<p>My son ordered a new 2012 Ford Focus back in June after carefully weighing what options were important to him and what color he wanted. Originally he was told it would come in around August 15. Finally came in yesterday. My husband and son went down to the dealer , did all the paper work, loans et cetera. Then went outside to get the car and found out it was not in the color ordered. His paper work says the color he wanted but somehow the dealer ordered the wrong color. (Which is not to his liking. ) They did not take possession of the car. and the salesman said he could not do anything for him, he needed to talk to the dealership Manager who was not in today. </p>
<p>Not really sure what can be done at this point. Supposedly the dealer did a search for a similar car and could not find one. My son really needs this new car because the one he is driving now is almost on life support. So sad after planning and waiting so long for his first new car to be disappointed.</p>
<p>Ask the dealer to take $500 off and accept the vehicle. Live with the color. If your son doesn’t get used to the color (heck, he might learn to like it), he can get it painted at some point.</p>
<p>OR, ask the dealer to provide a rental for your son until the correct vehicle arrives. You have waited long enough for this!</p>
<p>If its a color he really dislikes, then I wouldn’t take the car. My last car lasted 11 years. I would have been unhappy if it was some color I really disliked. I like the idea of having a loaner car until his comes in.</p>
<p>Does the color your son wants come in an upgraded model? Maybe they will honor the price and give you an upgrade? If not, what’s his second-choice? Most car buyers have a back-up color they would accept and if that’s got additional equipment on it, try to get them to include it at no extra charge.</p>
<p>I would NEVER take ownership of a car that was not a color I liked. Sorry…you gotta look at it every day. He made a request…the dealership should honor it.</p>
<p>Get the dealer to give you a loaner for a couple of months and order the color you want. They might be willing to accommodate since it is their fault. Or maybe they can spring some money for a cheap rental or split the cost with you somehow. If it would have cost you certain amount, ask them to pay the difference of what it would cost you to rent a car.</p>
<p>We always gave the dealership 2 color choices just in case they couldn’t find our number one color choice.</p>
<p>I would give the dealership one chance to correct the error within a reasonable time frame. If they can’t make the correction within the set time frame, I would back out of the deal and go to a different dealership. You are the consumer and you shouldn’t have to settle.</p>
<p>Isn’t that the whole point of ordering a new car, to get it the way you want? Is there any other reason to order a new car? Otherwise wouldn’t you just search through dealer inventory and find one that is “close enough” to what you want? I bought my last car through AAA. I let them do all the legwork until they found a car optioned exactly as I wanted. If I went to the trouble of ordering a new car, followed by waiting for it to be built, I would not accept anything different (unless there were additional options given to me at no cost) without at least the offer of compensation. Is the Ford Focus in short supply?</p>
<p>Give the dealer 2 choices? I think, nysmile, that this wasn’t a dealer locate, but rather a model ordered from factory. The customer would have itemized his exact preference on every option on a made-to-order car.
I don’t doubt he can refuse the wrong car, but the tough part is does he want to? Is the customer worse off if he just backs out and walks away? He can walk down the street and find a new Focus; but he cannot easily find the exact Focus that he cared enough to order. It is getting late in the season and they may not still be taking orders for new cars this model yr.; unless of course he wanted a 2012 model.
Maybe the dealer can do a dealer locate(again), and might find an upgrade model that suits him at or near same price? Ask them to search more than just their region.</p>
<p>Customer can always ask dealership for name and contact info of the region manager. Sometimes he/she has a greater power to search. Sometimes, if dealer just thinks you will contact regional office they try harder, particularly if the dealer was up to any kind of “funny business”. Region managers do not like to deal with unhappy customers over dealer errors. Dealerships know this.</p>
<p>I’m with Thumper - your S shouldn’t settle for anything less than exactly what he wants. This new car is a lot of money and he’ll likely need to live with what he gets for years. If it’s not right to him it’ll bug him every time he sees the car.</p>
<p>I’ve factory ordered a new Ford before as well as some other manufacturer’s vehicles since I practice what I preached in the previous paragraph. It’s difficult for them to get the color wrong. They usually confirm exactly which options one wants, put in a build order, and then get a copy of that special order from the factory right away, which includes the exact options including color, back along with the build date. They even faxed a copy to me so I could double check it. This sounds either like either an incompetent dealer or a dealer trying to pull a fast one to get a deal done. </p>
<p>Unless the dealer can correct this within a day or two I’d tell them to forget the whole deal and go elsewhere. The dealer will likely put a lot of pressure on to leave the lot with a car including perhaps some unethical behavior, but stand firm. One thing you can do is to request to see the special order paperwork and confirmation by the factory of it. I doubt they’ll be able to produce one unless someone really made a mistake on specifying the color and they didn’t give you a chance to see the build order. If they can’t produce one then they likely didn’t special order it. Another way to check this is on the factory sticker of the vehicle that should indicate it’s a special order. This assumes it was a factory special order rather than a wait for random cars to come in with a hopeful match to your S’s specs.</p>
<p>Is it really that difficult to get this domestic car? Have you checked the inventories of all the other dealers within a few hour driving range of your home? You can usually do this online. IMO it’s not a big deal to drive an hour or two away for a one-off large purchase like this.</p>
<p>I didn’t realize you could still order a factory build from anyone. </p>
<p>In any case, how about using auto trader and their search function which will give you options of looking within a certain area radius and you can also specify the color. It will theoretically tell you what is in stock. </p>
<p>For the record, when I’ve used it, I find that it is sometimes wrong, at least according to the salesmen you reach by phone. I will say that buying cars is one of my least favorite activities. For the first four cars I bought in my life, the salesman was gone from the dealership within 5 weeks. </p>
<p>Don’t settle for something less than what you wanted.</p>
<p>Boy, that brings back memories. Back in 1996 we ordered a Escort wagon when my old one died. We told the dealer that I’d take any color but purple, since we were in a hurry and the main concerns were having an engine block heater and a couple of other things. Paid cash for the thing thanks to a big insurance settlement.</p>
<p>He called to tell us he’d found a car and we went to pick it up. As we approached the dealership our kids started laughing 'cause there was a dark purple car sitting right in front. Dealer looks at me with a straight face and said “the official color is boysenberry blue”. </p>
<p>I owned that car for 14 years and everyone at gas stations and the like always said, “that purple car”.</p>
<p>Something is not right about the dealer’s story. I would ask for a paper trail to find out what happened, given this was a special factory order and it came in the wrong color. There is a paper trail. </p>
<p>If he does not want the car as is, he walks away… starts over… and waits all over again. Or he uses the internet to find a car close to what he wants. If he does not want to do that, ask for the dealership to discount the car and walk away until they accept renegotiating. </p>
<p>I agree that maybe the car was never ordered to begin with and they found one identical except for the color. Something is just not right if the paperwork lists the correct color but the car sitting in the lot is not that color.</p>
<p>I purchased a Hyundai Elantra earlier this year. I wanted a base model only, with a few color choices. It was a very hard car to even find on the lot in any color or model. I found one 2+ hours away, did the deal over the internet, had the bank draft sent from my credit union, and drove to sign the few papers that were not financing related and drove off with the car. I loved dealing with the salesmen only online. One or two calls total. Most dealers have their inventory online and up to date. And Auto Trader is a great resource as were a few other sites.</p>
<p>One more thing - don’t ever start signing the paperwork, doing loan stuff, etc. without first thoroughly inspecting the exact car that’s being purchased. Besides an ordering issue like this one needs to consider that it’s a long journey from a factory to a dealer lot with lots of opportunities for surface damage, and then one needs to contend with the dealer lot jockeys (people moving cars all around - maybe a HS kid with little driving experience who’s maneuvering in tight spaces), dealer detailers who might ruin the finish with their power buffers, etc.</p>
<p>I had the dealer bring out a car to me once that the detailer ruined with the power buffer - probably trying to take out a surface scratch. I rejected the car immediately and the dealer tried to talk me into it but I just said no. I told them if they have another identical one then fine, otherwise I’m off. They had another one identical to it but without the buffer damage. I inspected very very closely and it was fine so I took it.</p>
<p>I also refused a car recently. The car I wanted was in another state so my dealer, after agreeing on a price, went and picked the car up for me. When the car arrived I notices an uneven seam as well as what appeared to be overspray of clear coat. I figured the car might have had a bit of body work done, maybe due to the jockeying back and forth. I wasn’t worried that the repair was a big one, but I wanted a new car, not one that had already had body work. My salesman tried to convince me that there was no body work done, and they even had some meter that measured paint; it showed that the car only had factory paint on it. I wasn’t buying that story, and refused the car. </p>
<p>Even if they had reduced the price, I wasn’t taking that car. I would have noticed that seam every time I got in and out of the car. Because I was looking for a color that was in short supply and the dealer said there was not another one they could trade for, I looked for myself. I must have called all the dealers in 7 states to see who had the car on the lot. I then went back to my dealer and said, I found this car at 3 other dealers, can you get it for me? It turned out they of course knew which dealers had the car, but they didn’t trade with any of them. I made a deal over the phone with one of them and flew to the city and drove the car home. It was a very easy transaction and I couldn’t be happier.</p>
<p>Do not take a car you don’t want!! If your dealer will not get the car for you, get on the phone and find it yourself.</p>