Ford's Fiesta
The Ford Fiesta continues to be the car of choice for UK drivers.

According to figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), the Blue Oval shifted 18,651 units of the little supermini during September - the month which saw the new "62" registration appearing on number plates.

Close behind the Fiesta was the Vauxhall Corsa with 17,089 cars being registered and the Ford Focus finished third with 13,837.

Moving down the top ten list, the Vauxhall Astra was in fourth with 9,864 models sold; fifth was the Volkswagen Golf (9,270); sixth the Mercedes-Benz C-Class (7,948); followed by the BMW 3 Series with 7,726; the Nissan Qashqai in eighth (7,471); Volkswagen's Polo finished ninth (7,291) and the Peugeot 208 (6,741) in 10th.

September exceeded expectations by more than 26,000 cars, where total registrations where 8.2 per cent up.

Paul Everitt, SMMT chief executive, said: "Although the economic outlook remains challenging, we are starting to see a tentative return of consumer confidence as motorists explore new products and the latest fuel-efficient technologies."

However, Autoblog understands three volume players registered a large number of cars on the last day of the month.

It's a view backed up by KPMG – John Leech, its UK head of automotive, said: "KPMG's estimate is that the new car sales figures for the year are approximately five per cent overstated by pre-registrations which suggests that the overall market has actually been flat year-to-date."

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