ADM for GT performance edition

[Clint Eastwood]

Just to add my experience here - I have had a hard time getting my reservation dealer on the phone or email and others on here had bad experiences with their Premium Mach-e orders so I contacted another dealer in the area - they promptly responded, answered all my questions, accept x-plan and no ADM. I called Ford to switch the dealer on my reservation and they also said it could take up to a week and they'd email me back when it's done. She was adamant that I don't attempt to place an order in the meantime because it would make the process of switching the order complicated and possibly mess up my place in the queue (reserved 11/2019).

Still, I played around with the ordering form and discovered my new dealer is the only one in my area that has additional markup when building an order on the Ford website, yet the general manager is in the ADM thread stating they do not charge ADM - I texted the dealer to confirm they will not charge ADM on a reservation order and he confirmed via text.

So possibly take the Ford ordering website with a grain of salt. Confirm pricing with your dealer instead.

I believe this dealer does add markup to the units they order for their own lot, which I think is fair. But definitely not for reservations that don't sit on their lot.

I confirmed with my original dealership that on GT they are charging $5000 ADM. he wasnt sure if it was going to apply to current reservation holders and said he would call me back. He didnt call me back and i switched dealers. Screw them.

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[scoopman]

Yeah so I had, in writing via email from Sunnyvale Ford, that they would not charge me an ADM for my Mach-E GT reservation back in July. When I went to order on Tuesday, surprise surprise, the order flow slips in an additional $3995 "Difference from Total MSRP" which is a dealer ADM.

I got them to stop this for my vehicle by making the General Sales Manager confirm that, because they already agreed with me to no markup, that they would not charge me the additional $3995.

YMMV but the ordering site is sneaky and the dealers generally equally slimy.....

 

[agoldman]

Didn't the head of Ford says to PM him if this was going on?

 

[deadduck]

Didn't the head of Ford says to PM him if this was going on?

ADM is happening straight off the Ford ordering website. Then there are whatever shenanigans they play on top of that. The Ford buying process was never going to be Tesla-like in this respect, no matter what BS the head of marketing says.

Remember how truecar used to play dealers against each other, then in a couple of years that all stopped? Or, in my area, try to get an internet quote and see how that works for you. No one will even respond.

It's just a horrible process designed to F you over the entire way.

One of the other issues is that Ford lots are wastelands at the moment. Can't make your numbers if there aren't cars so they're probably not, just being jerks, even if they are, it's probably a survival / market thing too.

 

[Frankie]

ADM is happening straight off the Ford ordering website. Then there are whatever shenanigans they play on top of that. The Ford buying process was never going to be Tesla-like in this respect, no matter what BS the head of marketing says.

Remember how truecar used to play dealers against each other, then in a couple of years that all stopped? Or, in my area, try to get an internet quote and see how that works for you. No one will even respond.

It's just a horrible process designed to F you over the entire way.

One of the other issues is that Ford lots are wastelands at the moment. Can't make your numbers if there aren't cars so they're probably not, just being jerks, even if they are, it's probably a survival / market thing too.

Ford should be embarrassed about the reservation process they designed. It combines the absolute worst aspects of the dealership model and the online model and ends up being worse than both.

 

[db4z]

From my multiple calls to Ford, the pricing on the Ford reservation page means almost nothing as the price isn't final until you sign on the dotted line with the dealer as Ford has no legal power to force a dealer to sell at a given price. However, if your dealer is already listing ADM or being iffy about pricing I would be prepared to walk away or try to switch dealers. I qualify for A/Z plan, which most dealers take more seriously than x-plan, and honestly the best thing about it is not having to worry about negotiating pricing beyond dealer add-ons (and trade-in, which is still pain but at least I can always walk away and sell to carmax but give-up the sales tax offset). I do still worry my dealer will change their mind when my car arrives.

 

[scoopman]

From my multiple calls to Ford, the pricing on the Ford reservation page means almost nothing as the price isn't final until you sign on the dotted line with the dealer as Ford has no legal power to force a dealer to sell at a given price. However, if your dealer is already listing ADM or being iffy about pricing I would be prepared to walk away or try to switch dealers. I qualify for A/Z plan, which most dealers take more seriously than x-plan, and honestly the best thing about it is not having to worry about negotiating pricing beyond dealer add-ons (and trade-in, which is still pain but at least I can always walk away and sell to carmax but give-up the sales tax offset). I do still worry my dealer will change their mind when my car arrives.

Oh I fully expect the dealer to be super-slimy when my GT Performance arrives, but I do have emails from them saying they will charge me MSRP and also the other fees, DMV of about $800 and an $85 document fee. But I'm sure they will pull something ($5,000 underbody rust protection perhaps? $5,000 oil change for life package?) .... I think they'd love nothing more than to have me walk away so they can sell my car for $10,000 over MSRP, but I will be ready to DM tweet those hip Ford execs when I see what they pull.

It's too bad Ford has dealers, the seemingly really good car they built is being lessened by them.

 

[t12g]

Ford should be embarrassed about the reservation process they designed. It combines the absolute worst aspects of the dealership model and the online model and ends up being worse than both.

Couldn't agree more. I just went through the ordering process, and it's an absolute shit show. I had to separately contact several dealerships to figure out their deposit refund policy and whether they accept X plan pricing. It's really unnecessarily frustrating.

I understand Ford has no direct control over the dealerships, but maybe they can gather the relevant information and display them in a single place? Instead, each customer will have to do their own homework (or contribute to a forum like this to list the dealers w/o ADM). It just feels like a waste of everybody's time.

 

[Frankie]

Couldn't agree more. I just went through the ordering process, and it's an absolute shit show. I had to separately contact several dealerships to figure out their deposit refund policy and whether they accept X plan pricing. It's really unnecessarily frustrating.

I understand Ford has no direct control over the dealerships, but maybe they can gather the relevant information and display them in a single place? Instead, each customer will have to do their own homework (or contribute to a forum like this to list the dealers w/o ADM). It just feels like a waste of everybody's time.

Yeah, like you said, Ford doesn't have direct control so they're limited in some ways but I think there's a lot of relatively small tweaks they could have made that would have saved a lot of problems.

1. They could have given each reservation holder a pin that's required for the dealer to convert the reservation to an order. I had reservations for both a Mach-e GT and a Bronco (going to replace my Accord Hybrid that's getting long in the tooth and also replace my F-150 that got totaled in a car accident) and BOTH were converted to orders without my consent by two DIFFERENT dealerships. And once that happens, you've basically lost all your negotiating power.

2. I'm not sure how they're doing Mach-e reservations right now but my $500 was automatically refunded as soon as it was converted to an order (this is good) but my Bronco reservation money was kept by the dealership as soon as it was converted to an order (this is bad). In this way Ford's reservation system has actually gotten WORSE over time.

3. The biggest thing that would help consumers would be if dealership allotments were based on how many reservations they have. If you're trying to charge everyone ADM and just in general being a scumbag, you're not going to get many reservations so you're not going to get much allotment. You're a good dealer being fair and up front with people and you will get a lot of allotment. The way it is now dealerships are literally encouraged to convert reservations without peoples permission and then try and get them to abandon the order so they can put the car on the lot with a big ADM.

Frustrating waste of time is a very accurate and succinct description.

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