Denver’s ABC 7 reports that a couple of Mercedes-Benz dealers in the Denver area have been charging customers delivery & handling fees on their lease buyouts. They’re now making things right, but only after they were found out.
ABC 7 spoke with customer Jason Taylor, who wanted to buy his 2019 Mercedes at the end of it’s lease. The two Mercedes dealers he called however made the buyout more expensive than it needed to be.
…he said that when he called Mercedes-Benz dealerships in Loveland and Westminster, he found out about additional costs and fees.
“Both dealerships implied that there would be a $599 dealer and handling (D&H) fee. But Loveland also was requiring that I do a service appointment because I had mentioned that the check engine light was on,” he said. “And so they were going to force me to make the repair on that check engine light before I could even purchase the vehicle. Whereas, Mercedes of Westminster didn’t have that same requirement.
“It should have just been the residual, plus the $150 fee, plus any official titling and taxes.”
Taylor said he felt like he couldn’t do anything, even when he filed complaints with state and federal officials. He wasn’t alone though. Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser backed him up and called the D&H fee illegal and misleading. “I’ve got a very simple message here: If you buy any product or service, and you’re not told about some fee, and then later, they say, ‘Oh, you’ve got to pay this fee, a hidden fee.’ That’s illegal. That’s deception,” Weiser told ABC 7.
Mercedes-Benz Financial Services backed Taylor up as well with a spokesperson telling ABC 7 that a customer should not be charged any additional fees in a lease buyout.
Colorado’s Auto Dealers Association appeared to be on Taylor’s side at first. However the association’s president Matthew Groves said Taylor’s case might be an exception, essentially saying that since the dealer that sold him the Mercedes wasn’t the one who leased it, that dealer should get to make some money since they weren’t in on the original deal.
“That’s the gray area for us because in this case, the dealer who sold the vehicle was not the dealer who leased the vehicle, and therefore they were not a party to the leasing contract.”
Groves said the dealers need guidance from the state on how to proceed, citing Colorado’s consumer protection laws that he says dealers interpreted as “all transactions had to pay the same fee.” Groves said the association is in contact with the Colorado attorney general’s office over the laws.
Meanwhile ABC 7 did some digging and got the Mercedes dealer to refund Taylor for the D&H fee.
After Denver7 Investigates started making calls about Jason Taylor’s D&H fees, Kevin Steward, the owner/GM of Mercedes-Benz of Westminster sent an email stating: “I wanted to let you know the dealership values the relationship it has with its customers and that this customer received a refund.
When asked if any other customers would be charged the D&H fee in a lease buyout, neither Steward, nor any other dealer personnel responded.