[swiftnfurious]

Though you have mentioned some facts, unless Ford / dealers are asking EVERY waiting customer to cancel their booking or buy another model, the thread title deems misleading!

But yes, a poll on this thread should have been good.

1. Would you hold on to your booking?
2. Did you buy another Ford car?
3. Cancelled your booking and bought another brand's product?

[girishglg]

Even if this is not forced on every customer, even if this is partially correct it is another low for Ford. First they launched a good product at a great price, then increase the price all the time by nearly 1lakh, in the meanwhile cut domestic sales to push exports when the rupee got weaker even when there were hundreds of thousands of local customers waiting for months at end.

Even the dealers played foul when they had a blockbuster by forcibly pushing customers buy unwanted accessories and insurance with them and now when they are making hay, have started deviating customers to other cars.

Come on Ford and its dealers, customers would not just walk across and pick up any other model. Look at what you have got, an ageing sedan in Classic, a dud in new Fiesta, an staid skinned Figo without any updates. The rest are not in contention. With this what do they expect customers to go for one wonders?

This is just the reason why Ford and other such manufacturers will still remain as fringe companies in our market and even if a tin box sold well read Maruti can be the largest car company in our land. Please stop this unethical practices at once!

[mints21]

This is precisely what happens with a company which has seen limited success. They cannot digest so much and that is where the arrogance comes. Many car companies in the past have seen the long waiting lists but they have never come out in open asking customers to change their mindset because of their production constraints or have gone for arbitrary price hikes leaving customers no where.

Ford India has had a series of flop products like the fusion, mondeo. The only product that use to sell till a few years back was the Ikon, which is no longer available. Classic is all set to RIP. The only product that today sell reasonable numbers is Endeavour. Ecosport can get them good numbers but their arrogance will take people away from their fold.

Ford India should remember that a customer that goes out of their fold may not like to come back ever again. High time they keep this kind of arrogance aside and concentrate on fulfilling customer requirements.

[sansvk]

Originally Posted by S@ndy

If the report on Business Standard is to be believed, ford is asking it's customers to either cancel the booking or buy another Ford model.

Question to Ford is which other models have you got?
The Aging Figo, Paralysed Classic, Dead Fiesta and the Expired Endeavour?

[tifoso]

Though Ford hasn't asked each of us to cancel our bookings directly in some cases, such as mine, they have given a strong enough indirect guidance to do so. Ecosport that i was scheduled to get this Jan is now being expected to come in Jan 2015. This, I believe, is nothing short of saying that cancel the booking and look elsewhere.

With that sort of a waiting, and the increased prices I definitely would not wait on for delivery. I can pretty much predict another couple of price hikes before i get my hands on it.

[Saanil]

I would actually wait for some concrete information on this before passing any comments on Ford. But in case this is true, I will be disappointed.

[Geo_Ipe]

To answer the question - NO!

Like some people claim, Ford did launch the Ecosport with a very VFM price tag. But looking at it retrospectively, Ford never planned to sell many Ecosport's at that price point. They've been trying to take us customers for a ride, by promising stuff they never even planned to deliver. 15% in 7 months is unethical and atrocious!! And if I remember correctly, the Titanium variant has been losing features too??

And if Ford is asking customers to buy other models, they are digging their own graves! As it is, i've heard a lot of Ford owners claiming high maintenance costs, from the Ikon days.

And personally too, the Ecosport never appealed to me thaaaat much. A new segment, agreed, but not even a soft roader. The hype will die down soon. And Ford is helping itself go down that road...

[Powersteer]

This coincides with the price reduction on the erstwhile Fiesta/Classic.

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian...up-1-lakh.html

Debatable but many find the earlier Fiesta a wonderful car to drive in, despite its age.

[tharian]

Unbelievable!

Although I am fan of Ford cars, no way am I fan of the company or management. First they launch the Ecosport in a price range that everyone wants to buy one, and when they do, they are given a crazy waiting period and now, this.

If there is a way not to do business, this is how you do it.

It looks like Ford is actually not interested in the Indian market, they are just interested in producing their cars in India.

They had and have one of the best line up of cars, but all except a couple were failures only becuase of their wrong business attitude to the Indian market.

[sridhar24]

This price increase is very unreasonable and it takes away the VFM proposition now. Maybe Ford management had this idea from the beginning to jsut to create a huge demand and now increase the prices suddenly and take the customers for a ride. It surely will drive away quite a lot of potential customers. Its none but their own loss and will eventually pay for it. I have never admired their management's business ethics, and this again proves that.

[arjab]

Ford should learn a thing or two about demand management from Hyundai.

Going slightly here, the Hyundai i10 Grand has also been pretty successful with an average sale of around 9000 units per month (more than Ecosport in fact).
If you want to buy an i10 Grand now, most variants are available within 12-20 days of placing one's order - and most orders meet the customer's colour choice etc. And this seems to be consistent across the country - quite a few of my friends / acquaintances have bought the i10 Grand in cities as far apart as Baroda to Guwahati - but the "waiting period" for all was the same.

And Hyundai exports the Grand i10 too - almost in same numbers as Ford does the Ecosport.
Which brings us to the moot point - is it true that Ford could not estimate demand and hence things went out of control and created this huge supply - demand mismatch?

Or, is it because of the fact that Ford India is making much more money by exporting (because of the depreciated rupee) and is intent on making hay while the sun shines - indian customers be damned !

Or is it because they did some goof up in their currency hedging, which has led to expensive imports and hence the complete stoppage of bookings for all the Petrol variants - the Ecoboost engine (known as the 1.0L FOX) is imported from their Cologne plant and the 1.5 NA Gasoline is also imported (forgot which plant - is it S.Africa?).

Or is it a combination of all of the above?

Whatever it is - Ford is certainly not winning any brownie points for their behaviour and attitude towards the Indian customer.

The Indian customer, bestowed with an immense "patience index" possibly the highest in the world - can be tremendously loyal if treated well or can be extremely unforgiving and suspect of an OEM's overtures, had the OEM taken them for a ride at any point of time, and then later on, is trying to make amends for their sins.

Just ask Fiat , Peugeot et al and they will tell Ford how NOT to treat the Indian customer.

Let's hope Ford sets their house in order and does not end up ruining its reputation.

[libranof1987]

Ford's indifference in managing the waiting period and arrogance in hiking the price, not offering price protection, asking people to cancel bookings and not taking enough steps to reduce the waiting period baffles me.

They don't have a presence in all the segments in the Indian auto market, none of their offerings are even close to being segments leaders and they go about the Ecosport in this way. I really do hope they learn a lesson or two on customer centricity.

[Apple]

I've booked EcoSport in October and I did not receive any such communication from dealer/Ford.

I'll hold my booking as I'm not in a hurry to own a car and will also wait for new models to be announced in Auto Expo.

[sukiwa]

This will be bad publicity for Ecosport and Ford India. They should at least offer price protection to existing bookings.

Originally Posted by mints21

Ford India has had a series of flop products like the fusion, mondeo. The only product that use to sell till a few years back was the Ikon, which is no longer available.

What about success of Ford Figo?

[zenren]

Originally Posted by Apple

I've booked EcoSport in October and I did not receive any such communication from dealer/Ford.

I'll hold my booking as I'm not in a hurry to own a car and will also wait for new models to be announced in Auto Expo.

Just curious, what is the expected delivery date that Ford has promised for you?

Also, as someone has quoted below, will you still hold on to the booking if the expected delivery date is mid-2015?

Originally Posted by sukiwa

What about success of Ford Figo?

If we are looking at the past performance, I think the old Fiesta too was a successful product for Ford. The fact that its no longer modern enough in the current scenario and doesn't sell well cannot take away the fact that it was successful in the past.