[sivathetechwiz]

Hi Guys,

Thought I should share my negative experience of dealing with a car dealership when I bought my Ford Aspire 1.2P Titanium from Hans Ford, Porur, Chennai.
(https://www.hansford.in/)

If you have a friend or family member working for Ford India, you might be aware of a little benefit that their referral while booking a new Ford car could get you - free 3rd and 4th year extended warranty (beyond the first two years of warranty that Ford provides).

How this normally would work is, my friend working for Ford India refers me for such a benefit by generating a 'code' on his side. This code, is sent to the dealership and used during my booking and they would honor it by attaching a 3rd and 4th year extended warranty to my car. In some way, Ford reimburses the dealership for the cost of this benefit.

I followed the same steps and the dealership that I chose to deal with was Hans Ford, Porur, Chennai when I booked by Ford Aspire back in December 2017. I shared all required details as requested by the sales consultant and he seemed to be aware of this benefit and on how this is to be processed. This was recorded in the Vehicle Pricing Form under "Discount offered - Corporate:" section as "F&F - 10000 (3rd, 4th)" (Handwritten).



Everything appeared to go smooth and on the day of the car delivery, my documents did not indicate this extended warranty. I know the Team-BHP advice states suggests that "Ensure everything that was promised were delivered before signing PDI and delivery" - so on enquiring whether we'd receive any written/printed receipt indicating the extended warranty it, we were assured that this is recorded in their 'System' and if we wanted a written proof to guarantee us, the "Vehicle Pricing Form" (signed by the consultant, buyer and the manager of the branch) already has a note of this. This sounded reasonable especially as I wasn't sure if they'd be able to generate a 'receipt' for this extended warranty which is a 'benefit' and no monetary transaction was involved.

During one of the later scheduled vehicle service before the first year, I noticed that the sales consultant was not working there anymore. It just occurred to me that I still don't have a proof of the extended warranty and so I asked the employee over there to check if this shows up in their system - and as I feared, it is not recorded in their system! What are the odds?! I explained them what happened, but right then I didn't have the original "Vehicle Pricing Form" with me. They too agreed to look into their physical records and revert to me. Fine, reasonable I thought.

My thoughts during that day:
Has the sales consultant deliberately cheated me? Why would he do that, he was nice to me all along - and I was nice to him and got him a gift as I took delivery (Thanks to TeamBHP for adding this to the checklist) - after all the dealership would get reimbursed for the benefit anyway so there is no reason to skimp on that I thought.
Was that a lazy miss on their part? Most likely. They deal with a lot of customers, they may have missed recording this in their system despite confirming to me that they did record it. It is going to be one more hassle for me to prove that it indeed was promised - but hey I got this physically recorded and signed in their pre-numbered VPF, so I'm safe.

Some time later I enquired with them to get this resolved, this time there was a (New?) Customer Relationship Manager who assured to get to the bottom of this.
After multiple follow-ups and failed promises from their side - there was no progress on this issue. I found the original "Vehicle Pricing Form" and shared a copy of that with the CRM sometime before the completion of 1st year (December 2018). I also shared the initial code generated for my F&F benefit - he thanked me for that and assured he'll look into this.
After a frustrating number of follow-ups and many months later, he admitted that they indeed found what the issue was - that the sales consultant at that time had failed to log a claim with Ford for them to be eligible for a reimbursement and hence they didn't get paid for this. It was clearly a lapse on their side. Apparently, since its been more than a year, they wouldn't be able to file for it now.
Then came the shocker - "...and therefore, you will not be getting 3rd and 4th year extended warranty for free". Adding more to the injury, he says "...you may, if you want, get the extended warranty for 3rd and 4th year by paying the current price for the same." (Which had increased since the time I bought the car, but immaterial, why should I even consider that as an option?)

I could not believe what I was hearing - a CRM for a dealership admits that I've been promised this benefit, admits that it was a lapse on their side that it wasn't applied, but goes on to say that since they didn't make money out of this, they won't provide me the extended warranty.
If they lost the money I paid them for the car after a few months, are they going to ask me to return my car AND pay depreciation because 'hey, we didn't get your money'?

He says this was the decision of the management there is no further escalation possible - we did mention that we plan to take this up with Ford India - but they appear to not give a damn about this. So I did raise this as an issue to Ford India by email - I really doubt if they'll provide an acceptable resolution.
And it worries me that this is the place I plan to take my car for scheduled maintenance.

I'd want to ask the helpful, wise crowd of TeamBHPians - what is the best way to take this forward?

On a larger thoughts, even if I don't get this extended warranty, I'd want to throw light on the indifferent treatment and the unethical practices of certain car dealerships like Hans Ford.
Even if they do come back post escalations and agree to offer this, I wonder, do they expect customers to fight always for what was rightfully theirs? And what is Ford India doing in this regard?
It's easy for a business or brand to save face by offering an apology and remedy for issues raised and shared over public forums like these - and some people cheer for their 'prompt handling of customer concern' - but why aren't they ready to do that when they had a chance, when the customer raises an issue with them directly? If they could only act concerned when customer ask them something over a public platform, then I wonder what real customer service is.

[bottle]

Keep sharing this on as many social media platforms as you can and see if you can get a response , thats the only way to get a response these days

[rsrnair80]

See if you can tag Ford's worldwide "Contact Us" emails.

I had a similar experience in a VW service center in Chennai. Some of the extra services (paid) that i requested was not done but it was noted as'done' and was chanrged for the same. Escalating to the service center and to VW India did not work.

What worked finally was when I included VW Group Woldwide Support emails, who acknowledged my email promptly and also ensured the service center called me back for a free service.

[GTO]

Originally Posted by sivathetechwiz

If you have a friend or family member working for Ford India, you might be aware of a little benefit that their referral while booking a new Ford car could get you - free 3rd and 4th year extended warranty (beyond the first two years of warranty that Ford provides).

How this normally would work is, my friend working for Ford India refers me for such a benefit by generating a 'code' on his side. This code, is sent to the dealership and used during my booking and they would honor it by attaching a 3rd and 4th year extended warranty to my car. In some way, Ford reimburses the dealership for the cost of this benefit.

Why not use the help of the same friend who works in Ford India? He might surely be able to ensure that your legitimate complaint reaches the right channels .

Even if he has left Ford, he'd surely have some ex-colleagues he can speak to?

[sivathetechwiz]

Thanks all for your comments!

Ford India did respond, but didn't help. Ford India says, "the dealer claims they have included this benefit as a cash discount" - in other words they claim that the cash discount offered on my Aspire included the F&F extended warranty value.

This is not true at all and it's a new statement they are making to evade this - why would they in any sense write in the order form saying 'F&F 3rd and 4th year' if they had already included this value as a cash discount?

Further, I did ask Ford India if the dealer ever claimed this F&F discount with them, they confirmed that the dealer didn't - doesn't that clearly reveal the truth? Was the dealer being very generous in 'offering me a cash discount' though they didn't claim this from Ford? Doesn't add up, doesn't it?

On raising this as a point to Ford India, they just say 'now it's a dispute between you and the dealer, Ford India cannot intervene' - I can't believe a brand like Ford back off and call this a 'customer vs dealer issue which they can't intervene in' - illustrates the poor state of consumer protection here - a Car dealer like Hand Ford pulling off a quick trick in any possible way and a respected car brand like Ford turning a blind eye to these practices.

@GTO, thanks for the suggestion! Yes I could do that, he did everything right from his side more than a year ago and it is a car dealer who's messed up - I could only think of the corporate work life and stress that it'd bring for someone - didn't want to add another headache by asking for help to resolve the issue I got with the car dealer.

On thinking of this, I do want to take this on myself and see how far it goes when a customer reaches out to legitimate channels about an issue with the right information. I could just be one victim out of thousands - not everyone uses TeamBHP as a platform to post their grievances to the community - I'm certain there are so many out there who are being scammed. What worries me most is that if someone who took the necessary precautions and has access to the right mediums to surface this issue still cannot get this resolved right, what about many others out there?

For now, I'm going to write to Ford India over email again to get their response in writing - I wanna see if they would be prepared to say in writing that 'Ford India cannot interfere in this Customer - Dealer conflict' (I wonder, when does a car owner EVER deal with the brand directly?)

[sivathetechwiz]

Originally Posted by rsrnair80

See if you can tag Ford's worldwide "Contact Us" emails.

I had a similar experience in a VW service center in Chennai. Some of the extra services (paid) that i requested was not done but it was noted as'done' and was chanrged for the same. Escalating to the service center and to VW India did not work.

What worked finally was when I included VW Group Woldwide Support emails, who acknowledged my email promptly and also ensured the service center called me back for a free service.

I tried searching for an email to contact Ford Worldwide but could not find any - their @Ford twitter handle is the one I found, and have reached out to them. I'm waiting to see how the parent company is trying to handle this.