Dealerships taking stock after taking full brunt of Storm Babet

Car retailers from around the country are facing a series of rapid clean-up operations following the flood damage caused by Storm Babet.

Storm Babet brought widespread flooding to parts of the UK. A rare Red severe weather warning was put in place in eastern parts of Scotland, along with numerous Amber and Yellow rainfall warnings in many parts of the country which led to widespread flooding.

Scotland's family-owned and operated John Clark Motor Group which has heavily invested in a new dealership in Aberdeen - where exceptional rainfall predictions prompted a Yellow warning - luckily escaped any severe impact to its business.

Hugh Duffy from the Greenwell Road site in Aberdeen, told AM: “We experienced minor damage which you would associate with the high volume of water and wind, but nothing that prevented normal operations throughout the period, some customers cancelled service visits and others delayed collection of their cars, we are now back to business as usual.”

The Inchcape JLR dealership at Derby was hit worse after being forced to close due to damage caused by the River Derwent flooding and advising customers not to attempt to travel to the site. Social media posts showed the severity of the flooding.

“Colleagues remain on hand to assist with your enquiries via telephone, email and through our website,” the dealership stated on its website, adding, “If your vehicle is currently with us for service, you have a future appointment or you have purchased a vehicle, one of our team will be in touch to discuss this further with you.”

Enquiries made by AM seeking an update on the status of the site were being handled by its sister site in Chesterfield.

Perrys Ford at Chesterfield meanwhile reported that it had to take similar action over the weekend when roads around the Spire Walk Business Park became impassable due to flooding.

A spokesperson from Perry’s told AM: “Everything's back to normal now.

"The water has gone from here at the Chesterfield site. The showroom didn't actually get flooded but we had to move all the cars off the forecourt to the rental parking space. Where we are, the roads were completely flooded so we weren't able to open on Saturday. It happens all the time. We can send a man up to the moon but they can't solve the flooding around here.”