Ford's Plan for Fixing Quality - CEO Reponds

[Cruising68]

CoHPhasor

My comment angered you? lol
My ST was a demo had just under 3000 miles on it.
So it was driven around 3000 miles with over inflated tires.
Not good for the tires. And the rides way too stiff.
They dont check the tire pressure at my dealer. They dont check or look for quality flaws.
I take it in for service and find they didnt check the tire pressure even though the checklist states they did.
If you do a search on here for tire pressure you will find many people experienced the same thing.
Their dealers never lowered the pressure.
Its a big deal and its symbolic of all the rest of the things that are not checked or taken care of
before the sale.
Bottom line is, if you dont notice it, it does not get fixed.
Hows all that build customer confidence?
FORD is dropping the ball.
Im not happy about that having paid over $60,000.00 for the vehicle.
Not making payments. I bought it. And I expected better.
Thats why Ford says they have a plan for fixing quality.
Because its a problem.

Can’t argue with that although I kind of hit the lottery as far as defects go. I remember decades ago buying new cars was a big deal for most dealers. Great vehicle prep and they went to great lengths to make the delivery pleasant. Now a days, few brands and dealers follow that path. I don’t even have dealers prep the outside, leaving the factory plastic and stickers. I have seen them do more damage than good prepping the paint.

My first new car cost $10,500. A Cavalier Z24. It was delivered well prepped at $49 over dealer invoice. I would expect that level or better on any $60k vehicle.


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[RacerX33]

I wish I had hit the lottery with the two I have owned in the past 11 months.
Im a new FORD owner and this stuff is crazy. My dealer just gets them off the truck and puts them on the lot.
They apparently check nothing. When I buy a new car. The only thing I want to take it back for is the 5000 mile service.
Ive been back to the dealer 3 or 4 times since I bought this ST in April.
I still have to bring it in another time to replace a wheel and a rear door panel that was put together sloppy as can be.
And Im having a new exhaust put on it to be fair thats one of the reasons its going back in addition to the door panel and the wheel.
I like the ST, Im just put out about the quality issues.
The dealer is going to fix it all but, its not good for FORD to
put its customers through this kind of stuff on an expensive purchase.
Dont know why they have not realized how much their quality issues really cost them?
Because if I have mechanical problems,
Im going to get rid of it and turn my back on FORD forever.

 

[CoHPhasor]

If I were to look at this from the dealer's perspective - I might not be checking that much either.
Think about it. If suddenly the factory loses its damn mind, and ships partially-defective goods, what am I supposed to do, pay a small team of mechanics to fix merchandise?
(Yes, you'll feel personally attacked by me saying anything like this, but don't check out just yet)

Is there recourse for a dealer? As in, is there a program for dealers to be able to say "It took 'x' man hours to fix your bullsh**, and 'y' money had to be spent fixing paint. Pay me full rate for it"?
Imagine being a dealer, paying out interest for vehicles sitting around needing repairs? (They already suffered this for 360 cameras, etc)
Think about it for a minute. Your job is car sales. Yes, you have a service department, but it is there to make you money, not give Ford Motor Company extra manpower.
This is an example of "sh** rolling downhill", and absolutely none of us like it. In fact, we're here complaining because the dealer let sh** roll downhill, right?
It comes down to who gets the short end, and the dealer is doing what they can to avoid it.
Unfortunately, dealers are using Used car sales tactics here where "the buyer has to find the problem" is the motto.
^ ***This really sucks and should not be the case***

I wish this was not the case, and that dealers were being reputable.
Honestly, dealers should be filing a class-action against Ford collectively, to correct Ford Motors' bad behavior.

 

[Cruising68]

I believe dealers DO get paid to fix anything found in delivery. Now their warranty rate is lower than their shop rate so they do make less on warranty work. Still, no excuse to not check IMO.

At my old business, we ran into a quality problem with one of our computerized tool manufacturers. I told my staff that for the next year they would test every tool that came in before going to the customer. In the long run it saved us money and customer goodwill.


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[RacerX33]

CoHPhasor

No I dont feel personally attacked.
I can see your point about the dealers plight.
However, as a customer buying a ridiculously expensive product,
Dealers issues with FORD and selling cars are not my problem.
Or at least they should not be.
I want a good quality product.
I dont give a rats rusty that its hard for the dealership to be in business.
Im a customer. I didnt instruct them to open their business.
Im a paying customer and have no sympathy for what FORD does
or fails to do. This is what Im talking about. I didnt sign up for all this Mickey Mouse stuff. I signed up
for a good quality product and so far its hassles.

Am I supposed to say great job? I do like the car but the lack of quality leaves a person wondering
what the heck did I get myself into. Not a good feeling.
Down the road after the flaws are taken care of and the new exhaust has gone on and
some time has gone by, I'l get back on here and report how it goes down the road.
So far the whole experience Im shaking my head.
I guess maybe its typical for these times?
Or is just typical of FORD?
Is this why people buy Toyotas etc?
Better Quality? Better Service?
Hey maybe thats it?

 

[CoHPhasor]

^ I don't disagree at all.

To be honest, I spent my youth ridiculing Ford, because they had become so crappy over the years. A while back a friend had impressed me with the changes Ford made, showing that they weren't a joke anymore, and I bought an explorer. Then I leased a Fusion Energi and at my 20K mi oil change they messed up and rod-knock hit it.
I forgave that as a "mistake", and now here we are. Pandemic-era desperate-manufacturing produced shitty vehicles? Or has Ford gone back to those crappy 80s-90s roots?
I cant say.

Am I disappointed that we have to talk about it? Yup.
Does Ford get a pass in my eyes, especially for such an expensive vehicle? Hell no.
Does Ford deserve every bit of vitriol being spewed here? You bet your ass.

I'm simply a pragmatist and an observer. I would be remiss if I didn't look at the entirety of the situation to observe and report on all aspects.

 

[RacerX33]

Hey Bud,
I didn't realize I was "Spewing Vitriol" ?
I thought I was relaying my experiences with
FORD and FORD Dealers and FORD Products and their quality issues
I have experienced over the last 11 months.

Never owned a Ford before.
"Spewing Vitriol" ?

 

[Caster]

My previous brand new Explorer ST was a 2022 model year. Like others, I had to find the issues the factory and dealer did not. Right off the bat I saw a drip in the paint on one of the front fenders, the wiring harness for the tow lights wasn't ever attached correctly and was lying directly on the exhaust pipe at the back of the vehicle, a wiring harness going to the 2nd row seats was never attached correctly either and was dangling in the area your feet would be and lastly there was a nice chip in one of the black spoked rims. Complete BS to deal with all of that. It is well known in the industry that the CAP (Chicago Assembly Plant) is a shitshow. Between the union and it being in Chicago says enough about what comes out of that factory.

 

[Sgt1411]

Hey Bud,
I didn't realize I was "Spewing Vitriol" ?
I thought I was relaying my experiences with
FORD and FORD Dealers and FORD Products and their quality issues
I have experienced over the last 11 months.

Never owned a Ford before.
"Spewing Vitriol" ?

Your comments and frustrations are bang on.......some people just dont like holding others accountable. That's completely fine but not all of us are sheep and we all don't have to bend over. I say this as a customer who loves my ST but after purchasing 6 Explorers in a row I won't be buying another one when my lease is up. That's for all the reasons you articulated plus many more. The fact that Ford is THE MOST recalled car company should speak for itself. I actually don't even mind the recalls if the OEM handles the recall correctly. That's investigate, find a solution quickly, work with suppliers to produce new parts, deploy to dealership network as quickly as possible. Ford simply cant do that, the RVC recall is a classic example. or the rear end bolt fiasco whereby I have to have the parking brake on now every PARK cycle because some supplier didnt produce a strong enough bolt. STill no bolts for retail customers, how long is that 18-24 months?

 

[EDWYER]

Hey Bud,
I didn't realize I was "Spewing Vitriol" ?
I thought I was relaying my experiences with
FORD and FORD Dealers and FORD Products and their quality issues
I have experienced over the last 11 months.

Never owned a Ford before.
"Spewing Vitriol" ?

Read the whole thread, many have had various QC issues. He is saying the entire thread, relax buddy.

"Does Ford deserve every bit of vitriol being spewed here? You bet your ass."

 

[katmandude]

Ford cutting corners to save a buck is rearing it's ugly head,, the production line and untrained / incompetent personnel My '23 ST had no heat coming out the vents. It turned out a heater hose clamp to frame was never done at factory and the hose managed to kink and pinch off water flow to core, dealer tech fixed this defect, I waited for 2 hours wasting away until they finally found the problem. So this Einstein CEO's plan having some schmuck joyride the vehicle to find issues with it?
That's like giving your dog a bone for crapping on your bed..
The quality control department needs a thorough house cleaning

 

[bluesnake01]

Can’t argue with that although I kind of hit the lottery as far as defects go. I remember decades ago buying new cars was a big deal for most dealers. Great vehicle prep and they went to great lengths to make the delivery pleasant. Now a days, few brands and dealers follow that path. I don’t even have dealers prep the outside, leaving the factory plastic and stickers. I have seen them do more damage than good prepping the paint.

My first new car cost $10,500. A Cavalier Z24. It was delivered well prepped at $49 over dealer invoice. I would expect that level or better on any $60k vehicle.


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IDK, growing up, I remember people always said never get the first new year models, they always had issues. That was in the 90's. The difference in today's time is there are more electronics even on standard cars, something that was mainly used on BMW's/Mercs back then and were considered hugely unreliable in those years because of that.

I agree though, new vehicles in general need to be prepped better whether they cost 20k or 100k. Still remember my dad's friend having issues on his brand new 99 Mustang that was month's old. Then there was that Firestone fiasco on the Explorer's as well in the 90's....

60k is a lot, but there are some that feel entitled because of it. In reality, it is a 34k~ vehicle from early 2000's after inflation lol Wasnt exactly top status back then, still isnt now. Love the vehicle a ton but some people put it on a pedestal.

 

[Sgt1411]

I'm not sure if that old adage "Never buy the first year of a new model" still holds true today. Reason being there are a ton of different prototype builds that get built and are driven by Engineering staff before production is approved for public sale. I had no idea how many vehicles they (any OEM) builds before the final "OK TO BUY" stamp is given. PP builds, TT builds, PP1 builds, PP2 builds, etc etc etc. Its crazy and they all get crushed afterwards. Did they do that back in the 80, 90, 2000's?

For the Explorer and PIU I know they are using the Mod Center for a second QC check.

 

[GregALewis]

1600 miles on my 2025 ST
I have been a Ford guy since my first used 1966
Mustang to my last Ford a new 2017 F150.
The quality of my new 2025 ST is soooo below what I’m used to I’m actually thinking about selling it at a loss.
Four defects so far. Not sure how they are going to fix the moonroof interior that does not close all the way without tearing the entire car apart.
Sad. Just plain sad.

 

[enphor]

The way I see it is you have your dealership problems of them not doing the proper diligence and checks on new vehicles they get from the manufacturer and of course service quality. Then you have the actual mechanical physical quality of the vehicles (on Ford).

As for dealerships, I don't think its a secret that with any car maker there are good ones and bad ones.

As for quality of the vehicles. All I know is that this is my first Ford. I have owned mostly Subaru and one Infiniti. Nearly all of them had their issues. Subaru Tribeca would eat front suspension parts after 30K miles, WRX had a fuel line issue which hit me spraying fuel all over the engine while driving!, Infiniti was the worse with piston ring defects causing crazy oil consumption necessitating a huge fight and them finally replacing the block.

So my personal experience is that problems will happen, some dealerships suck, and what counts is that the issues are resolved with minimal fuss. I am also of the mind that small things are forgivable, however massive major mechanical design deficiencies are not (such as those with cursed engines that no matter what you do they will self destruct prematurely, like the BMW N20 engine fiasco).

That being said, if there are widespread quality problems with assembly that stuff needs to be addressed, seems that is most of what I'm reading here about ST complaints. Maybe thats why they are moving everything to Mexico as they can which is sad.

 

[Ray Nabozny 1800NEWFORD]

At 1800NEWFORD we check the tire pressure on EVERY Vehicle that we deliver. 2 pounds over the cold door number.

 

[speedracer05]

A sign of leadership is owning up to mistakes and working on game plan to fix them instead of making excuses or pushing them off to the next CEO. Pushing problems down to dealership and sales reps was never sustainable and Ford seems to have a good game plan for setting itself up to be able to compete, for consumer and shareholder expectations for excellence. The next couple of years will be interesting to see how their quality fixes unfold. "You have to set up a culture shift, a performance reward system where every engineering manager, purchasing component manager, every plant manager is fully accountable for the quality and cost of their work. We're still not at the world-class levels that, not only our customers expect, but, more importantly, what we expect out of ourselves." CEO - Jim Farley

https://www.axios.com/2024/02/15/ford-jim-farley-quality-issues


The biggest issue with this rhetoric is that there is no skin in the game. If you are improving quality, lengthen you warranty. The Koreans did it and, as it stands, they are the only brands that actually have the balls to do it. Why wouldn't the 'Quality is job 1" company do the same?

 

[EXST]

A sign of leadership is owning up to mistakes and working on game plan to fix them instead of making excuses or pushing them off to the next CEO. Pushing problems down to dealership and sales reps was never sustainable and Ford seems to have a good game plan for setting itself up to be able to compete, for consumer and shareholder expectations for excellence. The next couple of years will be interesting to see how their quality fixes unfold. "You have to set up a culture shift, a performance reward system where every engineering manager, purchasing component manager, every plant manager is fully accountable for the quality and cost of their work. We're still not at the world-class levels that, not only our customers expect, but, more importantly, what we expect out of ourselves." CEO - Jim Farley

https://www.axios.com/2024/02/15/ford-jim-farley-quality-issues

Launch and Line Quality Changes:

• "We have a 25-mile pre-delivery quality shakedown" — where employees drive the vehicle 25 miles and scrutinize its performance as a customer might — "and we drove 28,000 Super Dutys, and 100 more each day to assure quality of the product. We pre-drove every vehicle to find any kind of defect.
• "We now have added higher mileage, real-world testing during the launch. We have tripled the number of trucks in trailer towing tests, which is really critical to Super Duty. That's nearly four times as many as we typically do in our durability testing.
• "We now have a lot more quality checks on the product line in both (factory) locations. We've added now AI (artificial intelligence) on the line to catch quality issues that aren't visible to the human eye.
• "Simply put, you are not going to see us launch product until it meets or exceeds the highest quality standards that we've ever had. This is what we're doing for all vehicles, like we're going through now for (the new) Mustang and other upcoming exciting products."

Owning Up to Problems & Culture:

• "For our management team, quality is our No. 1 priority. And our overall quality today is improving. However, we're still not at the world-class levels that, not only our customers expect, but, more importantly, what we expect out of ourselves."
• "We are starting to see our initial quality improve markedly in North America. We're taking a range of actions, as you would expect, to eliminate any defects in the first place. And we are totally focused on finding and fixing issues that do come up. The way we portray this inside the company is, we always want to put quality first because that's the most fundamental commitment to our customers, and our customers, we want to treat like family."
• "It requires a lot of end-to-end changes, from our supply chain, our manufacturing and engineering system, to the way we test, and also the way we find root cause and solve that across all the different disciplines in the industrial system. I want to give you maybe an example of what's changing at Ford, what we do differently."

Great Quote from Farley:
"The capability atrophied in engineering, supply chain and manufacturing at Ford," Farley said.

Having worked in the auto industry I have had the pleasure of working with former Ford folks and great talent is there, just matter of unleashing it in the right way. This industry is a pressure cooker, but customer feedback is gold that helps drive innovation and a higher standard of quality. As owners, keep your expectations high and keep providing feedback to Ford, it matters. The adults in the room at Ford appreciate it.

Although I appreciate the fact that you are doing things to improve quality, I think what you don't understand is that you have too many suppliers who are easily affected by the economy, and they only make enough parts to build cars and everything else becomes a backorder issue at the dealer level or one particular dealer may buy a lot of parts and then the rest of everybody doesn't get any what I'm saying is I know you have a lot of shared codes with a lot of your products and that's good but at the same time you have a lot of parts that take forever to get and when you get them, they're delivered incorrectly. In other words I can tell you that I ordered an exhaust for a Ford flex and got a Ford F250 exhaust don't know how that happens but it delayed the repair of my car an additional month because it was undrivable as an example as you continue to use more and more suppliers and cross international boundaries this will become more and more critical also complications. You make the cars too technically complicated plus use the computer system to stuff things in places that humans aren't capable of actually reaching with any kind of tool without ripping apart, half the car to replace the single thing. In other words you're relying too much on computer generated, build process and not enough about how the technicians can work on the cars cars used to be very easy to work on you can't use the excuse that you build better cars. They should be easily repairable and this is another problem. Most for vehicles are not easy repairable in fact there a technological nightmare and this two basically makes any warranty work take five times as long because the text wanna make money and the only way they can get this warranty work done is to do a little bit of work here in there in between all the paying jobs because warranty payments are so bad with that being said I think Ford does a lot of things right but a tremendous amount of things wrong your partners and suppliers aren't doing you any good a lot of them should not be building parts for Ford or any car manufactured for that manner. I can tell you a number of different things owning so many Ford cars that are just poor quality. The steering wheel coverings are very poor quality the switches in the doors of the Maki the little tips of the window switches the little crow pieces break off I don't know how that's possible but they do they break off and you have to get the whole new assembly. You can't just buy the switch part which is silly. We're $1600 headlamps. The other problem is if the car gets damaged either in a comprehensive manner through say a rat that was stuck in your car from Mexico to the United States and did tremendous amount of damage like in my Mach E It cost me a fortune to get it.fixed and nowadays insurance companies refused to fix things with new parts. They use what they call recycle parts which have less of a warranty and Ford won't back the warranty of the vehicle so you're stuck paying out-of-pocket this goes for the whole product line. I own a Ford Explorer, ST, which I love very much but the one thing that I can say is stop piping an audio into the cabin that just sucks. I wish there was a way to turn that off dries my wife, crazy and myself. I'd like to hear the car shift and the engine not something coming through the speakers. It has nothing to do with either. Thank you for listening.