BEACHBOY

Do the cars that are sold orders appear on a dealers car inventory list on the Ford-Direct website? Meaning if you order from a particular dealership, then search the inventory of that deatership on Ford-Direct, will a car that one orders appear there?

wild stray

No

TKEUofM

I actually work for FordDirect.

We will only display vehicles that are ordered for dealer stock. The site won't display customer ordered vehicles. Basically we don't want to show a vehicle as available when it is already reserved for a customer.

Also, depending on the dealer, we are sometimes able to pick up a vehicle through Ford's inventory system when it is still in transit and not actually on the ground. All depends on how the dealer updates their computer system at the store.

Also, vehicles may stay on the website for a couple of days after it is sold. Once again it depends on how fast the dealer processes the paperwork and reports the car sold to Ford.

Hope this helps.

Eric B

Could you guys PLEASE add a "nation wide search for a specified vehicle" function? The way it is set up now is bloody annoying and rather useless. You are limiting the power of the web to 5 miles off the block. Might as well read the local car ads :notnice:

bryman

Could you guys PLEASE add a "nation wide search for a specified vehicle" function? The way it is set up now is bloody annoying and rather useless. You are limiting the power of the web to 5 miles off the block. Might as well read the local car ads :notnice: [/b][/quote]
Amen to this! I want to be able to search on my configured car and find the closest dealers with my configuration! I would drive more than 10 miles to buy it if I could find one!

I would bet though that they purposely do not do this to show loyalty to their channel of dealers. They want you to go to your local dealer and have them search for your car, and give the local dealer your business. stinks for us consumers, though!

GTVroom

YES! That would be GREAT. I had to pull zip codes off autotrader to search outside my area on forddirect. That was a PAIN!! I couldn't understand why I couldn't search within a 200 mile radius. I drove 4 hrs to pick up the car I found on forddirect and I'm sure others would be willing to do the same.

Mine was listed on forddirect before it was actually on the lot. That was a good thing because I was able to put a deposit down and have them hold it after it arrived, so no one got to test drive it or buy it before I got up there.

TKEUofM

As a company we are in an interesting position. FordDirect is technically a Joint Venture between Ford Motor Co. and the Ford Division dealers. The concecpt of the company was actually created by the dealers in 1999.

The main purpose of the site is to show customers their local dealers based on zip code. Our used car site does allow you to search based on the mile radius that you choose. It just isn't available yet for the new car side.

We are working on a bunch of different enhancements for the new car searches. Hopefully we will be able to get the new car search set up so you can look further out from your town similar to the used car search.

One problem that comes out of it though is state laws. In some states we are able to show invoice cost and others we aren't. So in border towns we could run into some "technology" problems with inventory display.

All stuff we are trying to work through. Thanks for the feedback though, I'll make sure to pass it on to the bosses.

Eric B