I checked out an ex lease A4 last year. I never proceeded with the purchase due to the non franchised service history. For certain cars over 3 years old, there are benefits with servicing and MOT costs through the Audi dealer network if a car has a full Audi history .

I think that fleet managers and company car policies have become rather more hard-nosed these days as costs are sweated.

Nobody gets to swap their car just 'cos the new plates are out these days and everyone's jacking the contract length up to four years and 100,000+ miles. They also don't dob in cars early any more. If a car becomes available before its contract is up, it sits around and gets allocated to the next person who needs one. This latter is a right pain. You run yours up to four years, you start test driving replacements and then some swine leaves who has some god-awful French oil-burner with two and a half years still to run on it......