[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 29-Jul-00 AT 11:01 PM (EST)[/font][p]I hate sleazy sales men. No offense to you normal ones out there. Last wed I took my truck to ford.(97F150 4.2 3 door 25K miles) They agreed to service it under fords good "samaritan program" even though my warrantee was expired by 2 months. So far so good. While I was at ford I saw a nice truck for sale.(2000 F150 4x4 space cab with 10K miles) I told the sales man I wanted to trade in my truck for it. They appraised my truck and told me they would give me between 10-11k for it. A little low but not insulting yet. The sales man and I sat down to talk numbers. This pimp of a sales man comes back and quotes me a monthly payment higher then the asking price of their truck. And in addition expected me to give them my truck. It added up to about 40K. I looked at him and said, "do I have sucker written on my forehead or something. He pretended to look at his figures again and said, "Ill be right back. He returned with his next insulting offer. I added up his numbers on paper in front of him and pointed out they were offering me about 500 less for my truck then he had just quoted me. Eventually he said he would drop the price down to $24,800 for a 2000 F150 4x4 5.4 space cab. I got them to throw in the undercoat paint. I will sell my truck privately before I let this pimp rip me off. Monday they better offer me the same deal or... Or... Or something.

Today (sat) I picked up my truck from service. To their credit they did fix the engine. It was just a bad spark plug. First thing I would have checked. They also said they fixed the wipers and replaced the faulty switch. They didn't touch them. It was the same old dusty wiper switch. Wipers wouldn't turn off for almost a minute on the way home from the dealer. Even though they gave me a price break, I did pay $50 bucks for a spark plug. Took 4 days before they even touched my truck. Funny thing is they were unable to give me a receipt because they were fixing it under fords "good samaritan" program. Still haven't figured out what that means. Know one knew how to do it in the computer. I will be paying them a visit monday.

 

I have no doubt that your service experience does exist in officialdom. The question is, how was the service dispositioned in the "computer." A year ago I approached Ford (via their telephone call center in Toronto, Canada) regarding out of warranty service issues and they advised me to return to the selling dealership. A "Good Samaritan" policy did not exist. In my experience all service must be documented - usually on a PC which is uplinked to the coroporation. At the least there should be a service log maintained by the service manager. The problem is that when you visit any shop for service you are fighting city hall. Where I am from that usually results in one floating face down in the Detroit River, or at least they bend your ignition key.

 

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 31-Jul-00 AT 10:59 PM (EST)[/font][p]98 F-150 XLT,245 70 yokahama AVS/ST's
prarie tan w/tan int.
K/N gen.II fipk
B/M electronic shift improver
COBRA 75 remote mount CB with weather alert
SNUGTOP LID/body color
4.6 litre V-8

I travel for a living and it is impossible to take
it to the dealer I purchased it from. I know what
your talking about, I have to take it to a different dealer every time,sheeeez! I had some
stuff taken care of before the warranty ran out.
And now,about every 3 to 6,000 miles the serp.
belt and tensioner goes bad. The second dealer
that replaced them tried to spray belt conditioner
on it and say it was fixed! Of course by the time
I picked it up the goo had dried and it was sqealing as loudly as before. They finally did re-
place them and sent me on my way. Now I'm having
to call the dealer I bought it from to deal with
the door cracking problem. Bought it in Houston
and I'm in Milwaukee. I'm going to go to Houston
anyway in Oct.(yippee,my hometown) and I'm certain
that they will lose the paperwork by the time I get there. I might be pleasantly surprised,but I'm
not counting on it!

 

Today I bought the 2000 F150 extra cab 5.4 4x4 I was talking about in my earlier message. I paid $24,700 for it. It had 10K on the odometer. I hated every minute of the wheeling & dealing process. The salesmen I dealt with were all full of #####. But in the end I ended up happy. Now I will sell my 97 F150, and I will become the salesman. But I will not lie my *** off to anyone who shows interest, like a cheap..... Thanks for your responses.

 

98 F-150 XLT,245 70 yokahama AVS/ST's
prarie tan w/tan int.
K/N gen.II fipk
B/M electronic shift improver
COBRA 75 remote mount CB with weather
alert
SNUGTOP LID/body color
4.6 litre V-8
Dual exhaust/rear exiting/Gibson
rectangle tips

Well,I've just been informed that they will do nothing about the doors. This is the proverbial
straw. This is the last vehicle I will buy from
Ford in my lifetime. Won't even get the truck serviced by them,either