- FCA ‘insulting’ compensation interest rate slammed
- Vertu buys Marshall Skoda dealership
- £1.5bn JLR government support fund ‘untouched’
- Nexperia chip shipments to resume?
- WEEK AHEAD: SMMT October new car registrations
- Evans Halshaw sets target for BYD UK sales
- Volvo recommits to plug-in hybrid
- Mazda boss calls EVs a ‘mistake’
- BYD profit and sales fall
- OPINION: Accessing automotive retail
FCA ‘insulting’ compensation interest rate slammed
So-called victims of the car loan scandal could miss out on more than £4bn in compensation if the FCA continues with plans for an “insulting” interest rate in its redress scheme, say claims firms and consumer groups.
They believe borrowers should be offered the same terms as Marcus Johnson, the sole motorist whose case was upheld by the supreme court in August. Terms of the payment have not been disclosed by he is widely believed to have received 7% interest on his compensation.
The FCA has proposed a rate of 2.09% on compensation.
Darren Smith, MD of claims law form Courmacs Legal, said this is “frankly insulting to the millions of victims who were overcharged… it exposes a staggering hypocrisy. If the boot was on the other foot, and a bank was a successful claimant in a commercial dispute, would they meekly accept 2.09% on their losses?”
The FCA has calculated the compensation scheme will cost banks £11bn, of which £9.7bn will go straight to consumers. However, if the interest rate were closer to 8%, consumers would be due £14.3bn. The Guardian says this calculation is from FCA documents.
An 8% rate “is what has historically been paid out alongside successful county court cases, and by the Financial Ombudsman Service before its own rates were cut earlier this year”.
At an 8% rate, consumers would receive £1,030 in compensation, rathe than the proposed sum of £700.“
The interest rate is way too low,” MoneySavingExpert’s Martin Lewis recently said in a BBC podcast.
Vertu buys Marshall Skoda dealership
Vertu has bought Marshall’s Skoda dealership in Leicester for an undisclosed sum. Vertu has also opened a new Skoda site in Nottingham following a termination of Marshall’s franchise in the city.
The acquisition and new operation takes Vertu’s Skoda total to six.
A statement on Marshall’s website said: “Further to a strategic review of Skoda’s representation in Leicestershire, Skoda Leicester will transfer to a new franchisee, Vertu plc, effective Friday 31 October 2025.”
Skoda and the wider Volkswagen Group has been restructuring its retailer networks with the aim in reducing the number of partners it works with.
£1.5bn JLR government support fund ‘untouched’
JLR has not drawn down any of a £1.5bn loan facility guaranteed by the government following the crippling cyberattack, The Guardian has revealed. Suppliers are “expressing anger over ministers’ claims to have supported the carmaker’s supply chain”.
“In some ways the government played a blinder with everyone thinking they bailed out JLR,” said one parts maker executive. “They did nothing.”
On Friday, Labour MP and head of the parliamentary business select committee Liam Byrne wrote to business secretary Peter Kyle asking if any money had reached JLR and if the aid was requested by the OEM.
Sources told The Guardian that instead of using the loan facility, JLR used its existing cash reserves to help suppliers.
In related news, JLR is reportedly racing to avoid fresh production disruption in December following the Nexperia chip crisis. Bosch, Johnson Electric and Hanon systems are among its tier two suppliers to have said they will halt deliveries of parts.
“It might not stop us dead, but it will be a significant stoppage,” one source in the supply chain told The Sunday Times.
Nexperia chip shipments to resume?
Following a trade pact agreed by Donald Trump and Xi Jinping this week, the US is set to announce that Dutch semiconductor firm Nexperia will resume shipping chips. The news is expected to be announced in a fact sheet being prepared on the US-China deal.
It is likely to ease worries about chip shipments that threatened car production in Europe, reports Automotive News China.
Beijing last month blocked Nexperia from exporting from its facilities in China. It was in response to the Dutch government seizing control of the Chinese-owned chipmaker.
WEEK AHEAD
Wednesday, SMMT October new car registrations
Thursday, Auto Trader interims
Friday, UK unemployment
DATA INSIGHT
Evans Halshaw sets target for BYD UK sales
1st: Evans Halshaw, part of US giant Lithia, wants to become BYD’s leading retail group partner in the UK. It has appointed Robert Hamilton to the newly created role of market area director for the Chinese OEM. Evans Halshaw now operates five BYD sites in the UK.
Volvo recommits to plug-in hybrid
2040: Returnee Volvo CEO Hakan Samuelsson says Volvo will produce a second generation of plug-in hybrids that will last it until the end of the decade. It follows the reversal of its earlier ambition to be all-electric by 2030.
GLOBAL AUTO
Mazda boss calls EVs a ‘mistake’
Mazda CFO Jeff Guyton says the industry’s focus on zero tailpipe emissions is ‘unbalanced’. Speaking at the Tokyo Motor Show, he told Australia’s news.com.au that “EVs are not carbon neutral, they’re just zero carbon at the tailpipe”.
“The fundamental mistake we make as a society was not looking at the wheel-to-wheel energy lifecycle.” Instead, Guyton wants to see more interest in the potential of biofuels.
BYD profit and sales fall
BYD net profit in the three months to September 30 fell 33% to 7.82bn yuan (£1.1bn), the company reported this week. Total revenue was down 3% to 195bn yuan, missing estimates for 216bn. Sales were down 1.8% – and BYD lost its title as China’s best-selling OEM to state-owned SAIC in September.
OPINION
Accessing automotive retail
In the upcoming November issue of sister title Auto Market Insight, there’s an article about the state of recruitment and retention in the industry by Nigel McMinn, CEO of Pybus Recruitment, and Lynda Ennis, CEO of Ennis & Co Group.
The two, who have extensive experience of the how the industry works at all levels and from all sides, explain what needs to be done to achieve meaningful improvement in recruitment that will lead to lasting business gains.
Lynda and Nigel aren’t wrong, and the past few weeks have brought home one aspect to me.
My eldest child, who’s in her second year at university, has spent some time looking for placement jobs for her third year. Being my daughter, she’s aware of how extensive automotive retail is and that there are a huge variety of roles across thousands of businesses.
But how is she supposed to find options that fit what she can offer?
As far as she and I can tell, there’s no central, industry-wide, resource to point her in the right direction.
Between us we’ve looked in all the obvious places; NFDA, IMI, SMMT, but found nothing of use. If you want a technician apprenticeship, you’re fine, but anything outside this doesn’t seem to exist. And you have to ask, ‘why not?’ because I’m always being told that attracting the next generation into the industry is vital.
So, I’d like to thank those retailers who responded to my emails about this and add that if anyone out there that offers work placement positions in a finance department (she’s studying maths and economics), get in touch.
Yes, this is verging on the mis-use of this column, but it’s also a sincere call for a more consolidated approach to helping enthusiastic young people enter automotive retail.
Tristan Young
Editorial Director
Get in touch: tristan@autosunday.co.uk
ISSN 2977-6597