Donnelly Group Reviews 

Hello,
I am messaging with regards to a negative encounter I am currently experiencing within the Land Rover Donnelly group. My husband was contacted with regards to a manufacturing problem which resulted in a recall of our Land Rover Discovery Sport. Despite this being an inconvenience having two fulltime jobs and 3 young children at home, my husband took time off work today to bring the car in to the shop.
What really should be a day turn around has now turned into a minimum of two weeks, due to bolts being broken in the process. I completely understand that these things happen at times and cannot be helped, that is not the problem. The problem with this situation that has resulted in such poor customer service, is the fact that we will now be without a car for a minimum of two weeks through no fault of our own, with no courtesy car made available. I am extremely disappointed and discouraged from working with a dealership like yourselves again. Dealing with a ‘luxury car’ brand like yourselves, I would have expected efficient, organised and ‘impeccable service’ that would make your customers feel valued. However, our current experience has made me feel that I would disadvise anyone to use your services if they want any sort of customer service that puts the customer at the forefront.

Bought a New, albeit demo 10 miles on clock, Fiat Scudo van for private use. Disaster. Cost £29500, June 2023, sold it back to them Dec 2024, 18,000 miles for £14500. This was after 7 breakdowns. Refused to take it back, reject vehicle etc, left me no choice to walk away at huge loss or take them to court. I have spent over £80,000 on vehicles with them since 2021. Never again.
UPDATE. CONTACTED CUSTOMER SERVICES AS PER THEIR SUGGESTION. NO REPLY.

UPDATE 20TH DECEMBER....STILL IGNORING ME AFTER CONTACT WITH CUSTOMER SERVICES.

NOW APRIL 2025. STILL NO CONTACT FROM DONNELLY GROUP. Sent them numerous emails as they suggested in their reply. They must have eventually fixed it as it was recently advertised for £18k and sold. My wife saw it on the Antrim road....poor sod.

AVOID THE SERVICE DEPARTMENT AT ALL COSTS

I bought a 2021 kia sportage from the mallusk branch back in June 2024.The sales guy was great but there service dept are dreadful.The car was meant to have brake pads fitted all round but now (nov 2024) the car needs rear pads and disks..Further inspection by my mechanic today (nov2024) that the rear pads where near close to the metal.But the service dept told me oh we can replace them for you at a cost of £300+vat.Even know they told me they replaced the pads less that 5 months ago ..The windscreen washers have very low pressure..This is the 2nd time I’ve reported the issue to the service dept in the space of 3weeks and there answer is bring it up and we will inspect the washers again.But just to inform you that the washers aren’t covered under warranty and that I will have a bill of £120+vat just to look at it..When I bought the car I was told that they where give me an extra years full warranty so everything would be covered.But now that they have the £16.500 I paid for the car suddenly this so called full warranty doesn’t cover anything I need fixed.absolute rip off merchants..

Went to order a new evoque & agreed trade in & price with salesman (Derek) signed a new vehicle form ;paid deposit £1k & less than a week later he moves the goal posts trying to get me to take £2k less for my BMW ; absolute amateur experience on their behalf so will purchase elsewhere: clearly their word isn’t worth the paper it’s written on:

Couldn't have been happier with the exceptional service at Donnelly group Ballymena, Carol Noble was amazing and made trading in our car and buying a renault captur so easy. We will be going back to her when it's time to replace our other car.

Once again, many thanks to Kirsty and Nigel for the efficient and courteous manner in carrying out the work to my car this week. Thank you also the the courtesy car whilst the work was being carried out.

All the staff in Dungannon have been so nice over the years that I know it would be impossible to take my business elsewhere! Five star treatment every time and am greeted by the lovely Erika each time and supplied with endless cups of tea!

Thank you

Bought a HR-V from Donnelly Honda Boucher Road. 5 star service from both Carl and Scott who were outstanding in customer service and an absolute pleasure to deal with. Both very friendly and knowledgeable. Loving the car so far and will definitely be back some time in the future for another purchase.
Derek (Killyleagh County Down)

During the sale - no issues, pleasant experience.

After sale / service team - unhelpful, poor advice, ongoing issues.

Purchased a car march 2024. 2019 vehicle with around 30k miles and 1 years warranty.

Couple of months later the vehicle started to making a squeak noise when braking or applying handbrake and the air con was making a drone / vibration noise very noticeable when vehicle stationary. Demonstrated both noises to member of the service team.

Vehicle booked in to investigate the issues in August 2024 (5 months after purchasing)
Brake issue - not covered by warranty, needs cleaned and re-greased - work not carried out.
Air con issue - not covered by warranty - advised it needed a regas to fix the noise issue - £149 paid.

On collection of vehicle air con noise still present. Vehicle returned again to same service team member who now advised the car air con vibration is normal.

After several attempts of explaining I had paid £149 to fix a noise and the noise was still there and being told that air con would now be colder and vibration is normal.

I asked if the noise was normal why wasn't I told this when I first let the service member hear the noise and that I had never had an issue with the temperature which was always working but just the noise that was still there and service teams offer was if I let them remove the Aircon gas from my car they would refund the £149. I agreed to this but I didn't have the extra 45 minutes to wait for this to be done.

So in summary it's cost me £149 for bad advice and to know I won't return to Donnelly group

Where do I start. After been treated so poorly by a kesh car garage I was blown away by the respect and genuine kindness of Declan who dealt with my interest in a Golf. No hard sell, just the right balance of knowledge and personality. I immediately trusted him. Really, I never been treated so well before. Will be talking about this unexpected great experience for a long time and will certainly do business here again when the time comes to change in the future. Thank you Declan!!

I was looking for a used Honda CR-V a few weeks back and came across a used approved crv at Donnelly Dungannon Branch. I rang and got speaking to the sales manager who assured me the vehicle was known to him and Urban Titanium not brown but a bronze grey. From the photos it looked in great condition and with used approved warranty a safe buy. I immediately got in the car and travelled to Dungannon. At the dealership I was underwhelmed by my greeting and shown a grubby looking BROWN crv that hadn’t seen a wash in weeks. The interior was shabby the Tyres worn Brake and disks rusted with huge lips on the discs and pitted alloys. The car hadn’t yet been prepared for sale and the salesman assured me it would all be taken cared off if I wanted the car . He offere a deal on my Lexus part exchange and half hearted tried to close a deal he knew wasn’t going to happen. What an appalling way to try to sell a so called used approved Honda. No wonder they had a few horrible looking grubby and unprepared vehicles lying around outside. Why does Honda allow these terrible dealers to represent them displaying poorly prepared stock to the gullible unsuspecting public. I bought a fantastic used crv a week later from a used dealer beautifully prepared with a great warranty and a dam site better than was on show here.

Top Class
I visited Donnelly Group Suzuki in Mallusk (Suzuki) and was met by the most brilliant staff I have ever encountered in a car dealership.
Pierce McMahon the sales person was amazing with our 3 year old and us.
From start to finish Pierce and the staff were fantastic with us throughout (not at all pushy) which resulted in us getting our car from them.
I picked up my car within 4 days ....wow!
I couldn't recommend Pierce and the rest of the staff here highly enough...
Try Them!

Left car into Seat Dungannon this morning and got a courtesy car only to be told it had to be returned with same amount of fuel, this was not the problem, when i lifted my own car in the afternoon it had used 25 mile of fuel and my car had not been washed, would NOT recommend Donnelly to anyone

What can i say about donnelly group belfast,friendly, professional an ease to do business with, We have delt with other dealerships in our lifetime and can safely Say hands down non could do it quite as good or possibly come close to donnelly belfast from start to finish,and we hope to continue our business with for the foreseeable. Scott was fantastic, a true professional and nothing was a problem ,as for Kieran, well what an absolute pleasure and honor it was to not just deal with him but also meet,who not only walked us through every step of the car, with patients and ease and how to operate it to its full potential,it was completely obvious he was a car expert who loves cars and everything about them and does his job with such care and compassion, it was clear he loves his job.Kieran and Scott thank you so much.

I don't often write reviews but Darren's expertise, advice and professionalism warranted recognition. He gave freely of his time and knowledge, and arranged a same day test drive to suit me. A true gentleman and credit to the Donnelly Group.

Bought my last 2 seat from them. Wanted to change. Phoned 5 times got back to me once then were to come back to me, but never did. Called another dealer came back to me within 10 minutes. Deal done . Donnellys seat don't want repeat customer or to sell cars

Agreed Purchase price for Audi RS3, deposit paid. Order form recived. Booked flights and Ferry on 29th March informed dealership of travel dates and arrival time April 16th to collect car. All going well no issues no problems.
Full balance paid for car on April 15th, due to fly out next day.
Without notice or any care for my time requesting I attend to pick car on Thursday, knowing I have made travel arrangements weeks in advance. Like I dont have other commitments ot anything else better to do than have my time wasted. Requested delivery of car, refused dont deliver anymore despite stating in adverts they deliver all over UK.
Fortunately ferry refund straight forward, left out of pocket for flights.

Saw the Jaguar I wanted, spoke to three different sales people before I sent a payment to reserve the car. Since I was in Wales I had to make arrangements to fly over. On the day I was to book the flight, a call from Stephen said the car had developed a fault and he was unable to say when it would be fixed. He agreed to return my reservation fee if it was going to be delayed and that they would keep in touch.

Still waiting for the call four weeks later but at least I received my fee back! Not a good experience!

I purchased a used van in February 2024 the sales person was fine very helpful in getting Mot Road fund licence etc however after taking delivery of the vehicle a small problem developed which was rectified however as I do regular checks ie fluid levels etc I noticed that the oil level was very low and had to put almost 2 litres of oil to bring to correct level I contacted the sales executive who in turn referred the matter to the service department in fairness they did ring to arrange to have the vehicle checked but unfortunately I missed the call and I received an email from Customer service to arrange again I replied to the email but since no contact has been made the vehicle has been fine no loss of oil I am just annoyed that I bought a vehicle from a reputable company that obviously wasn't checked before it was offered for sale

We purchased a blue Seat Ateca from Seat Donnelly in Dungannon on the 18th of March - the vehicle was delivered to us on the 20th of March as Seat Donnelly Dungannon had banking issues related to the NI bank holiday and would not release the vehicle to us until their bank was open. We had travelled over one hour to collect the vehicle and had to leave without it.

On the 20th the car was delivered at approximately 2:15pm and remained parked until we took it for a first drive at 3:45pm. Upon switching on the engine the engine warning light came on and did not go off.  We drove it for 10 minutes to see if the engine light would go off - it did not.  We then made the decision to drive one hour to Seat Dungannon in order to return the vehicle to be checked.

We were devastated that having had the car in our possession for less than 2 hours an engine warning light came on.  We were disappointed and confused that this was not picked up in any of the checks completed.  We suspected this was likely an underlying issue with the car that was not apparent to us when we test drove it - especially as we had been informed that all services had also been done at Seat Donnelly in Dungannon.

We allowed time for the vehicle to be checked but by lunchtime on the 21st of March we still had no feedback on the reason for the warning light. We then made the decision to ask for a full refund for the vehicle.

In addition to the above we were also disappointed with the standard of the valet (there were several sweet wrappers, a coin on the door bins, a pen on one of the seat pockets and pet hairs) and standard of repair done to the bodywork of the vehicle. We had been assured that the repair would be done not “as new”, but to a high standard, which in our opinion was not the case.  Having said that, we might have been willing to overlook cosmetics if we had a vehicle with a sound engine and sensors but it seems all the workmanship was below standard.

All in all, we were utterly devastated by the experience. In the end we did receive a full refund for the car, however we lost money on fuel and road tax. We cannot put into monetary terms the stress that we felt and time that was wasted during our dealings with this garage. We believe we were sold a faulty and substandard car.

Thank you to Ms Seodhna Kissack for her expertise and communication in our recent commercial Fiat Scudo purchase.

The whole process was seamless, on collection even Brin was on hand to offer advice on the local area for the evening.

Thank you again from the Greenthumb Lawn Care treatment team in Manchester.