The new Ford EV certification program for dealers has attracted its fair share of backlash since being announced a few months ago, with those entities raising questions over a small handful of stipulations such as a cap on the number of EVs lower-tier dealers can sell, as well as large required investments to install public fast chargers. Regardless, the majority of U.S. dealers signed up for the Ford EV certification plan – most of them opting for the higher-tier Model e Certified Elite status – and actual costs have thus far been lower than most expected. As Ford Authority reported last week, The Blue Oval has been meeting with dealers that aren’t quite as enthused about some terms of the Model e Certified program and mentioned that changes may be coming, and now, they have, according to Automotive News.
The first change is that lower-tier Model e Certified dealers will no longer be strapped with a 25 EV per year sales cap, which was one of the more contentious points of the program – though no decision has been made on how many all-electric vehicles they’ll be able to sell. Additionally, those dealers are also getting a discount of $10,000 on how much they must spend on employee training compared to the original requirements. Previously, those dealers were required to spend $25,000 on that training, but now, they only have to dish out $15,000.
Lower-tier Certified dealers will now be listed on Ford.com, though they still won’t be able to carry any physical EV inventory. Dealers – regardless of tier – won’t be required to have public chargers with 24/7 access, either. Instead, those chargers must be available from Monday through Friday from 7am to 8pm.
Ford will allow dealers – on a case-by-case basis – to potentially change the tier they selected as a result of this announcement, and will also give those that wish to drop out completely that option as well. Dealers that opted out of both Model e Certified programs will also have the opportunity to sign up even though the deadline to do so has passed, though as Ford Authority previously reported, those that opt out will get a second chance to sign up for one of the programs in 2027 as well.
We’ll have more on the Model e Certified program soon, so be sure and subscribe to Ford Authority for continuous Ford news coverage.
Comments
In other words, the short story they are having issues getting dealers to sign up!
It is one thing for Ford to tout their pipe dream of the future. It is another to ask dealers to cough up the money and pay for the fantasy.
Allocation is a pretty big cudgel.
So is $1T is taxpayer theft (i.e your IRA teddy bear).
Oh you silly man, not bothered by the unfunded explosion of debt due to Trumps 2017 tax cuts that gave money back to ultra rich but whinging about investments in good roads & bridges, ports, power, broadband, education & cleaner transportation modes. Great sense of priorities.
Oh double gg, that is but one interpretation.
It could be that they had more sign up than they expected, and over subscription allows for the fee reductions due to scale effects (I expect the fee reduction will apply also to dealers who already signed up.)
Could also be that in some limited areas, there were not enough signups and the plans goals were not achieved so tweaking and sweetening was necessary.)
As for the charger hours of operation on first impression, I find that not a good thing but this may be a post IRA adjustment given how much federal money will soon be going into expanding the density of the charger network. (Could also be that the synergies of charging leading to sales isn’t that profound especially in an future online ordering environment.)
Regardless, it will be interesting to hear of what all drove the plan adaptions.
Or, dealers don’t want people hanging out in their parking lot at 3:00 AM “charging” their cars / casing the joint.
(In theory, given dealers won’t have acres of metal waiting for sale, exactly what is it that that is being cased? It would seem most likely very thing would be behind a fence in the future. Here “theory” is admittedly doing some heavy lifting.)
That said, the amount of traffic coming in those late hours is probably minimal so it would be relatively easy to drop this demand to make dealers feel more comfortable.
Would seem a mistake not to require 24/7 public chargers.
Not doing so seems to squander a significant advantage of and reason for maintaining a dense dealer footprint.
Regardless of the changes, the plan will at least in part, help to consolidate the footprint leaving healthier dealers.
(As for pipe dreams, if the original plan was a maximalist one designed to test the limits of who would bail out and that goal was substantially reached, why not tweak the program at the edges where it benefits the company?
(Folks who think that any original iteration of a plan will be the final iteration of that plan are a bit dim.))
My cousin is a manaher at a dealer and dealers have no interest in EVs and are steering customers away from them. Funny how many times Ford had to walk this back.
Ford is now dealing with the lack of majority interest in EVs. Thankfully the dealers hold all the cards, not Ford.