Do you have that too? You take a test drive in a new and unfamiliar car because you are in the market for something new. For example next week at the EV Experience, where you will be test-driving ten different cars.

Where is the kill switch?

Chances are you will not feel at home in the car right away, and you will not immediately understand how the car works and where all the important functions are. Especially the kill switch for all the new safety systems.

An example? My wife drove a Mercedes GLA in 2022, and whenever you got near a white line, you immediately thought you had a flat tyre.

The interventions and warnings were so bad that she got rid of the car again: too much hassle, too much safety, to the point where it became unsafe. And new cars are even more packed with systems than that Mercedes was in 2022. So what do you do as a car salesperson?

Say I am in the market for a nice Mercedes-Benz GLE. I make an appointment with the salesperson, who hands over the keys and wishes me a pleasant drive. Or does he briefly explain all the features and switch off all the systems for the perfect test drive? Or does the customer get the fright of his life at the first line? Or is he a better driver than me, and does he spend the first few kilometres doing nothing but switching off systems, so he can focus on ‘just driving and experiencing’?

I asked a number of people and, of course, tested it in practice at Experience Store Doesburg. And yes, many people recognise this and feel that all those systems do not contribute to a good first impression. In fact, they often put the buyer off the car instead of giving him a wow moment. The safer the car, the more safety systems, and the greater the chance that the test drive is experienced as less pleasant.

Set up the test drive properly!

It would simply help if, just like with the Defender, you could switch everything on and off with a single button, without having to go through all kinds of menus.

If you translate this to the test drive, I would just switch everything off. The systems can always be explained later, because I have to say: they are not there for nothing, of course. That said, I switch off the most annoying alarms straight away every day…

Sure, it is easier with some cars than with others, but my experience with the GLA back then was so negative, and the systems reacted so aggressively, that it was more unsafe than safe. And I am not even talking about the systems that check whether you are looking ahead. It is almost a reason to drive a modern classic or just a Jeep… So what do you do when you hand over a car for a test drive? Everything on or everything off? Either way, it is worth thinking about.