This isn’t important enough to warrant a post to GQ, but it’s a factual question of sorts (though maybe the answers will depend on the dealer or situation), so I’ll go MPSIMS.
About eight years ago, I bought a late-model used car from a car dealership, planning to pay in cash after selling my prior vehicle in a private sale instead of trading it in. It was a Saturday afternoon, so I put $5,000 as a down payment on my credit card to lock in the sale, agreeing to return on Monday with a cashier’s check for the remaining $25,000.
I went in after work on Monday, got greeted by the salesman, cooled my heels for 15 minutes and then spent 45 minutes in a room getting annoyed with their “financing officer” despite having the papers already in order from Saturday for a cash purchase. I sat there refusing various flavors of extended warranties and service contracts before he signed all the right forms to conclude the sale (basically forms documenting that he’d tried to sell me that stuff, from what I could tell - I was signing forms “refusing” the opportunity to get those deals).
I exited his office and the salesman escorted me to their cashier window, where I was given the keys to the car, waiting for me right outside the door.
The salesman shook my hand, apologized a bit for the “hassle” involved in picking up the car, and said he hoped I’d come back for servicing or for our next car purchase.
I looked him in the eye - he’d been very friendly and low pressure while showing me 3 or 4 different cars, had talked to me about his kids who were a little older than my own who had been climbing in and out of all the prospective vehicles - and said, “So, that’s it? I’m finally done with all the paperwork?”
“That’s it!”
“What about the registration, title, plates, and all that?”
“The plates are on the car, and the title and registration care are here (points to them)”.
“And the title is clear, in my name?”
“Yes, if there was a lien recorded, it’d be indicated on the title.”
“So the car’s all mine, I can just drive off now?”
“That’s right! Congratulations!”
“It just feels like we’re forgetting something.”
“No, you’re good to go!”
I looked him in the eye, with his broad smile and everything, while shaking his hand a little longer.
I ran through different scenarios in my mind, weighed my potential actions or inactions against a judgment of my soul… Then sighed, and with my free hand, reached into my jacket and pulled out the cashier’s check made out to their dealership in the amount of $25,000 and handed it it him without saying anything.
His handshake and face froze. His eyes bugged out. His jaw dropped. He was a black man, so maybe it was a trick of the light, but he seemed to go ash gray.
I laughed and said something like, “Think again, buddy!” while slapping him on the back, which almost sent him to the floor, his knees were a little shaky. He stammered “Oh, my God --”, then said “thank you”, to which I said, “You gotta be more careful!” and left.
So here’s what I was wondering: had I left without handing over the check, what would have happened?
From my perspective, I’m pretty sure I could have taken the check back to my bank the next day, said I had ended up not needing to use the check after all, and had the money redeposited into the account it had come from. I would have had all the paperwork documenting me as the legal and full owner of the car, as processed by the dealership itself, and that would basically be that.
But in my mind’s eye, in that 2 or 3 seconds that I held his handshake, I pictured either the salesman or the financing officer losing their job or worse, over the shortfall. $25,000 is a lot of money, but it was money I obviously could afford and had planned to spend, and I wasn’t about to dirty my soul and spend the rest of my life imagining the guy’s life ruined, even the annoying financing officer, who after all was only doing his job.
I would assume it was the financing officer’s job to have taken my check, in the 45 minute period he spent trying to sell me an extended warranty.
But, from the salesman’s very physical reactions, I suspect it’d have been HIM on the hook had I driven off. Maybe because the forms that documented it as a cash sale required the salesman to take the money?
And what would have happened to them anyway? Fired, I assume, but would either or both of them be personally responsible to make good on the $25K, or is there some kind of insurance that would kick in?