FG Barnes Group Reviews 116

TrustScore 3.5 out of 5

3.5

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Rated 5 out of 5 stars

Had my car booked for MOT got plenty of notifications, booked online. Arrived at FG Barnes, friendly staff, contacted when it was ready to collect. Nice area to wait with free coffee facility.... See more

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

Just purchased a new Jaecoo 7, excellent service from the sales man Mr Ali Hussnam, we explained what we were looking for, he arranged test drive and valuation on our car. Exceeded our expectation

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

Got help from alex. Regarding motability. Absolutely amazing person, very helpful, kind and amazing customer service. Helped me more than I expected & sorted my car out quickly & worked around me, alw... See more

Company replied

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Appalling service, excuse after excuse. Mananger unable to answer basic questions. 1. Why was the pre purchase condition report only given six weeks after purchase? 2, if I had been given p... See more

Company details

  1. SEAT dealer
  2. Alfa Romeo dealer
  3. Fiat dealer
  4. Jeep Dealer
  5. Nissan Dealer
  6. Used Car Dealer

Written by the company

The FG Barnes Group offers a range of car brands in Guildford. Operating in the South East of England, offering new and used cars, as well as Aftersales and Motability.


Contact info

3.5

Average

TrustScore 3.5 out of 5

116 reviews

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Hasn’t replied to negative reviews

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Rated 5 out of 5 stars

Hannan was great

Hannan was great, took me out on a test drive, explained all the functions .... what all the buttons do, took me through the extra packages I could buy and went through the finance no problem. Hannan is very thorough and explains everything very clearly, makes sure everything is done properly. I bought the car there and then and only a week before I picked it up - all sparkly and clean and looking just like a new car. Very happy with my purchase and would highly recommend Hannan. Thank you

May 17, 2022
Unprompted review
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Reply from FG Barnes Group

Thanks for the great review Lucy. We love to see that our customers are happy with the service & efforts put in by our hard-working team. Your kind words will be shared with Hannan and his colleagues within the Vauxhall Maidstone team.
We hope you have many happy years in your new Vauxhall.

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Arrived for test drive at 1450 15/2/22…

Arrived for test drive at 1450 15/2/22 at canterbury branch. On arrival I was told that the manager was taking the only available ev car in 10 minutes. This was a waste of my time and an embarrassing situation for the salesman I dealt with. It appears the manager has no consideration for the customers on this occasion and should be ashamed. Poor service.

February 16, 2022
Unprompted review
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Reply from FG Barnes Group

Very sorry about this Mr Oatridge. This mix-up should have never happened. It's a definite learning curve for us. Best of luck with your new vehicle.

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Avoid avoid avoid

Avoid avoid avoid.

Should really be zero stars!

Bought a car from Maidstone Vauxhall at end of June and what an absolute joke it has been since. I’m still not registered as the verified owner through My Vauxhall as it still hasn’t been confirmed by the dealership due to an error made by AH on initial sale who put the wrong info in and now they can’t correct it or say they can’t. Meaning I can’t book services or a service plan online as the system doesn’t recognise my car. No proper checks carried out on the car - infotainment unit is faulty and is missing privacy settings, meaning I can’t use a great proportion of its security or any of its journey tracking services. NH is a bully who knows nothing about consumer law and is a cowboy in a cheap shirt and tie. Services dept just make false promise after false promise and whoever the mystical ‘Technical’ department are I have no idea. They’ve had my car in three times so far and have done absolutely nothing to it except allow technical to close my case, so many times by every member of the service team I’ve been told that they need to do a data transfer but technical refuse to actually visit the dealership even though I was told by A that they would be doing just this in December 2021. They didn’t. RT at services had no idea that I’d had this conversation with A - communication amongst the different people and different departments is a joke. IB, the business manager, and RC couldn’t care less once they’ve got your money. This is an ongoing saga and my car is due to go in for a FOURTH time imminently (same false promises, same work being carried out apparently but no progress whatsoever) but my next step is legal action and local media. AVOID! AVOID! AVOID!

January 6, 2022
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Very poor experience

Very poor experience. Arrived to test drive a used car, every single panel had scratches and scuffs on, was told they have a very good guy that could fix this, so why not fix it rather than show the car in such a poor condition - alarm bells already ringing. Then asked if instead of the wheels that car came with it they could source bigger wheels - was told that the manger ' had said' - "if you want 16" wheels you should go to Halfords". I had already asked this question on email before visiting the car to which I got no response, had I known i'd be directed to Halfords for Fiat parts I would not have bothered turning up in the first place. If you want a Fiat, go to another dealer.

August 10, 2021
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Gave one star

Gave one star, as it would not allow me to put 0. Organised a test drive on jeep,which was good. Asked for a quotation to purchase vehicle and asked again 24 hours later, 4 days later still no quotation

August 8, 2021
Unprompted review
FG Barnes Group logo

Reply from FG Barnes Group

Hi Derek, after speaking with our Sales Exec Sophie, we look forward to welcoming you to our showroom on Wednesday. Hopefully this will resolve any issues you have with us.

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Do not touch this company!

Very bad experience. Was sold a faulty car, and so far had to spend money on the car to fix problems. Was meant to be seen by the manager, but instead was fobbed off with his mate Rob, who was more interested in talking about himself and to my partner instead of talking to me who was purchasing the car. They claimed they have done an MOT last year, but somehow tyres that are 5 years old passed, with barely a thread on them. I'm now having to spend more money on tyres for the car. The car eats petrol, after being told it was good on petrol and cheap to run. It's more expensive than my 1.4! Still haven't received my V5 documents. Not impressed at all, would never use nissan again. Watch out, these are scammers!

July 23, 2021
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Worst ever company I have dealt with…

Worst ever company I have dealt with CUSTOMER SERVICE do they know what these words mean.I bought my Fiat from there Guildford branch worst mistake ever dealt with there service desk for three years RUDE STAFF arrogant and did not help with my issues or problems that I had with my car.

I now go to my local garage for service and repairs and would not step into that hell hole in Guildford sums it up for me.

July 11, 2021
Unprompted review
Rated 1 out of 5 stars

A very Selfish attitude for a so called sales person

what a waste of my time! So I am looking at getting a Seat Leon Estate so as you do, was going past FG Barnes, Seat, Parkwood last week so I popped in to see if the had any 1.4 Phev's that I could drive. They had a Leon out on display but this wasn't the engine I want. So we sat down for about 20 min and had a discussion and then looked at the car. After all this I asked if I could actually drive a PHEV an if they were getting one in to which the dealer told me that he has a Cupra with roughly the same engine and they could get one for me to test drive the following week. The next week I turned up for the test drive with my licence only to be told that the car didn't have enough charge and then that (after about 40min) that the car was out of my budget?? They quoted me for a lease and it was no where near what other dealerships have quoted at least £100 more +VAT..
So again, Thanks for totally wasting my afternoon I'll go elsewhere and recommend others do too.

In response to the reply below. I don't "feel" like you wasted my time, you did. I wasn't looking at buying somewhere else I had a legitimate interest in leasing a hybrid estate car.. But hey ho, your loss. Also because of your completely uncaring attitude towards a potential customer I have now rated you as 1 star. I am a very proud owner of a Toyota corolla sports touring. Top spec 2.0 full hybrid.. Much nicer

June 30, 2021
Unprompted review
FG Barnes Group logo

Reply from FG Barnes Group

We're sorry that you feel that we wasted your afternoon. Unfortunately we don't offer test drives to potential customers who are looking to purchase elsewhere, during busy times. We wish you the best of luck with your search for your new Leon.

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Not a great experience. Suggest you Avoid

Purchased brand new Seat Leon Fr. Worst experience of life. Dealer all smiles & laughs to get the deal, but then an abysmal car & dealer customer service. Car 3 weeks late in being available. Delays in insuring car as dealer slow to register it. On collection car had chip in passenger door and virtually no valet with filthy engine compartment. How can a dealership prepare and offer a brand new car that had allegedly been fully checked and cleaned in this state? They apologised and confirmed in writing it was way below their normal standards!! Should have walked then but had paid balance prior to pick up etc. Dealer assured us car would be fixed asap. Ok we thought, oh no! on drive home warning lights on for passenger airbag constantly, then brake gets noisy and spongy. Check manual & dealer has not activated airbag!! A day later warning lights and exclamation marks all over dashboard & infotainment screen indicate park assists\parking sensors faulty! and a wiper is smearing badly. Call dealers who book car in. They keep car 2 days & despite numerous calls we never got an update, so go to dealership. They advise everything done except the valet as need car more than 2 days to valet it as well. Demand car is returned, so they get it and happily say, sensors reset its possibly an intermittent fault, brake servo filter replaced, wiper sorted and the chip has been touched up.
Total farce, we check chip which is still there and point out to an embarrassed member of staff. So the primary things it went in for a chip repair and valet not done. The staff member advised us ironically, if it had been him he would have refused the car when we collected it on registration!! Wow at least he was honest. think they thought as a female was purchasing car they could get away with chip issue and not do valet. Profuse apologies, So in it goes again, this time for 3 days and it's semi sorted out. The intermittent issue with park assist, park sensors is still there but Seat do not know how to correct this, even after referral to the technical team, so advise to monitor it!!. the service manager was at least trying to help and was polite and kept us informed but advised to sort chip out fully door will need respray, however the valet and engine were cleaned to a great standard, shame the car had to go back twice to get a decent valet that should have been checked prior to handover. Totally unsatisfactory in a brand new car . The sales manager and area manager assured us they would personally oversee the car through its second return visit but did not. Nobody has ever contacted us since to check up on things. Have owned Seat Leon\ibiza before and they were good cars, but the latest model is awful as is this dealership customer service. We have also contacted Seat HQ 4 times to complain and never once had any reply. Will never but a Seat again and suggest avoiding FG Barnes seat Maidstone.

May 1, 2021
Unprompted review
FG Barnes Group logo

Reply from FG Barnes Group

Hi Steve, we were under the impression that all issues relating to your vehicle had been resolved 3-4 months ago. If this isn't the case, please let us know.

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Definitely Avoid

Although I tried every effort to do business with them, it didn't end well. They are not good with communication and usually very difficult to reach someone. We finally decided to buy a car and particular Vauxhall model was available at Maidstone and drove 100 miles but when we went there, the car was outside with lots of scratches and dents and the lady said "oh this is normal because it is second hand car, not brand new!??" And manager came along and said "I can refund your deposit and sell it £1000 more on the price, no problem if you don't take it.. website photos shows all the scratches you knew the condition"... I wasn't expecting a brand new factory out car but assumed that I am buying a car from an original Vauxhall dealer with warranty and good condition but I was wrong. They tried to sell a car that doesn't fit original dealer quality and standards. They damage reputable British brand Vauxhall...

They didn't offer any help or any gesture to complete the sale or at least little discount to rectify the small problems but they said "definitely NO Negotiation!!!" So we pulled out because I didn't like the way we treated. I think their sales strategy and sales people must be changed. That's not how business should be, rude and they have serious customer service issues...

Straight, unhelpful, incompetent, "don't care" type of business... Plus they charge £149 admin fee for not answering phones and treat you like (!!!) ... I should be charging them admin fee for all my time wasted but they are not type of people care customers... Vauxhall should do something about them because they put me off and now I am buying another brand... Anyways... I probably will not use them again. I hope they do my refund soon. I don't recommend them. Nothing personal but business should not be like this... Definitely Avoid!

April 25, 2021
Unprompted review
Rated 5 out of 5 stars

Excellent customer service

Excellent customer service from salesman Kevin - purchased Alfa Guilietta in march 2021. Car accurately described - fully valeted, serviced, even added fuel for my journey home which was a very pleasant surprise. very professional would recommend to all. Thanks again

April 7, 2021
Unprompted review
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Reply from FG Barnes Group

Thanks for the positive review! This will be shared with Kevin and his colleagues. We hope you continue to enjoy your new Giulietta for many years to come!

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

DO NOT BUY FROM THIS PLACE!!

DO NOT BUY FROM THIS PLACE!!! I BOUGHT A VAUXHALL MOKKA X AND AFTER 30 MINUTES OF LEAVING THEIR BUILDING AND HITTING THE MOTORWAY THE ENGINE LIGHT CAME UP ON THE VEHICLE. THIS INCONVENIENCED ME IN SUCH A BAD WAY AND I HAD TO TAKE 2 DAYS OUT OF MY TIME TO GET IT RESOLVED. HOWEVER ALL THEY DID WAS BOTCH THE CAR UP AND SENT ME ON MY WAY THEN THE ENGINE LIGHT CAME UP AGAIN 6 WEEKS LATER!!! THEY BUY FAULTY CARS AND SELL THEM FOR RIDICULOUS MONEY WHEN THEY KNOW THAT THEY ARE FAULTY. THEY DONT DO THEIR CHECKS PROPERLY EITHER BEFORE SELLING!

March 17, 2020
Unprompted review

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