEGY

    What would one think, if he sees a car’s waiting period is 10 months - “Oh! Looks like that car is in everyone’s talks”. It's obvious, this reaction is natural, as it looks like the car is doing well. Though, not in every case, sometimes car makers even fake it.

    You might have seen car makers showcase the waiting periods of their cars, well, it's for nothing but marketing. They artificially increase the numbers, so that it could create a better impression in the first place. Staging a product in demand, naturally creates optimistic thoughts about it. It might even make you buy it sometimes. But again, it's all nothing, but marketing.

    Now, these were all the malpractices done by the carmaker himself, let’s talk about the illegal practices done by a dealer.

    Malpractices done on the dealer’s level are very rude and unfair in the first place. They actually leave us no choice, but do as the dealer says, Let's check what do we have here -

Malpractices done by Dealers →

COMPULSORY SALE OF AD-ONS

     This starts from the very beginning, basically, imagine Customer A books a car and that car happens to be in demand with high waiting periods. Now, if you remember, I just talked about the impatient behaviour which now-a-days customers are having to receive something which is exciting and special to them. This sometimes makes the customer a bit annoyed and some of them even end up cancelling their bookings. And that’s what Customer A does.

    Now, the booking has been cancelled for Customer A, but if that car has been dispatched or is in the final stages of its production, the dealers don’t usually cancel it. They instead let it come into the dealership and then they use one of their favourite tricks, which is bursting up all the accessories onto the vehicle.

    What difference does it create, if you wonder? Then, if that car cost ₹ 10 lakhs, but as now the dealer has installed almost every possible accessory, that car would comparatively cost more, let’s say ₹ 13 lakhs. And then, let’s imagine, you want to buy the same car which costs ₹ 10 lakhs, as it has a good package. You happen to book it from the same dealer, where Customer A cancelled his booking. So, what happens over here is - the dealer now has a plus point of using your patience, by giving you a choice that goes, “Sir, we already have a similar model in our warehouse, would you like to purchase it instead of waiting for the car?” 

    Now, what’s your opinion, if you are given a choice of not waiting for your car and having a similar alternative with some tweaks done cosmetically. Though, you are getting that alternative right away. What would you do?

    It would be tough to reject, right? Yes I know and unfortunately this is the case with every other customer. You just couldn’t resist even if it has all the accessories you didn’t ask for.

PAY EXTRA FOR AQUISITION

    Now, this trick is similar to the first one, but this one doesn’t include any accessorized version of your car. This one is kind of like bribing the dealer for getting your car in quick succession. 

    Over here, the dealer tells you straight, that your car has a long waiting period and if you don’t want to be a part of it, you can pay us 'X' amount to get your desired car in a matter of days.

    Some of the customers even fall for it easily. And there are plenty of examples on the internet, where people have ‘arranged’ their car just a few days after their booking day.

This practice sometimes even consists of the involvement of DSA’s ( District Sales Agent ).