Anyone ever have issues getting warranty service at dealers they didn't buy from?

[MaverickDragon]

Thanks @Darryl.
You made a more refined case than I mentioned, but that might well be a significant number of the "denials" that you have personal experience with.

I imagine if a customer comes in with a problem that clearly won't be covered under warranty, and they are informed of that, they might interpret that dealer as not accepting the warranty, where that may not be the case.

At this point, I don't know if the Ford Protect not being accepted is a reality or not.
In my case, it's accepted locally, so I have nothing to complain about.

I have yet to hear of anyone with first hand experience mention any dealer by name who wouldn't accept the Ford Protect warranty, and as was pointed out, that policy doesn't seem to make very good business sense.

If anyone does have first hand outright warranty refusal experience, mention them and if no one else is willing, I'll call Ford Corporate and ask them to change their advertising which indicates that the warranty is available at all Ford dealer locations.

Perhaps that might end up changing the dealer's policy, or maybe not, but the phone call is free.

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[sajohnson]

I am reminded of the fable of the 6 blind men describing an elephant. One is touching the tail, another a leg, another guy the trunk, etc. Each one is adamant that they *know* what an elephant looks like.

I agree that it's stupid, bad business, etc., but some dealerships do refuse to do OE warranty repairs. That's been well documented and confirmed by numerous techs and service managers. Presumably, those same dealers would refuse factory extended warranty work as well.

FWIW, I've had several bad experiences, but I have had a couple good ones too. Our Badlands has had 2 recalls. One was to reprogram the BMS software, and the other was to replace the OE FLA battery with an AGM. Both went smoothly.

So it's hit and miss. No doubt there are dealers who seek out warranty work. Others see it as a necessary evil but do it without any resistance, and still others who try their best to avoid it. I imagine some mfrs are easier for dealers to interact with regarding warranty work as well.

 

[Darryl]

I am reminded of the fable of the 6 blind men describing an elephant. One is touching the tail, another a leg, another guy the trunk, etc. Each one is adamant that they *know* what an elephant looks like.

I agree that it's stupid, bad business, etc., but some dealerships do refuse to do OE warranty repairs. That's been well documented and confirmed by numerous techs and service managers. Presumably, those same dealers would refuse factory extended warranty work as well.

FWIW, I've had several bad experiences, but I have had a couple good ones too. Our Badlands has had 2 recalls. One was to reprogram the BMS software, and the other was to replace the OE FLA battery with an AGM. Both went smoothly.

So it's hit and miss. No doubt there are dealers who seek out warranty work. Others see it as a necessary evil but do it without any resistance, and still others who try their best to avoid it. I imagine some mfrs are easier for dealers to interact with regarding warranty work as well.

A dealership is REQUIRED to perform warranty service if it is a franchised dealership. They may not be equipped for certain specialties such as Hybrid or EV. But if not equipped to service a vehicle, we are not allowed to sell it. If a dealer refuses to honor warranty, it has to have a legitimate reason. They may say they're overbooked and can't get to it right away. But they can't refuse . If they do, the customer needs to call Ford's customer service number. We may be able to refuse an individual customer because of a personal issue. But we can't refuse warranty work. People evidently aren't making Ford aware of what's going on. Ford will shut a dealership down.

 

[MaverickDragon]

... but some dealerships do refuse to do OE warranty repairs. That's been well documented and confirmed by numerous techs and service managers... and still others who try their best to avoid it. I imagine some mfrs are easier for dealers to interact with regarding warranty work as well.

As @Darryl noted, refusal to do warranty work while a vehicle is withing the 3 year 36K original warranty for a covered repair should be reported to Ford.
It's a contract violation.
There are consequences should a dealer arbitrarily decide to violate their contract.
Unless a customer brings that up, the dealer gets away with it. That's on the customer.

"Well documented" would mean that a specific instance for a warranty covered repair at a specific dealer was identified, rather than somebody said they had a problem somewhere.

Again, there is a difference between the extended warranty and original factory warranty, but in either case, it is likely a good idea for customers to call out bad actors, even though it's a personal decision to do that.

 

[sajohnson]

A dealership is REQUIRED to perform warranty service if it is a franchised dealership. They may not be equipped for certain specialties such as Hybrid or EV. But if not equipped to service a vehicle, we are not allowed to sell it. If a dealer refuses to honor warranty, it has to have a legitimate reason. They may say they're overbooked and can't get to it right away. But they can't refuse . If they do, the customer needs to call Ford's customer service number. We may be able to refuse an individual customer because of a personal issue. But we can't refuse warranty work. People evidently aren't making Ford aware of what's going on. Ford will shut a dealership down.

I have not claimed that some Ford dealerships refuse to do warranty work, although I imagine that it happens, as with essentially all makes.

Of course on paper, dealerships (for all mfrs) are required to honor the factory warranty, and it seems most do, but plenty of people do get turned away. One common reason is, "You didn't buy it here." Of course we all know that while there are legit reasons to deny warranty work, where the vehicle was purchased is not one of them.

From my post (#80):

"In ~45 years, I've had several dealerships -- different mfrs (none of them Ford) -- refuse, or strongly attempt to refuse, warranty work.

(We had a bad sales experience at our local Ford dealer -- several attempts at fraud -- but no warranty work so far)."

Our experience getting recall work done at the local Ford/Subaru dealer we purchased our Badlands from was smooth. Of course we did buy it from them.

Generally speaking, over the 5 decades that I've been working on and reading about cars and trucks, the issue of dealers (of all makes) refusing warranty work has been a constant complaint. Here is an article/transcript I found with just a quick search:

(Car Talk) "TOM: But until warranty repairs generate income equivalent to nonwarranty repairs, there will always be dealers out there who will shirk the warranty work -- assuming they've got enough work that they can pick and choose. So you can blame the shortsighted dealers, but some of the blame also has to go to the manufacturers for creating this customer-unfriendly disincentive."
https://www.cartalk.com/cars-content/dealerships-so-reluctant-to-do-warranty-repairs

I saw several webpages from law firms, which is another indicator that it is a significant problem. To be fair, most law firms deal with refusal to honor all types of warranties: OE factory; mfr extended; 3rd party extended. A high percentage of complaints are likely generated by the 3rd party warranties.

https://sevenlaw.com/blog/what-to-do-if-the-dealership-wont-fix-your-car/
https://paulmankin.com/car-warranty-denial-disputes/

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