Warranty Repairs ludicrous - DON'T go to Galpin Ford!

[Mike Curtis]

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Delays and lies led to six weeks for a warranty repair that should've been a few days.

ALL THE DEETS:

So, for the second time, I had the dreaded High Voltage Battery Junction Box failure in my '22 AWD ER. The first time was within hours of picking it up on late September '22, well after the "fix" was done in the late spring/early summer.

This time, I was driving on a hot day (July 30th) over The Grapevine, a known HVBJB killer. I called my dealer the next day and they said to bring it in in two more days. The service manager had lots of ambiguous phrasing and wouldn't commit to anything, but said it might take a while. I had some other routine maintenance to do (rotate tires etc) so I said do that too. I got conflicting information about bring it in or schedule a time when they could work on it - two different people said different things - one voicemail said call to schedule a time to bring it in once they were ready to work on it, and the service manager contradicted that and said he couldn't schedule like that. Six days later I picked it back up when it was clear they wouldn't be getting it any time soon - I'd drive it with reduced power. That was on 8/8, I couldn't bring it back in to be worked on until the 21st, when they were supposedly ready to work on it.

I'm told they don't have enough techs and battery lifts so things are slow. Come on, Ford/Galpin, get your act together. This is now the second best selling EV in the US, MAYBE have some folks ready to work on one of the biggest known problems!!!

There's multiple instances of asking for status updates/ETA and hearing nothing back for a day or two. I'm told it was SUPPOSED to be ready Friday Sept 1st, but the tech didn't quite finish, so it'll be the following Thursday. What??? Well, he says, Monday is a holiday, Tuesday is required training, and then the tech can get on it. Dammit, but OK.

I text Wednesday to make sure it is getting worked on, and the service guy texts back:

No I expect Friday. I think I may have misspoke, as the holiday always messes me up on timing. If I did, I apologize!

I text back that he very clearly walked through day by day what was going to happen, there's no way he misspoke or got messed up on timing. This is just a lazy lie on his part. He says he'll do everything in his power to get it done by Thursday. I have zero confidence.

I check in on Thursday, and he calls me back and lays out a story about how software updates can take a long time, he hopes it'll be today but he doesn't know. I say something to the effect of "So I presume the mechanical work is complete and you're just waiting on these software updates now, right?" He says he's not watching the guy work, but he'll check on it and get back to me. He doesn't get back to me. Now, I'm dubious of even this claim. When you pull the battery from a laptop, it doesn't lose the OS or updates. I'm betting cars work the same way. My car was fully up to date on software updates, including the radio fix one (that also messed up my radio presets again, and also wiped the error code, but that's another post). So even if he was telling the truth about update times, no updates were needed.

I check back in the next day, Friday Sept 8th first thing in the morning. He says that they just finished installing the battery and are doing updates now. DUDE - if you're gonna lie to me, at least keep your lies straight. If the battery hadn't been installed yet, all that talk yesterday about waiting on updates was IRRELEVANT to the conversation!

I call back later that day to see if it is ready, and he says they just finished 10 minutes before and he was helping a customer (maybe, sure, probably not, whatever).

I pick up the car and I'm never, EVER going back to Galpin.

Too many delays, too many BS stories and straight up lies. I suspect that warranty work is a low profit, low priority for them so when paying work comes in warranty goes to the back of the line, but I have no way to know.

Just know that Galpin will NOT be straight with you, will NOT give you the truth, and can NOT be relied on to get warranty work done in a timely fashion. When the tech is "almost done but couldn't finish today" that isn't a valid reason for a WEEK'S DELAY!

I'm furious and never going back there. Does anyone have a dealership in SoCal that got things done reasonably quickly for a similar issue?

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[Mike Curtis]

...when I get the inevitable "How did we do?" survey, the only nice thing I can say is the service guy was polite...while he lied to me. Zeroes for everything else.

 

[RickMachE]

Galpin is well documented on here as not being able to handle the volume of EV work.

 

[Mike Curtis]

Galpin is well documented on here as not being able to handle the volume of EV work.

Unfortunately I didn't know that going in. But there is a quite a difference between "not being able to handle" and delaying, stalling, and ultimately lying about things. In no way did they indicate it would take six weeks to accomplish.

 

[abr]

I've had no issues going to Vista in Woodland Hills, BUT, I schedule far out . . . can't get any appointment quickly.

 

[Chuck]

I purchased my Mach-E from Galpin but live in Ventura county so I've never used them for service. They're Ford's largest dealer and you'd think they'd have their act together regarding service.

 

[keithnteri]

I purchased my Mach-E from Galpin but live in Ventura county so I've never used them for service. They're Ford's largest dealer and you'd think they'd have their act together regarding service.

I’m the same as you in Ventura County. Haven’t had to get any service yet. On my last vehicle I was less than impressed with Envision Ford in Oxnard for my Hybrid 2020 Escape.

Hate to drive all the way down to the valley to get good service but might have to try Vista as another post said they had a good service department.

 

[Chuck]

I’m the same as you in Ventura County. Haven’t had to get any service yet. On my last vehicle I was less than impressed with Envision Ford in Oxnard for my Hybrid 2020 Escape.

Hate to drive all the way down to the valley to get good service but might have to try Vista as another post said they had a good service department.

I live in T.O. and have had good luck with DCH in T.O. but I've been their beta tester on some things that they want to learn on. I also like Vista Ford in Woodland Hills.

 

[ConejoRed]

I am also someone who purchased from Galpin, but I service at DCH in Thousand Oaks. So far, no real issue with them expect for the Blue Cruise update. Took them several days longer than expected to do it, but must say they were persistent and finally got it to work. This was after Ford extended the service bulletin for it (after we missed taking it in by a few days and they wouldn't do it becuase it didn't show on the list of updates needed). I think the day they finally got it to work (after about 10+ times trying over several days) they pulled the service bulletin again as dealers were having install issues. Usually have no problems scheduling an appointment when needed (only have taken it in for updates a couple of times).

 

[jksu]

I bought my Job1 2021 Mach-E at Star Ford in Glendale since it was closest to home. But considered Galpin given I know they're a larger dealership and might have more priority/volume/service experience.

When I had my HVBJ issue a couple months ago, Star Ford was able to get to it within a week, got the part within 2 days after diagnosis, and repaired in 2 days. Free rental was offered (I declined since we have an extra car and didn't want to deal with the hassle of a rental).

Updates came through Ford's BEV team which was great, since they dealt with calling/phone-tag/text with the Star Ford service rep, and I got a regular phone updates from the BEV team. Overall impressed with Ford's BEV team's service (which also covered the tow).

Perhaps the large volume of sales by Galpin was not balanced with enough training/hiring ofEV techs. Hope they catch up soon.

 

[Scarpia]

Simi Valley Price Ford is competent in my experience.
I took my car to Vista Ford in Oxnard twice and it was a complete disaster. The dealership has since changed hands, and maybe it's unfair, but I will never go back there. (I doubt if there was much turnover among techs and admin staff.)

 

[Steve-o]

I bought my Job1 2021 Mach-E at Star Ford in Glendale since it was closest to home. But considered Galpin given I know they're a larger dealership and might have more priority/volume/service experience.

When I had my HVBJ issue a couple months ago, Star Ford was able to get to it within a week, got the part within 2 days after diagnosis, and repaired in 2 days. Free rental was offered (I declined since we have an extra car and didn't want to deal with the hassle of a rental).

Updates came through Ford's BEV team which was great, since they dealt with calling/phone-tag/text with the Star Ford service rep, and I got a regular phone updates from the BEV team. Overall impressed with Ford's BEV team's service (which also covered the tow).

Perhaps the large volume of sales by Galpin was not balanced with enough training/hiring ofEV techs. Hope they catch up soon.

That is pretty nice you were offered a free rental. Im in NJ and just got the warning and they wont be able to look at it until next Tuesday (i get it). However, they have no rentals and was told I can use Enterprise across the street, but can only rent Ford and max $35 a day including taxes. I actually went to see my BMW sales people to ask about the i5M ?

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