Mach-E Lease from Ford: Who do you make payments to?

[Arsenic17]

I took possession of a new 2023 MachE GT about 5 weeks ago from a local dealership, setup as a lease. However, since then I have received no follow up information in the mail or via email. My first lease payment was due about a week ago per my lease contract. With no information received yet, I'm not sure what I need to do here and no one seems to be able to help me.

I've logged into my Ford Credit account but all I see there is my prior MachE which is now 100% paid off and traded in to the dealer. I dont see anything in Ford Credit online about my leased car. I've contacted the dealership and they just punt me to Ford Credit. However, Ford Credit tells me they have no record of my new account or that VIN even being leased.

I just want to confirm if anyone else had this leasing experience and if in fact your lease payments are made through Ford Credit online? Or is there another sub-contractor company you pay?

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[orangethunder]

Ford lease payments go to Ford Credit unless your dealer has another leasing company they use (very very unlikely).

My guess is your paperwork hasn’t flowed from dealer to Ford Credit properly/yet. Should be most electronic process uunless there was an outage that day or something. Did you sign in a screen/tablet or on paper?

Sometimes can be sixty days for payments to be sorted I have seen but having no record seems odd for sure.

 

[vortix]

My recent '23 MME GT lease showed up in my Ford Credit account within a couple days of signing paperwork at the dealership. Your paperwork from the dealership should have included a Ford Credit Lease Agreement document. Double check the VIN and your contact info on that document and follow up with Ford Credit and/or the dealership again.

That is a good question posted above - did you sign your paperwork on an iPad in the Finance Office at your dealership, or was it on paper? My last two MMEs at different dealership locations were signed on an iPad.

 

[Arsenic17]

For the lease, I signed via an iPad in the dealership. It should have been electronic and almost instant getting to the finance company.

I've been in comms with both the dealer and Ford Credit the last few days and made zero progress. The dealer says they submitted things correctly to Ford Credit and they already got funded by them for the car. They just tell me to contact Ford Credit.

Ford Credit says there is no record of me having a lease account with them. My VIN is not in their system at all. The only account they have for me is my paid off old MachE. They tell me to contact the dealer to figure it out.

What a joke! Perhaps this will just disappear and I will have a free car....

 

[ToOldForThis]

I would at least ask for the current response from Ford Credit in writing - so that you have something documented that says "on this date... we have no record of your account". This could quickly turn to a bad credit situation for you, if they all of the sudden "find" your paperwork, and then hit you with a late payment fee.

 

[hybrid2bev]

For the lease, I signed via an iPad in the dealership. It should have been electronic and almost instant getting to the finance company.

I've been in comms with both the dealer and Ford Credit the last few days and made zero progress. The dealer says they submitted things correctly to Ford Credit and they already got funded by them for the car. They just tell me to contact Ford Credit.

Ford Credit says there is no record of me having a lease account with them. My VIN is not in their system at all. The only account they have for me is my paid off old MachE. They tell me to contact the dealer to figure it out.

What a joke! Perhaps this will just disappear and I will have a free car....

There’s no way the dealer got paid without having successfully submitting and Ford Credit completely processing the paperwork. That usually only takes a few days. Now it is possible that there was an internal issue and a flat cancel is needed to re-book the deal, but even then that would only take a couple extra days.

I would be curious if the Ford Credit rep searched by something other than the VIN, like by SSN or name to find the new deal. They should be able to pull up your newly approved credit application and see the new account number there too.

 

[Arsenic17]

I provided

There’s no way the dealer got paid without having successfully submitting and Ford Credit completely processing the paperwork. That usually only takes a few days. Now it is possible that there was an internal issue and a flat cancel is needed to re-book the deal, but even then that would only take a couple extra days.

I would be curious if the Ford Credit rep searched by something other than the VIN, like by SSN or name to find the new deal. They should be able to pull up your newly approved credit application and see the new account number there too.

I provided my social over the phone to Ford Credit and the only credit account tied to it was my closed (paid off) one.

I also confirmed with the dealer my application had the correct social.

I have escalated the issue to my the dealership finance manager but they said their part is done. They got their money and they don't have access to Ford Credit databases to do anything further. So weird.

 

[AKgrampy]

If the dealer got paid then the ball is certainly in Ford Credit’s court? Did you receive a title/license/registration with FC as the lien holder?

 

[Arsenic17]

If the dealer got paid then the ball is certainly in Ford Credit’s court? Did you receive a title/license/registration with FC as the lien holder?

No but that takes a while. Last time it took almost two months to receive that in the mail. Right before temp plates expire...

 

[AKgrampy]

No but that takes a while. Last time it took almost two months to receive that in the mail. Right before temp plates expire...

My point is if you can’t get things cleared up by then perhaps that info may be helpful. Then again if things are in limbo you may not get your plates prior to expiration of temp tags.

 

[Arsenic17]

Update: Received my title complete document a few days ago and today registered the car successfully.

My dealer did contact Ford Credit but they said they had no record of this vehicle in their system. Dealer assistance was minimal and they confirmed once again everything is done for their side and mine.

Ford Credit says the same thing to me and can't help. I am working on getting a written statement from Ford Credit that they do not have any leases active under my name or for this VIN. I've gotten verbal confirmation of this over the phone (not recorded).

I also pulled my updated credit report and there is no listing for the leased car on there, though my old car loan is now showing as paid off.

I guess I will just take the free lease once I get written confirmation from Ford Credit. Can't really do anything else from my end. I've done my due diligence wasting several hours of time already, but it seems I cannot overcome a computer glitch on their end, or whatever this might be.

 

[Arsenic17]

Update: Called Ford Credit one last time, same old story about having no record of my lease or car in their system. I then demanded written proof that they have no interest in my car and then magically they now see in their system that there was a paperwork glitch and they have been actively communicating with the dealership to resolve the problem. They say the dealer has been unresponsive on the whole thing, claiming they cannot get hold of a real person at the dealership when calling. Funny, when I call, you can push one button to connect to the human....

Ford Credit rep recommended I contact the dealer to urge them to move the process along, but I'm done for now. I will give them another few weeks to resolve it on their own if they want to make the effort. At this point, I have confirmed there is no loan or lease on the car tied to my name or SSN.

 

[Arsenic17]

Another two weeks down. I was out of the country on vacation. Still no word from either party. Guess I will continue to drive my free mache.

 

[macheClubPra]

Hey, so I got my new Mach-E Premium from the dealership in the second week of April. I went with Ford financing, and they gave me a sweet 0% APR deal. But it's been three weeks now, and I haven't heard anything from them. No emails, no mail, nothing.

I'm starting to think I should check on my first payment. I'll try to contact my dealership and Ford Credit tomorrow.

And on top of that, I still haven't gotten my license plate. I have no idea what's going on.

 

[Arsenic17]

Final Update on my situation:

Eventually my crazy lease issue was resolved--- but it took 11 weeks from when I signed the lease to fix! The problem appears to be that my dealer collected all the sales tax upfront while Ford Credit wanted the tax collected monthly as part of my payment. Apparently there is a state law in Colorado that says they have to collect the tax upfront for leases >36 months but Ford Credit didn't want to honor that. Not sure how legal that is, but it ended up raising my payment by about $2-3 per month so whatever. I'm not going to die on that hill.

The dealer just had to resubmit the paperwork with the correct tax breakdown/payments. I had to drive 30 miles to the dealer to do this in person. They wouldn't do it online annoyingly. They collected my missed first two monthly payments at the dealership and all is fixed now. My car correctly shows in Ford Credit website.

They actually gave me the option to basically delay the start of my lease agreement (from original signing date, to the date it was fixed), which I think would have been a good deal (basically 2-3 months of no lease payments, but maybe a mileage penalty at the end if there was an overage), but I didn't fully understand the implications of that option at the time and just kept the original start date.

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