BMWUSA European Delivery: Part 2

Continued from Part 1

The BMW European Delivery (ED) program has several advantages aside from just the opportunity to drive on some of the world’s best roads. Though in my opinion this is the main reason you should consider taking advantage of this program.

Unlike some manufacturers BMW has not tagged on added fees or packages. They take care of your road use tax for three months (additional charges for over three months), 14 days of $0 deductible insurance, which includes another driver (can be extended in 30 day increments up to 2 weeks before your delivery), and your tourist registration. So you are all set to drive.

Up until recently there were no added fees for the dozens of drop off locations throughout Europe BMW had setup. Italian drop offs will incur a fee; all other locations are free. We will discuss the locations and reasons for the charge for Italy later on in the series. The fee for shipping and marine insurance is already included in the fee BMW charges every customer: the destination charge.

So now that you know they are not going to tag on unwanted extra fees, packages and the like, how about those savings we mentioned in Part 1!

The ED savings on MSRP is around 7% for most models that are within the program. Most people see the cost difference and assume that the reason must be due to some tax break or in the past (not in recent memory) an exchange rate advantage. This however is not the case; the reason for the savings is simply cutting out the middleman. The middleman is actually the dealer incentive program offered by BMWNA to its dealers.

BMW dealers receive incentive payments from BMWNA based on customer satisfaction, or “CSI” scores. For those of you that currently own a BMW/Mini or other luxury brand you may notice that you receive follow ups in the form of phone calls or mailings to see how you would rate the dealer. The scores that are obtained from those follow ups, along with the number of cars sold is how they know what to write the dealer a check for. For this reason some dealers give you a little paper flyer that says they “need” 5s and that if something is wrong they will fix it in order to obtain those 5s, they are worth big money. BMWs sold through the ED program are not included in the dealers’ unit sales so BMWNA does not pay incentives. This is where the savings for ED originates.

Saving money does not just end there! Cars sold through ED do not come out of the dealer’s allocation they come out of the BMWNA ED allotment pool (this excludes //M cars, the 6 series and new model launches such as the 1 series which do come from the dealers allotment so more than likely ED MSRP it is for these). As a result many dealers have realized they are selling a car they would have otherwise not been allotted and not cutting into the profit from their allotment. Due to this they are willing to negotiate more easily and view the car as a bonus sale. NOT all dealers realize this or even believe in this practice. Some dealers will not negotiate at all on ED cars since they believe they are losing money already, though as just explained this is not the case, some may claim they can not negotiate because of the added expenses to the dealership (the only expense is a FedEX envelope or two) if your dealer says this, you should look for another dealer.

You think that is all? Well not quite. BMW has also struck a deal with Lufthansa German Airlines (the best airline to fly to Germany in my opinion), where purchasers of a BMW through the ED program can obtain a 2 for 1 ticket (Q-class coach, taxes for both tickets must be paid). This is very effective at lessening airfare during peak months of travel.

There are a few other little perks that we will discuss later…. Stay tuned for our next edition and post your comments and questions so we may address them in the future.

Part 3