Tomball Ford. Dealerships, greed and incompetence.

[MikeAmel]

Ford had a great idea to start reservation program for the new Bronco. It worked for Tesla with Model 3, there were no complaints, so it should have worked for Ford.
There is a major difference between Ford and Tesla, dealerships and greedy, incompetent dealers.
I have bought Ford vehicles before, I custom ordered a 2015 Mustang in November 2014 and got it 4 weeks after my order, with a cool feature of my name being on Window Sticker.
My story with Tomball Ford began in 2017 when I bought the new Explorer, so when it came time to make my Bronco reservation I made my early reservation and chose them because they are close and I was at the front of their reservation line.
I was assigned to Tomball Ford self proclaimed Bronco guru Jorge Lopez, a guy that can and gets people into Broncos for the right price. Yes he can and he does, but not for reservation holders. He gets people from Florida to California in their new Broncos.
At first I waited for the guru to call me so we can convert the order, when it didn't happen I made serious efforts and was able to convert the order on the last day 03/19/2021.
The vehicle wasn't built in 2021 and I reordered the 2022. The problem is that my configuration somehow ended up with several items I didn't want and are serious constraints, biggest of these restrictions are the Tube doors. I don't need them and I contacted Lopez who is REFUSING to update my configuration to a buildable one. He told it to my face.
Now he is requesting that I change my configuration into something he wants.
I contacted the Bronco helpline and they are helping me switch dealership after two years.
Most (not all) Car sales people are greedy, incompetent and cause a lot of customer dissatisfaction. Elon Musk realized that and other companies are again playing catch up.
Fortunately car salesman are one profession that will die off and changed by online configurators and online ordering.
As for me, I am waiting to see if I can be switched over to a new dealership and even if I do I doubt I would be able to be selected for the April build.

There is some Ford blame in all of this, but I believe that greed and incompetence of dealers is the leading cause of these delays.

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[22Badlands]

This is terrible sorry to hear this. Good Luck with switch.

 

[1975U15]

Same Jorge that gave himself a priority order for all his hard work.

Dude is the poster child for sleazy dealership sales.

 

[MikeAmel]

Same one. Got himself a Wildtrak with all the restricted goodies.

 

[Neps]

Sorry to hear of your experience, I too have had a less than a steller ordering adventure.

I will say that the Model 3 order process was not without its own problems, and these were a lot of complaints.

"As of April (2018), the company's analysis shows that 23 percent of those who placed a pre-order in the US have had their $1,000 deposit refunded."

"The Model X was delayed by over a year, with the automaker promising deliveries would start in early 2014 — only for delays to push the SUV’s delivery window back to September 2015."

And let's not even discuss the Cybertruck and all the delays it has experienced.

 

[TXAG96]

tell your story to Jerry Reynolds, "the car pro"....he's always speaking highly of Lopez on his show.
Maybe a good honest review to jerry will get some needed attention.

 

[phocion]

Wow, keep us in the loop about what happens. Tomball is a high volume dealership and Lopez is all over YouTube, so I'm thinking there are a lot of B6G people with orders there.

To be clear, you aren't scheduled already, right? That's the only legitimate reason to deny changes.

The only times I've heard of orders getting successfully transferred are when the original dealer does blatantly weird stuff like this, so maybe you have a chance of making it through that gauntlet.

 

[PSUTE]

Sorry for your troubles. My dealer was stellar, from reservation to delivery.

 

[555-RGNE]

Not surprising. Tomball Ford is a Keating Auto Group dealership. They’re known for sleazy practices. There’s a long discussion on a college related message board, started by a poster who said that a Keating dealership tried to scam his elderly parents out of $20K by dropping in undisclosed add-ons, then stringing them along to run out the clock on their ability to unwind the deal.

https://texags.com/forums/46/topics/3272009

The TLDR resolution is that it took another poster who has tight ties with Ben Keating, himself, to resolve the issue. Of course, no word is given on what happened to the finance employee who started the mess. The thread has other stories of similar practices at other Keating dealerships.

 

[Cartman3132]

Ford had a great idea to start reservation program for the new Bronco. It worked for Tesla with Model 3, there were no complaints, so it should have worked for Ford.
There is a major difference between Ford and Tesla, dealerships and greedy, incompetent dealers.
I have bought Ford vehicles before, I custom ordered a 2015 Mustang in November 2014 and got it 4 weeks after my order, with a cool feature of my name being on Window Sticker.
My story with Tomball Ford began in 2017 when I bought the new Explorer, so when it came time to make my Bronco reservation I made my early reservation and chose them because they are close and I was at the front of their reservation line.
I was assigned to Tomball Ford self proclaimed Bronco guru Jorge Lopez, a guy that can and gets people into Broncos for the right price. Yes he can and he does, but not for reservation holders. He gets people from Florida to California in their new Broncos.
At first I waited for the guru to call me so we can convert the order, when it didn't happen I made serious efforts and was able to convert the order on the last day 03/19/2021.
The vehicle wasn't built in 2021 and I reordered the 2022. The problem is that my configuration somehow ended up with several items I didn't want and are serious constraints, biggest of these restrictions are the Tube doors. I don't need them and I contacted Lopez who is REFUSING to update my configuration to a buildable one. He told it to my face.
Now he is requesting that I change my configuration into something he wants.
I contacted the Bronco helpline and they are helping me switch dealership after two years.
Most (not all) Car sales people are greedy, incompetent and cause a lot of customer dissatisfaction. Elon Musk realized that and other companies are again playing catch up.
Fortunately car salesman are one profession that will die off and changed by online configurators and online ordering.
As for me, I am waiting to see if I can be switched over to a new dealership and even if I do I doubt I would be able to be selected for the April build.

There is some Ford blame in all of this, but I believe that greed and incompetence of dealers is the leading cause of these delays.

Wait is this the dude with all the YouTube videos?

 

[MikeAmel]

Not scheduled, and there is no way of being scheduled. See the Tube door.
Wanted to remove the Tube doors and those floor Mats and other accessories.
Also wanted to add the hard top back since I heard it's nit a major constraint and aftermarket price is unbelievable.
That's it.

 

[Ramble_Offroad]

Wait is this the dude with all the YouTube videos?

If we are discussing this dude it doesn’t surprise me, he comes off as Uber slimy.

 

[MikeAmel]

Yes. The YouTube guy @Cartman3132

 

[Cornbred]

Never trust any man who wears a sweater vest.

 

[ByrdDogX]

I think we should go to his YouTube channel and ask him about it. I mean he does welcome questions according to his channel.

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