I took my truck to the dealer for my appointment to have some warranty work done. My dealer is 2 hours away from me, and I took it there because I hopefully can trust them to fix my truck and all the other Ford dealers in my area are terrible. I scheduled an apptmt a month ago, told them all the specific issues so they'd know the time frame on fixing it. I planned it so I would get it back today (a 1 day fix) and have it this weekend. Well they told me they were booked up and might not get it completed today. I questioned them and told them I had made the appointment well ahead of time for this reason, etc., and they told me that an apptmt just guarantees that it will get in that day, but it doesn't put you ahead of any others. I know for a fact that a month ago there couldn't have been a solid list of people getting work done. This pisses me off because I had to leave my truck there, and I personally won't be able to pick it up until the middle of next week due to my work and scheduled to be out of town. I had to ask customer service to get me a car to drive because they first told me no in the service dept. Anyway, I feel like I got jerked around and I was wanting to know your opinions on it based on how long it sounds like these things take to fix or check on my truck. Do you think it should have been done in 1 day, they said it takes 2 days to do this stuff?? Below is a list of what I asked them to do. Also, please tell me what you think out of this list will actually get done. All of it was valid and reasonable, but I've read here about how everyone is getting treated bad at these dealerships and not getting much of it fixed.

List of things for them to check/fix: Butyl pad, tilt wheel lever fell off, brakes squeeking bad, the shudder problem in the rear of the truck, PCM reflash because it seems to have delayed throttle response (but its not super bad), a/c because it doesn't get very cool (it gets mostly "cool" but not nearly as cool as other vehicles I've had), and I asked them to check the ticking noise in the engine.

All in all, should this take 2 days if they devoted the time to work on it? Will I get it all done or will they hold out on things like the reflash and the brakes and a/c? Also, I called and they didn't even get my truck in until 2:00 this afternoon and I took it for them yesterday afternoon so they could have it first thing this morning. I'm thinking about hitting up the customer service dept w/ some complaints when I go to pick it up. I just hope it's fixed right.

 

Next time set the appointment on a monday [early morning], most dealers try to get everything out on friday which means vehicles that are from previous days get out and they dont hold the cars on the weekends. Another thing, there might be 15 techs but only 1-2 of those techs might do diag.

Butyl pad
tilt wheel lever fell off
brakes squeeking bad
shudder problem
PCM reflash
a/c
check the ticking noise


I would consider that thats of diag time, but nor am i a tech so let Q chime in on that.

 

How soon they get your truck out is dependent on a lot of things; they may have specific techs to look at specific concerns on your truck, for instance, a driveline guy to look at the shudder problem, the engine guy to look at the ticking noise from the engine, HVAC guy for the A/C, etc. If those guys already have a backlog going into that day, it may take a bit before they get to you. But, given an appointment, and if they weren't terribly backed up, I don't see why they couldn't have at least started on your truck earlier than 2 PM. It really depends on the service department...the place I work at, for instance, often deals with quicky service waiters and appointment waiters for the first half of the morning, since we have a relatively small staff, then tends to the non-waiting appointments that afternoon.

 

Q,

That all makes sense, it's a fairly good sized service dept. it seems. They are located in Nashville, TN and the dealer is more of what I call a volume dealer that is well known, so I figure they should be pretty good. I didn't know about some places where different people look at different things, so that goes to show how the local places where I live do things differently (I don't think they have specific people for specific things) and exactly why I chose to take it to my dealer 2 hours away. Anyway, I totally think they should have gotten the truck in before 2pm, but as long as it gets finished in 2 days then it's okay with me. If they do the job right, I won't have any problems with it taking 2 days or whatever, but if it's not done right then I'm going to be upset. So what did you think about the reflash and stuff? You think they'll do it?

I have heard that if you call an 800 # in your manual that ford will help you with your problems (such as dealers) and that they actually have a 3 way phone conversation with your dealer to solve the problem if you call in. You know anything about this? I heard this is a good thing to do if your vehicle isn't fixed properly. I also heard it gets the service mgr in lots of trouble.

 

Q,

I finally got my truck back today after 6 days. It seems to be fixed all but the shudder. They just cleaned the brakes for the squeeling noise, not sure how long that 'fix' will last for. They told me that ford does not have a fix for the shudder right now. So they didn't try anything on it, said they've tried clutch packs and shimming before and it hasn't worked well. So do you know if ford is working on a fix for this problem right now?

See, I'm going to be getting one of those customer survey things, and I don't know what to rate it. If I say anything bad, the service dept will get in trouble I guess, but to me right now it seems like I'm not satisfied because my truck didn't get 100% fixed because of ford, not the service dept. So what are your suggestions?

 

Don't fill it out. Tell the service manager or CRM you are not satisfied and see what they can do for you. Compromise between them; what you want between how they want the survey filled out.

 

I agree with asinatra; the surveys are big deals for dealers. Find the service manager and tell him that you can't fill the survey out in confidence as "completely satisified." Anything less than completely satisified on the survey is a goose egg to Ford, dealer bonus and parts ordering priorities and whatnot are determined in large part by survey results.

 

Two days for the list of issues you had does not seem unreasonable to me, especially if all but one was fixed and it currently has no proven fix.
I would rather have a dealer that gives honest answers to when they will be done than have them tell you it will be done in one day and when you go to pick it up they tell you it is not done.

As far as the survey, answer it honestly, but not vindictively. If you are not completely satisfied say so, but put the explanation where you can enter text. Let them know the issue was Ford did not have a fix that the dealer could use. If the lack of fix is definitely Ford's fault it will be noted and not harm the dealer; if it is BS, Ford will nail the dealer.

 

Ford doesn't scrutinize the surveys to that point. All they do is look for "Was your concern fixed right the first time?" and "Were you completely satisified with your service visit?" Everything else doesn't matter, the surveys are all or nothing.

 

You said you had a ticking noise. Did that get fixed? What did they say it was? Or did they just say it's normal like they keep telling me?

 

actually, they never mentioned the ticking noise. I don't know what it is, and they didn't mention it and its not listed on my invoice sheets that they printed up for the jobs they did on the truck. Anyone know what the noise is? My dad just got an '05 and it has the same noise.

 

Which deaer is it?

 

Crown Ford. I like them pretty well, they seem professional. Ever heard anything about them, bad or good?