mh_mach_e
Member
- First Name
- Mark
- Joined
- Nov 8, 2022
- Threads
- 0
- Messages
- 18
- Reaction score
- 25
- Location
- California
- Vehicles
- 2023 MME Premium EAWD Vapor Blue
I've owned my MachE for 7 months and I have 12,000 miles on it. I drive 35 miles each way to/from work, 3 days a week. About 30 of those miles are on highways which are supported by BCHF. Sometimes it works throughout my commute and I appreciate it greatly. Other times it reminds me, as a 30+ year software engineer, how terrible software engineers are.
At $200/year I would like to think I would not subscribe out of principal. The reality is I probably would because I do get plenty of use from this -- when it works. That said, I paid $70,000 for this car with the understanding that I was paying for Blue Cruise Hands-Free for life. I know now that my understanding was wrong, I only paid for "Blue Cruise", not "Blue Cruise Hands Free". Congratulations Ford, you succeeded in tricking me with a deceptively similar name for a similar feature. (I won't be surprised if there's a class action law suit about this in the future.) I feel that asking your customers to subscribe to a $200/year feature when they've paid thousands for the vehicle is pretty sleezy.
If you want me to pay $800/year, you need to:
a) Make this thing work nearly 100% of the time. I accept that if visibility is too impaired, or if road conditions are too slippery, if it's too windy, or if something is interfering with my sensors, you cannot safely run this. However, no matter what reason you have to stop operating, you better make the reason available to me every single time. If I know why you're not operating I can accept that it's for the good. If you don't tell me why you refuse to operate, you just confirm my feeling that you don't know how to write decent software.
b) Make this thing work on every road that you can detect the edges of. It's fine that at the moment you're not prepared to do that, however you have no legitimacy in being prepared to charge so much without that (and probably even with it).
c) Here's the big one: not only hands free, but eyes free. If you're not letting me sleep while you take over, you aren't earning a high price tag on hardware I've already paid for. I recognize that technology might have a bit to overcome before this can be safely accomplished, but you want a large price tag so need to provide the value. BCHF in it's current state is so far away from even $200/year value that you embarrass yourself in suggesting $800/year.
That said, if there's a subscription model in the first place, why is it per time period? I'm pretty sure almost nobody measures the use they get from their car in years, they measure it in miles. The value one gets from a while-driving feature is not magnified based on longevity, it's magnified based on usage. Shouldn't you be charging by value, measured in the way your customers measure it?
I truly cannot imagine, if $200/year or even $800/year, you're going to make money on subscriptions for this. Even if you are able to though, I wonder if you've considered customer retention? While I'm not the most Ford loyal driver on the planet, this is my 2nd Mustang and my 3rd Ford product so clearly I'm not buying from you begrudgingly. BCHF was the biggest factor in my decision to buy my MachE but as already mentioned, your deceptive terminology caused me to not realize exactly what I was buying, and had that been clear I may have gone a different direction. Now, in 3 years when my BCHF is expected to start charging, it'll probably also be a time when EV technology has advanced well beyond what it's at now and I suspect I'll be investigating buying a new car. My EV experience will have been "bought a car for the hands free driving technology, without knowing corporate greed was tricking me and I need to keep paying indefinitely". I accept that was my mistake to have made and nobody forced me to buy without looking more into it first. I also learn from my mistakes. And I don't do repeat business with companies when I think they take advantage of their customers' trust. Where do you think you currently sit in the loyalty column?
At $200/year I would like to think I would not subscribe out of principal. The reality is I probably would because I do get plenty of use from this -- when it works. That said, I paid $70,000 for this car with the understanding that I was paying for Blue Cruise Hands-Free for life. I know now that my understanding was wrong, I only paid for "Blue Cruise", not "Blue Cruise Hands Free". Congratulations Ford, you succeeded in tricking me with a deceptively similar name for a similar feature. (I won't be surprised if there's a class action law suit about this in the future.) I feel that asking your customers to subscribe to a $200/year feature when they've paid thousands for the vehicle is pretty sleezy.
If you want me to pay $800/year, you need to:
a) Make this thing work nearly 100% of the time. I accept that if visibility is too impaired, or if road conditions are too slippery, if it's too windy, or if something is interfering with my sensors, you cannot safely run this. However, no matter what reason you have to stop operating, you better make the reason available to me every single time. If I know why you're not operating I can accept that it's for the good. If you don't tell me why you refuse to operate, you just confirm my feeling that you don't know how to write decent software.
b) Make this thing work on every road that you can detect the edges of. It's fine that at the moment you're not prepared to do that, however you have no legitimacy in being prepared to charge so much without that (and probably even with it).
c) Here's the big one: not only hands free, but eyes free. If you're not letting me sleep while you take over, you aren't earning a high price tag on hardware I've already paid for. I recognize that technology might have a bit to overcome before this can be safely accomplished, but you want a large price tag so need to provide the value. BCHF in it's current state is so far away from even $200/year value that you embarrass yourself in suggesting $800/year.
That said, if there's a subscription model in the first place, why is it per time period? I'm pretty sure almost nobody measures the use they get from their car in years, they measure it in miles. The value one gets from a while-driving feature is not magnified based on longevity, it's magnified based on usage. Shouldn't you be charging by value, measured in the way your customers measure it?
I truly cannot imagine, if $200/year or even $800/year, you're going to make money on subscriptions for this. Even if you are able to though, I wonder if you've considered customer retention? While I'm not the most Ford loyal driver on the planet, this is my 2nd Mustang and my 3rd Ford product so clearly I'm not buying from you begrudgingly. BCHF was the biggest factor in my decision to buy my MachE but as already mentioned, your deceptive terminology caused me to not realize exactly what I was buying, and had that been clear I may have gone a different direction. Now, in 3 years when my BCHF is expected to start charging, it'll probably also be a time when EV technology has advanced well beyond what it's at now and I suspect I'll be investigating buying a new car. My EV experience will have been "bought a car for the hands free driving technology, without knowing corporate greed was tricking me and I need to keep paying indefinitely". I accept that was my mistake to have made and nobody forced me to buy without looking more into it first. I also learn from my mistakes. And I don't do repeat business with companies when I think they take advantage of their customers' trust. Where do you think you currently sit in the loyalty column?
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