The general low standard of UK VW dealers is shocking. Most of the sales people have zero product knowledge, are not interested in delivering anything that could remotely be described as customer service and view their job as simply a way of killing time between 9 and 5 in order to get a monthly paycheck with the least amount of effort. They don't return emails or phone calls. Most have failed GCSE Maths so can barely add up the costs of extras let alone work out finance payments. My last car purchase was a Lexus and the dealer experience was unbelievably good. Considering that a Golf GTI now costs the same as a basic IS250, it is very tempting to take my business back to Japan. Unfortunately, the Lexus was a dog to drive, had no rear passenger space and a very small boot. In contrast, the Golf is a much more practical car, more economical, faster and better to drive even if it has to concede a premium quality edge to the Lexus.
So I guess it is all about the car itself at the end of the day, but your post shows that the dealer isn't keeping you reliably informed about what's going on. I can't help feeling that people are buying Golfs despite VW dealers, not because of them. How hard is it to train decent sales people, for goodness sake?