Where Do Vehicle Retail Prices Come From?

Retail prices are a fundamental part of managing new vehicle stock and sales. These prices form the basis for how vehicles are valued in your system and directly affect sales pricing, margin reporting, and customer quotations.

Understanding where these prices originate and how they can be amended is important for:

• Ensuring consistent pricing across the dealership.

• Applying promotional offers accurately.

• Avoiding discrepancies between invoiced and advertised values.

Source of Retail Prices

Retail prices on new vehicles are populated from price files. These files provide the manufacturer’s recommended retail price (RRP) for each model and derivative.

There are two ways these price files can be introduced into the system:

1. Third-Party Integration:

   • The most common method, where the system receives automated updates from a manufacturer or pricing provider.

   • Ensures accuracy and reduces manual entry errors.

2. Manual Addition:

   • Used when no integration exists or for rare/specialist vehicles.

   • A user manually creates or imports the pricing file to populate values.

Effect on Vehicle Records

• When a new vehicle record is created, the system uses the retail price from the price file to populate the record.

• This becomes the default retail price for that vehicle, reflecting the standard manufacturer's price.

What Happens if the Price is Amended on the Sales Order?

If a vehicle’s price is manually amended on the sales order screen:

• The new figure becomes the sale price, not the retail price.

• This is common in cases of:

  • Promotional activity.

  • Customer discounts or negotiated deals.

  • Dealer contributions or pricing incentives.

Amending the price in this way does not change the underlying retail price in the price file.

Can Retail Prices Be Changed?

Yes, but with limitations:

• Retail prices can be updated via the Price List.

• These changes will only apply to newly created vehicle records.

• Existing vehicles already created in stock will retain the retail price they were assigned at creation.