Not all certified pre-owned vehicle programs are created equal, but the best are bunched pretty tightly at the top. The 10th annual IntelliChoice CPO awards, presented Oct. 22 in San Diego, honored the certified stars of the industry, providing an analysis of which manufacturers offer the superior programs. As always, a surprise newcomer or two rose to the top.
Booming sales and growing competition in the burgeoning CPO market have clearly spawned improvements in many programs, which is great news for used-car shoppers, said Eric Anderson, ownership database supervisor for IntelliChoice, which reviews automotive values for new and used vehicles.
Multipoint inspections and re-conditioning are often enhanced and manufacturers become more discriminating in their choices of qualifying used vehicles — to the point where most top contenders in the IntelliChoice CPO rankings are separated by the thinnest of margins, unlike the earliest days of CPO, Anderson said.
“Back then, there was a big drop-off in quality behind the handful of highest-rated programs,” he said. “As certified sales started to take off, some manufacturers would just slap a program together and call it CPO to get in the game.”
Then the IntelliChoice CPO awards came along, honoring the top five luxury and non-luxury programs overall and in several subcategories such as best warranty, inspection list and brand value, as determined by exhaustive research and analysis.
“We do it up with a real awards presentation,” said James Bell, publisher of IntelliChoice.com. “All the manufacturers show up to get up on stage, take their awards, take their bows and enjoy the recognition.”
No doubt the spotlight of the increasingly high-profile CPO awards has sharpened the industry’s competitive edge.
Here’s how the ranking process works: Consumers on IntelliChoice.com give feedback on which aspects of CPO programs they consider to be most important, and the company’s statisticians give proportional consideration to each aspect.
For example, most consumers rate inspection quality and warranties as most important, so IntelliChoice bases up to 75% of each program’s overall score on those two factors, Bell said. Anderson and the staff calculate detailed statistical comparisons and determine the overall rankings.
Enough with the technical talk.
Here are the 2009 IntelliChoice CPO award winners.
Luxury
1. Volvo: The carmaker repeats as the No. 1 program in the top five, separated by only a 4% margin in overall scoring. Volvo’s 130-point inspection tied for first with six other programs, and its used-brand value and six-year/100,000-mile warranty (which finished very close to warranty winner Porsche) got strong scores across the board.
“Just like last year, Volvo scored on top or very close to the top in all the major categories,” Anderson said.
The logjam for best inspection is a good example of the uniformly tight race among the luxury brands, he said; all seven programs tied for first were rated 100% by IntelliChoice.
2. Saab: Jumping up from last year’s fourth spot, Saab scored with its six-year/100,000-mile warranty and 110-point reconditioning inspection. But the main improvement from last year was in its overall used-brand value.
“Saab is in a unique position,” Bell said. “They invest a lot of support and attention to their CPO program. That’s good news for consumers.”
3. Cadillac: After tying for second with Jaguar last year, Cadillac nearly held steady on the strength of its six-year/100,000-mile comprehensive warranty and 112-point reconditioning inspection.
Cadillac scored very well in the used-brand value category. And the program is among the most discriminating, only accepting used vehicles that fall within four model years and 50,000 miles.
4. Audi: Tied for fifth last year with four other programs, Audi broke through to the upper echelon based on improved scores for used-brand value and its 300-plus-point inspection, which tied for first in that category. The main factor is that more of the inspection points were rated highly this year by IntelliChoice standards, Bell said.
5. Lexus/Jaguar: Both programs are perennial top-five contenders and pioneers in the CPO market.
Jaguar — which once won the luxury division five consecutive years ending in2006 —dropped a tad from last year’s third-place finish, partly because its free oil-change program was dropped, Bell said. But Jaguar was boosted by its well-regarded 140-point reconditioning inspection, which tied for first.
Lexus did well with its warranty program, which runs 100,000 miles from the original purchase date, but three years from its certified sale.
Bob Young, Special Sections staff writer, Los Angeles Times
Nov. 12, 2008
