It’s always amazing, in any country, how many extras need to be charged for a new car to be put on the road. The dealer wanted $250 as its handling fee. For what; selling us the car? They arranged a weight certificate for the car at $12. This means that the car is physically weighed so we know which license fee is applicable. Surely the dealer knows the weight of the car from the brochure? The license itself, giving permission for the car to be on the road, requires another $331. License (number) plates added a further $98. It was essential that we added a tint to the windows. Not because of our celebrity (just joking) status, but to try to keep the hot sun at bay while driving, bringing a further bill of $345.

We did splash out on one extra for the car. We chose to add a reversing sensor which cost us another $250. Having driven with a reversing sensor for three years now, I’ll never drive a car without one again if at all possible. When I hire a car abroad, I now have to reverse with extra care.

All of these extras meant we had to budget for $1300 more than the actual cost of car. We did get car mats thrown in for free which effectively saved us $140, but probably cost the dealer $30-$40. The hi-fi in the Ford is very good. We could have spent another $500 and had it upgraded to an MP3 player. Luckily our cell phones have a feature where music can be played directly through the hi-fi by selecting the right radio frequency. We also decided against the soaring cost of a center armrest. $2000 just to rest your arm was a stretch too far.

The dealer originally offered us free servicing for three years. When we visited the dealer to sign on the dotted line, they withdrew the offer for free servicing because they realized they would be out of pocket on the deal. After all, they were selling us the car, at the price they paid for it. After the car salesman and his manager sat embarrassed in their office for 20 minutes he finally offered a deal of an extra seal on the underneath of the car. This is required in a country like Barbados, because of the weather, the closeness of the sea salt, and the lime that falls with the rain from the clouds. We would have paid for this extra anyway so in effect we were saving a thousand dollars. I knew we would be paying $1500 a year for servicing for three years.

I know that if we were in another country we would probably have argued the case and the legalities surrounding the original offer, but we didn’t want to cause the salesman to lose his job or to have to pay personally, for his mistake.