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Now I am going to talk about the experience with Harpreet ford and some initial feedback on the car. The first part of this post basically started as an email which I thought of shooting to Ford having gone through some traumatic experience with HF, Gurgaon during service. But somehow never sent that mail.
I am compelled to write this mail to you after having been thorough what I would call an absolute suicidal approach in today’s competitive market. It is a long mail and need patience. If you care enough to know, please go on and read it.
I happen to be an owner of a Ford Fiesta, Zxi, Petrol bought in the month of April’ 2010 from Harpreet Ford, Gurgaon. Would like to bring a few points to you and would very eagerly wait to see how Ford reacts to it.
Having set aside all the advices against “not so good” experience of Ford Dealers and after sales service, eventually my Boss drives a Fusion and is in love with the “car” but he was most vocal on suggesting me not to buy a Ford (More on that later), I decided to buy this vehicle hoping there is only one way to go for companies which want to remain in the market. And that is obviously to improve.
However, my worst fears (or should I say of those who suggested me not to buy a Ford) came true on the day of delivery itself. I was out to take my Fiesta home with wife and kid and there I saw a dent on the front bumper of my car which I only saw a day before standing spotless at the backyard of the dealership. I thought it’s no major thing, it can happen to any car at any dealer. What surprised me was the way the issue got handled in a hush-hush mode and someone doing a touch-up on the scratch. I let it go as it was an important day in my life and I did not want to ruin it with an incident like that. May be close to 3 hours procedure of taking delivery (that despite doing all formalities well in advance) may have had something to do it as well.
I drove the car, monitoring some niggling issues which I thought of bringing up when my first service is due. The day came on 10th of July and it was the day when car was going to go back to Harpreet Ford. This is when I thought I had enough of it and it is time to check with you folks at Ford to ascertain weather this is how Ford operates or Harpreet Ford is an aberration. Here is the chain of events for you to know how disappointed I am at the moment.
10th of July, I took the car to service center at 9 in the morning as advised. The guards did not even opened the gates as yet and on enquiring I got a reply “Sir, ye aadha sarkari office hai aur aadha dealership, yahan log 9:30 se pehle nahin aate”. (Translates to: Sir this is half of a government office and half of a automobile dealership, no one turns up here before 9:30). Am I to believe my ears?
I queued up, which was eventually blocking the traffic half way though the main road, and waited for someone to come and initiate the Job Card process. Waited enough before I decided to find someone on my own and give the car for service. I don’t even have adequate words to describe the attitude available service in-charges were having there. Finally someone had some mercy and told few of us that our assigned service in charge (Indresh) was not at work that day so some Mr. Rizwan would take care of it.
Mr. Rizwan came only after countless people (None in any kind of uniform) drove my car all around the service station to make space for vehicles which kept coming in. And I only haplessly watched as it was being run worse then the autos I have seen in Gurgaon. He initiated the job card. Issues told. Much after in the process he realized (after turning pages up and down from the service log book) that it is a Fiesta and during first service it only required general inspection. Trust me (I have Job card too to prove it) before that, he had already come up with a tentative cost of Rs 1500 for first service. Should I be panicked already?
Finally having created the Job Card correctly, he came with a peach of a statement I haven’t heard in a long time. “Sir, I don’t remember my cell number so I am not writing it here. You can come any time after 3 and car shall be ready”. I am dumb folded now.
Anyways, I mumbled a prayer and reached Harpreet Ford at 3:30 in the afternoon. My car was standing there, dirtier then how I gave it to them. And for a moment I went breathless when I saw a BIG, DEEP scratch on left rear bumper mocking at my decision of buying a Ford. I tried reaching Mr. Rizwan which I obviously could not as I did not even had his number and no one in the service center was interested in finding him for me. I called up my Sales Rep and he put me through Ms. Swati who I believe works in the capacity of some kind of customer service manager.
I told her what the issue was and I also thought it is only appropriate to tell her that it has happened twice with me after taking a “scratched” car during delivery, I don’t know if it was her best attempt to soothe me and clear herself off or she was really over worked that day. Her reply was “sir, this is a small service center in terms of area, these kind of things keep happening”. I asked a stupid question “then why call so many cars for service in a day”. Since the question was stupid, what do you expect the answer would be. Well it was “Sir, how can this be acceptable to any one”. I have no more comments.
Mr. Rizwan chased to establish that this indeed happened when the car was with Harpreet Ford, which thankfully he did. Can’t thank god enough for small mercies. Now was the time to see how Harpreet Ford handles this situation. And unfortunately even here they did not emerge a winner.
I was told to wait while ho goes and talk to his senior. After about 20 minutes he came back with a reply that I can take my car back home today. I can bring it on any later date and they will fix it without charging me. (wow). I insisted that I meet this senior of him as I was not only interested in getting the car fixed, I was keen to regain the confidence on Ford which was at the brinks at that time.
I walked into Mr. Rajiv’s room who is GM, Service at Harpreet Ford. What unfolded there between Mr. Rajiv and Mr. Rizwan is kiddish to say the least lets just not even talk about acceptable professionalism here. I was in his room with Rizwan, Mr. Rajiv walked in later. Even before I could say a word, he started shouting on Rizwan like a road side mechanic does to his juniors with things like “if this happens next time, I am going to debit you”. Having enacted this for 3 minutes, he turned to me and came out with some decades old “customer delight comments”. Went to the extent of saying, when I come here next I may not even find Rizwan here. Whoa, am I trying to eat away someone’s job or what?. He never gave me an opportunity to say what I wanted to. All I wanted to say was, “Mr. Rajiv, there is a very clear opportunity for you to find out what is going wrong in your service center, you being GM here. A car getting a dent is an accident. A car getting a scratch two out of two times it visits you is a fundamental problem in the procedures and systems. And on top of that your customer service manager saying “Sir, this keeps happening” is a disaster in the making”. Alas, he never let me do that before he did what, at best, I would call a down market ploy to soothe a frustrated customer.
I thought of not wasting my energies and whatever learning I have had in my definitely smaller career than that of Mr. Rajiv and decided to walk away with my car with a promised date of turning back and getting it fixed. I now noticed that car has some very sticky black spots on the front bumper. I asked Mr. Rizwan to at least clean those. He managed to get hold of someone in more than half an hour. This fellow came and tried cleaning the spots. After tackling about 3 of them in 15 minutes, he vanished saying he will come back with some kind of a “chemical” to clean those. Another wait of 10 minutes I reached Rizwan again. He got some other chap who then started the drill.
While this was on I noticed the car as a whole is not looking like “washed”. I opened the bonnet and there was dust all over the place. I asked the cleaning in-charge there if this car was washed at all to which he was adamant that it was. Some other fellow came out, checked and said that though there is generous amount of dust and “mud” but this car was indeed washed. It is just that the water quality of Gurgaon is such that after a wash plastics do look white. Lo and behold, I was being introduced to a phenomena which I could not unearth having driven a car for last 6 years in Gurgaon.
Time to go back to Mr. Rajiv again. He came, inspected the car, and without commenting anything asked me to follow him. I mean..why? So, he took me to the area where cars are washed and asked for washing in-charge, he was told that guy had already left. So much for being GM of Service Center I thought. Anyway, that is where I learnt that it is an out sourced service by Harpreet Ford.
Someone was deputed again to check my car and some Mr. Thomas Kutty came to inspect the car. Though not very openly, but he agreed that my car “may not have been washed thoroughly”. As a good will gesture, he wrote on the back of the bill that I am eligible for a free wash and clean “the next time I visit Harpreet Ford”. This bill already had a mention of a free of cost “dent repair the next time I visit Harpreet Ford”.
Now come to think of it. A Ford Fiesta when goes for first service, it only undergoes a “general check up”. Least you could expect is that they will at least wash the car. And there I was, trying to tell each any every person at Harpreet Ford how a “washed” car look like in Gurgoan. Which eventually they agreed after about one and a half hour, and that to in the same secret “hush hush” manner I spoke about during my buying experience.
As a true well wisher of Harpreet Ford, I decided to let at least one person higher up know what was happening here. Reached the receptionist of Harpreet Ford to get the name of the right person. I was given a name but, surprise surprise, with incorrect number and incorrect designation. I was told that this Mr. Mathew is GM Service for Ford India, North .. a Ford employee. It’s only after talking to him I came to know that he is a Harpreet Ford employee looking after all service centers of Harpreet Ford.
I called up Mr. Mathew. He gave me a patient listening and took the details of my car. He promised me that this will be fixed on Monday and that he will see that my car is picked by them, fixed, delivered back to me.
On Monday, my car was picked up from my place and delivered back to me in the evening with a very decent paint job done on the scratch. The credit should be given where it is due, and I think Mr. Mathew delivered on every single word he said to me on my brief call with him on Saturday. Good job there Harpreet Ford, I only hope that this service excellence becomes a routine and not result of an escalation. Why did it take so much time and calling up their superiors for them to own up this as their mistake and act accoddingly.
Lastly, let me come back to why my boss was against me buying a Ford. This can not be corroborated, I am wording the incident as it is, it is for Ford to decide if they want to inspect the said incident. I shall not be able to furnish any details. He had some problems with some parts of his fusion which happened to be an expensive repair. He was given an offer by Harpreet Ford to get this done at half the cost of spare. On enquiring how will they do it, the answer was, we get so many cars under warranty we can lift one from any one of them. I have nothing more to say on this.
Experience with Harpreet Ford aside, I don’t think I have anything to say bout the car which has not been said already. It’s a sheer delight to drive, easier to park than even my Maruti 800 and absolute fun to be in.
I have cloaked about 3500 kilometers so far. City average with about 70% AC is a notch below 11 (hovers between 10.5 and 10.9) and on highway it reached upto 14.Yes, she has already done a long drive. Since my parents could not be here when I took the delivery, we decided to drive down to our parents, about 500 kilometers away, over a weekend and this is where I got maximum mileage of 14.
The small issues that I talked about earlier, which Harpreet Ford expectedly refused to acknowledge, is basically a thud sound (not very loud but not ignorable too) on the slightest of potholes or speed breakers even if my speed is in 20ts. A loose plastic panel which they seems to have fixed during the first service.
Pretty much that, did not have any other problem as such. The car stalled sometimes during peak hour traffic when I negotiated quick start and stop overs. But I think that is more attributable to me then the vehicle. Will keep an eye on that.
Have not done any mods yet, seriously out of budget. Except an after market seat and steering covers and tints. I got this done @ Sekhri Car Dec, Karol Bagh. Needless to say I got them here on team-bhp it self. I am pretty satisfied with the tints. Seat covers are nothing great to write home about, I got what I paid for. In fact, when I went to Harpreet Ford for service, no less than 3 people asked me where did I get my tints done from.
Alloys, amp and a sub-woofer is in the pipe line as and when finances permit.
Will post some pics later in the day that includes tint and other smaller milestones. | 
6th August 2010, 10:40
