Dealership Rant

At least with Toyota - it is only shady dealers to worry about. GM is making their customers buy its premium subscriptions for $1,500 extra.
https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/10/business/gm-onstar-mandatory/index.html

 

Uhhhh. Mama Toyota has a national advertising campaign. And has for decades and decades and decades. You better believe they can.

 

Back in 2017, when I bought my SS, the dealership salesperson literally got pissed at me for not activating OnStar. To this day it's not activated.

 

What does advertising have to do with anything?

 

OP think dealers are out there on their knees begging to sell a car/truck. Clearly lives under a rock, and hasn't noticed there isn't much cars/trucks out there on the lots to sell atm. Even before shortages, dealers have all been ruthless, not just Toyota. With trucks, specially 4x4's, you have zero leverage right now. They have 20 more buyers after you, they can call to buy the truck. Basic supply-demand jr.

 

Had THE worst experience at Ford. For basic services couldn’t get in for weeks! I wonder why because they are fixing their unreliable products 24/7. Service and sales dept complete jokes.

WallStreet journal last week had a an article about Ford and their poor reliability. Ford having the most warranty coverage charges. Ford recently hired a former JD power exec to help fix these ongoing issues. That I think is smart. My take is Ford rushes their products to be the newest and greatest - reliability suffers. Toy is having some growing pains with this new truck but will get it figured out. Japanese culture does not reinvent the wheel- the refine, smooth, polish till the wheel is perfect.

 

My 2008 was a custom order. I picked packages, and colors (both interior and exterior).

 

When I read that story, my interpretation was that Ford was blaming all their reliability problems on their parts suppliers and were going to try to get reimbursed by the suppliers for warranty repairs. You know, instead of taking ownership of their problems and trying to fix them.

 

Yeah, but you hate Ford. Is it possible you had a bit of confirmation bias going? Honest question, as I don't care one way or the other about Ford.

 

That was just how I read the story. I don't think there was any bias but I'm sorry if there was. I'll have to see if I can find the story again.

I don't think I hate Ford more than I hate a lot of other car companies.

 

No need to apologize, and maybe I'm confusing you with someone else. I thought we had discussed and you were opposed to Ford on the basis of some of Henry Ford's personal beliefs?

 

It's common practice for vehicle manufacturers to receive reimbursement from parts suppliers for warranty claims(I worked at Honda for 12 years, FYI).

 

Could have been the bias of whoever wrote that story, too. This one makes it sound like they have a plan that they're putting in place right now.

https://www.bangkokpost.com/business/2363536/at-ford-quality-is-now-problem-1

This is what I was talking about. It's not the same story I read at the time and, while it's similar, it also has some additional information the original story I read didn't.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ford-motor-warranty-focus-idUSKBN2841BV

 

I think I was busting your balls when I posted that.

If I had to buy a domestic, GM would be my first choice but Ford would be my second.

 

Yeah, I just found another story talking about that. Supposedly the option to do that is in all the contracts but Ford hasn't been taking advantage of it until now. The story also says that defective parts only account for about a third of Ford's warranty claims.

 

I'm positive they've been doing it all along, but just now being vocal about it.

 

I suppose it's possible Lisa is lying but I don't see why she would be.

 

Stop apologizing. Your Canadian is showing.

Just busting back.


I'm honestly shocked that I remember that conversation at all. My brain retains odd things.

 

Apparently I only remember bad things about Ford.

 

I wonder how many people commenting here have actually bought a new vehicle in the past…when there were no supply issues and there were actually cars and trucks on the lot to pick from, when you could actually bargain with a dealership to get what you wanted…or walk away and go to another dealership to get it?

Unless you actually NEED a new vehicle right now don’t buy one unless you can get it for MSRP (or less ) and if you’re buying a Tundra be ready to get close to what you want, not exactly what you want unless you’re extremely lucky.

 

https://www.stout.com/en/insights/c...hift-more-warranty-costs-onto-their-suppliers

A good article to read, dated 2016, but goes back to 2002 or so.

 

Ford stopped pre-inspecting parts before assembly. I guess they were willing to take the chance and play the odds of vehicles having issues as a result. I think they said that their warranty claims has risen by 5% or so. With as many vehicles as they build that is a crap ton of issues. I previously owned a 2020 F-150 and it had a lot of issues I think were due to it being built during covid. They wer and still are slapping them together to get them out and dropped their "Quality is job one" slogan. I think quality has gone to crap on everything since covid. Customer service is completely gone due to Karens complaining over any little thing and dealerships not paying their techs decent wages.