Ford Roadside Assistance Experience

[Trustable]

Well, today I was dumb enough to think that the ford pass application would let me unlock my vehicle. I ended up locking my keys in the car with ford pass today (on purpose, was at gym) and was not able to unlock with ford pass again when I was done. I followed all of the literature on fords site for troubleshooting but it would just load infinitely. Eventually I thought screw it, and called the roadside number. Well I call and fill out the stuff, says someone will be there within 60-90 minutes to unlock my car. I thought okay, yeah its long but at least I got somewhere warm to go with water and not in the middle of nowhere. 90 minutes later guy gets there, he is pissed, i mean steaming mad. I guess ford is only giving him 15 bucks for the trip of around 50minutes one way. I get it, that's pretty irritating, but he signed the contract knowing the pay. Well, he tries to unlock it for maybe 2 minutes, says something about not wanting to damage the windshield, then says your all set and speeds off, almost backing into someone, and then honks at the guy he almost backs into. So 95 minutes since I called roadside and still am locked out. Next I tried a dealer. I was literally .75 miles from a dealer but they said they couldn't do anything, even if I paid. So then, I call ford back, it takes the person on the line at least 10 minutes to understand that the guy just left and didn't complete the service. All she does is tell me she can call someone back out but that will be 2 hours most likely. My thought is that if the guy was already 50 minutes away, there's probably not anyone closer or who actually will do the job. She just said sorry that happened, didn't refer me to the customer support line or anything. I told her I'd figure it out on my own since I didn't have another 2 hours to wait. They then kept calling me to figure it out and no matter what I said she just kept offering the 2 hour unlock service. I was able to get a ride from my neighbor to and from the gym thankfully. May have been a bit of venting, but I have never experienced anything quite like that before. Long story short, I am wondering if others have had similar experience with roadside assistance, as I will 100% never use it or the app again.

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[Joeiconic]

Moral of the story, don’t lock your keys in your truck on purpose.

 

[Trustable]

Moral of the story, don’t lock your keys in your truck on purpose.

Exactly, but thankfully I wasnt out in the middle of nowhere or I was screwed if I had to depend on roadside.

 

[Augie81]

My guess with things like road side assistance is that the company offering it contracts it out to the lowest bidder. And those services probably are the lowest bidder because they are not the best at what they do.

I say this because when I bought my house a few years ago it came with a home warranty that was paid for by the seller, not me. Less than a year later my heater shit the bed and I called the home warranty company. They gave me some numbers to call of their approved providers. Out of all of them one number was answered by an elderly lady that seemed to be answering a home phone, was rude and asked me why I was calling and when I explained she said her husband would call me back and he never did. Another I called told me they were too busy. The others went to voice mails that were never answered.

Finally after multiple calls to the home warranty company they agreed to let me hire someone on my own as long as they called the warranty company for approval. So I called several places and they all said , "No we don't work with them because they are difficult to work with." I was about to give up and pay on my own because having heat was kind of important. Then my Mom told me about a HVAC guy that did work for her and fortunately he agreed to do it and deal with their BS. In fact he did such a good job I hired him when I replaced my system for a high efficiency system later on and will hire him again if need be.

So with things like this they seem to farm them out to the lowest bidder and they are the lowest bidder for a reason. And I also wonder if they want people to just give up and pay out of pocket due to frustration.

 

[Trustable]

My guess with things like road side assistance is that the company offering it contracts it out to the lowest bidder. And those services probably are the lowest bidder because they are not the best at what they do.

I say this because when I bought my house a few years ago it came with a home warranty that was paid for by the seller, not me. Less than a year later my heater shit the bed and I called the home warranty company. They gave me some numbers to call of their approved providers. Out of all of them one number was answered by an elderly lady that seemed to be answering a home phone, was rude and asked me why I was calling and when I explained she said her husband would call me back and he never did. Another I called told me they were too busy. The others went to voice mails that were never answered.

Finally after multiple calls to the home warranty company they agreed to let me hire someone on my own as long as they called the warranty company for approval. So I called several places and they all said , "No we don't work with them because they are difficult to work with." I was about to give up and pay on my own because having heat was kind of important. Then my Mom told me about a HVAC guy that did work for her and fortunately he agreed to do it and deal with their BS. In fact he did such a good job I hired him when I replaced my system for a high efficiency system later on and will hire him again if need be.

So with things like this they seem to farm them out to the lowest bidder and they are the lowest bidder for a reason. And I also wonder if they want people to just give up and pay out of pocket due to frustration.

Based on how he acted I agree with what you said 100%. I get it, we all have bad days, but dont blame me you accepted the job and contract. Glad you were able to get the warranty issue with your house figured out, I just bought a house in November and my furnace and water heater went out in early February. Thought I was missing out by not having seller do the warranty or any guarantee, but it looks like I didn't miss anything. I'm in a more rural area, so there are not a ton of hvac companies/guys near me. When you say heater you talking water heater or furnace, just wondering as you mentioned high efficiency and those HE water heaters are pretty sweet!

 

[Trustable]

Fords Roadside has been good to me.
but its a crap shoot as Ford doesn't have their own trucks, they contract it out and that's where the problems happen as you have seen.
They can be crappy providers, busy like everyone else, or whatever....the bonus really is only that they do the legwork to find you a truck...you aren't leafing through the yellow pages on the side of the road looking for one yourself.

I was once down in a deep ditch that you couldn't see from the highway and the tow truck pulled right up to the spot because they got my location from the trucks GPS.

I've never been unhappy with the service, but I've never been overly joyed about it either.
it is what it is.

That's actually pretty cool to use the GPS, that is a definite benefit to using it.

 

[paval3]

I will never try to use it again! Here's my thread on what happened to me... for the short version, scroll down to post #12.

https://www.ranger5g.com/forum/thre...-on-side-of-road-waiting-for-tow-truck.15252/

 

[Danager]

That sucks.

If they can’t get my doors unlocked and I’m in the middle of nowhere, I’m telling them the truck won’t start and they will have to tow it.

 

[Trustable]

I will never try to use it again! Here's my thread on what happened to me... for the short version, scroll down to post #12.

https://www.ranger5g.com/forum/thre...-on-side-of-road-waiting-for-tow-truck.15252/

Thats awful

 

[Augie81]

When you say heater you talking water heater or furnace, just wondering as you mentioned high efficiency and those HE water heaters are pretty sweet!

Yeah it was the furnace. Apparently it was a circuit board that went out. He fixed it the same day even though he had to drive over an hour away to get the part. But later I decided to replace my entire HVAC units because they were about 20 years old anyway.

 

[Trustable]

That sucks.

If they can’t get my doors unlocked and I’m in the middle of nowhere, I’m telling them the truck won’t start and they will have to tow it.

During one of my 3 phone calls to them they kept asking "are you in a safe location" then they sounded surprised when I said yes. should have said no, maybe they would have sent someone who actually will unlock it.

 

[Trustable]

Yeah it was the furnace. Apparently it was a circuit board that went out. He fixed it the same day even though he had to drive over an hour away to get the part. But later I decided to replace my entire HVAC units because they were about 20 years old anyway.

Nice, same age as mine when it went as well! I am enjoying the money I'm saving on propane now, that's for sure.

 

[Augie81]

Nice, same age as mine when it went as well! I am enjoying the money I'm saving on propane now, that's for sure.

My furnace and water heater is gas and my last bill was about 25% more than this time last year.

 

[Trustable]

My furnace and water heater is gas and my last bill was about 25% more than this time last year.

Oh Jeez, I've heard natural gas has been going up, im locked in for the price of propane until may then im sure it will shoot up.

 

[Augie81]

Oh Jeez, I've heard natural gas has been going up, im locked in for the price of propane until may then im sure it will shoot up.

Well I guess it is the cost of living comfortably these days. There are millions of people that have no idea what HVAC even means.

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