What's wrong with my Focus?!

jeannieblue

goldspanners wrote: »

ford and the dealer always done my warranty work and they never serviced it,i serviced it myself, genuine filters but no stamps.

Its scaremongering - probably work for main stealers and fear for their job.

Tho to be honest, can't say I blame them (well...), dealerships are closing almost daily round here... a Honda one closed today... Lexus soon, Land Rover end of last month, Audi about to close, Volvo went about a month ago..... its not good out there.

northstar23

jeannieblue wrote: »

Stop forcing (or coercing) people to over spend at expensive dealerships!Remember the site you are on!

If that's aimed at me.... !!!!!!?????

I hate main dealerships with a passion. They lie, rip people off and generally carry out work shoddily. They book fixed price labour items such as an hour's labour to change a 10min headlight bulb. In my humble opinion the local Ford dealers are the scum of the earth and I go to them only when I need a genuine Ford part.

Even if you look back over this thread I've advocated going to cheaper independent garages. However in the case of warrenties... if you are desperate for that dealer stamp in the book (for resale value or whatever) and want less hassle in the event of a claim then yes I believe going to a dealer is the best course of action... and I've heard that straight from people I've known who work at Ford. It ain't nice and its certianly morally questionable but hey that's Ford for you.

Personally I believe the money saved at independent garages, using pattern parts and the like would pay the bills for any major fault over and beyond the value of a warrenty claim.

GLN

Sounds like the alternator come to think of it...?!

TiTheRev

jeannieblue wrote: »

Its scaremongering - probably work for main stealers and fear for their job.

Tho to be honest, can't say I blame them (well...), dealerships are closing almost daily round here... a Honda one closed today... Lexus soon, Land Rover end of last month, Audi about to close, Volvo went about a month ago..... its not good out there.

We've closed 5/6 sites in the last 6months we used to have over 20 dealerships in the group, that's fading fast...

TiTheRev

northstar23 wrote: »

I hate main dealerships with a passion. They lie, rip people off and generally carry out work shoddily. They book fixed price labour items such as an hour's labour to change a 10min headlight bulb.

Verging on libelous northstar23...

We bill by book times, but that is 0.1 (6mins) and regularly fit bulbs/wing mirrors/no.plates FREE OF CHARGE, and if we spend more time on it than the book time allows we lose money, not charge more to compensate. Swings and roundabouts. Ive never lied in the 4years i've been at a main dealer, never ripped anyone off or sold them something they dont need and although we've had a few cars back where work wasn't entirely satisfactory we have a very good record (less than 1% returns over the year) for workmanship.

Don't tar us all with the same brush and make such uneducated sweeping statements about maybe one event you've heard about or experienced.

northstar23

TiTheRev wrote: »

Verging on libelous northstar23...

We bill by book times, but that is 0.1 (6mins) and regularly fit bulbs/wing mirrors/no.plates FREE OF CHARGE, and if we spend more time on it than the book time allows we lose money, not charge more to compensate. Swings and roundabouts. Ive never lied in the 4years i've been at a main dealer, never ripped anyone off or sold them something they dont need and although we've had a few cars back where work wasn't entirely satisfactory we have a very good record (less than 1% returns over the year) for workmanship.

Don't tar us all with the same brush and make such uneducated sweeping statements about maybe one event you've heard about or experienced.

I applaud you sir... you are obviously a man of integrity. What manufacturer do you work for?

From my point of view it isn't just one event. I've had awful experiences with every local Ford dealership where I've been lied to... other's in my family will tell similar tales and I have friends who've had even worse experiences. Couple that with tales from mates who work in such establishments and its a grim old picture. There are manufactuers who seem to score highly for customer service (Skoda always do well in the JD Power survey) but Ford isn't one of them.

Please excuse my bitterness... but sadly it is based on extensive experience both as a mechanic, private customer and as fleet manager for a business.

jeannieblue

northstar23 wrote: »

I applaud you sir... you are obviously a man of integrity. What manufacturer do you work for?

From my point of view it isn't just one event. I've had awful experiences with every local Ford dealership where I've been lied to... other's in my family will tell similar tales and I have friends who've had even worse experiences. Couple that with tales from mates who work in such establishments and its a grim old picture. There are manufactuers who seem to score highly for customer service (Skoda always do well in the JD Power survey) but Ford isn't one of them.

Please excuse my bitterness... but sadly it is based on extensive experience both as a mechanic, private customer and as fleet manager for a business.

Agree with you - which is why I took the time to write to FMC and let them know that their dealerships were letting them down and giving them details, if they don't know, they won't do anything...

They offered to compensate me for the part that I bought and paid for (though it was warranty job really) - sadly the phone call from them arrived two days after I threw away the faulty part... and they needed that to refund me.

But I do think that it is important to service your car to manufacturers standard whilst it is under warranty and use genuine parts (hey they are not dear!) and they should then have no quibble over a warranty issue - if they do, sue them if need be, but I found it better to go direct to FMC, who did listen and were very very concerned about the treatment I had received.

If ones gear box went under warranty - you'd not want to pay out for that - so go independent yes, but make sure that it is serviced in accordance etc.

If they quibble, they are breaking the law... not you nor I.

jeannieblue

TiTheRev wrote: »

We've closed 5/6 sites in the last 6months we used to have over 20 dealerships in the group, that's fading fast...

It's all a bit sad... I don't like to see anything fold - cos you know that someone has just lost their livelihood.

Bit of a b*gger...

HoofeHearted

I have an 03 reg focus (from new). During the first year, it kept stalling when I slowed down. Yes it is very frightening when you lose power and your steering turns to concrete.

I did a bit of research on the web and the consensus of opinion at that time, was that the ECU needed re-programming. I took it back to the garage and they knew about the problem and re-programmed the ECU under warranty.

Hope that helps.

loobs40

missingink wrote: »

It's a '99 1.8(A/C) engine branded as a zetec. We've been having problems with the speedo failing but understood that to be an intermitent fault that a lot of Focus models have so we weren't too worried. Just lately though we've noticed that the car runs fine first thing in the morning but when you take it out later in the day, there is loss of acceleration when the speedo fails & when you change down to stop or turn a corner, the engine cuts out all together! Obviously this results in the loss of power steering so this has resulted in a lot of near misses on roundabouts & with parked cars & other objects!:eek:

!

I know exactly what it is ! It happened to our 1.8 focus X reg earlier this year. Its the gearbox speed sensor.

We had ours changed and it fixed the problem. Watch out though, they need to quote two prices. One if they manage to fix it without dismantling the gear box (cost us £90) and one if they have to dismantle the gearbox (over £200)