EDITORIAL EMINENCE

Response on dealers (long, for all, Chris Huck in particular)
Posted by Mark Christenson on Monday, 15 December 1997, at 12:10 p.m.

In all the new messages posted this weekend, there was one in particular that caught my eye. Following my stream of ranting from last week about Porsche's customer service, I saw Chris Huck's response. For those of you who don't know, Chris is our dealer. And for those of you who were unable to read between the lines of his post, he was more than slightly miffed. You see, Chris has provided price sheets, the latest scoop as he hears it, the Frank & Partner "S" pictures, and myriad other tidbits during the life of the Boxster dot Org web site. Without his input, the site wouldn't have been nearly as full of information as it was. Also, I have considered his service to be exemplary.

About six weeks ago I found out that the special order colors weren't being held up by PAG, but rather by PCNA. And I felt lied to. When I placed our order, I was told, by Chris, that the computer wouldn't accept special order colors. To me this meant PAG wouldn't accept them. Which isn't true. Maybe it's a matter of Chris being "just a sales professional caught in the middle" and being kept in the dark, but I'm quite certain that *somebody* at the dealership must have known that this "inability" to get a special color was a PCNA-only decree. While Chris may have been telling me the truth as best he knew it, he still has to bear the responsibility for his employer since he's the only link I have to them.

Furthermore, I remembered a story Chris had told me about the Speed Yellow Boxster that Pioneer (our dealer) delivered this summer. CHris said something along the lines of "they [which I thought meant PAG but now realize was PCNA] didn't want to do it, but this customer had been waiting 3 years and we said they better provide the color he asked for." (Since then Chris has said that that car was produced during May, the infamous first and last month during which all special colors were produced for the U.S., but I've never forgotten that first conversation.) At the time we had been waiting a couple months and I didn't really feel I had a leg on which to stand. But now I think about the little piece of paper I have from when I placed our deposit. It clearly states that we'll pay MSRP at the time of delivery for a car with certain options, one of them being a special order color which was available at the time we placed our deposit. I couldn't care less how binding this is in a "legal" sense - all I know is that it was an agreement made on good faith at the time. And, based on the fact that PAG is still producing Boxsters in special order colors, I think this agreement should be kept. After all, we'd certainly be paying MSRP. Also, I'm a little disappointed because the original story will always stay with me - somebody else was "important" enough for the dealership to go to bat for them and demand the as-ordered car.

I haven't gotten too involved in the "big debates" - like the Valmet vs. Stuttgart thing, the speedo accuracy problems, the base price increase. Probably because I didn't put down a deposit on a "German-built" car. I didn't get in line for a car with perfect speedo accuracy. I even understood up front that there may be a price increase and that we wouldn't be price protected. But we did make an agreement that we'd be getting a special order color. And PAG is still producing Boxsters in special order colors. I shouldn't be the one fighting for this - that's where the dealer and the dealership come into play. To be as factually correct as possible, Chris has said he's asked about the special order color and was told "no way." Of course, the reason given was always that PAG wasn't doing the colors anymore. In my mind, knowing the whole story now, he should be fighting this battle for us every day. He should be lobbying his boss who should be lobbying PCNA. After all, it's a simple decision, it doesn't require changing the way Boxsters are produced. And if they're worried about an avalanche of special order colors, then it'd be quite easy for them to say "well yes, he got it because we made an agreement back when that was an option. Today it is no longer an option." Seems simple to me.

This weekend I asked myself why I'm spending all this time trying to get a green car. Well, yes, it's certainly because I want one. It's also because Suzy has her heart set on a green one and nothing less will suffice. But then I asked why am *I* working so hard. I'm not the one getting a commission on the sale.

So, Chris, sorry to have aired publicly on this matter. In retrospect I admit it probably would have been best to talk to you privately. If we didn't get anywhere (which I didn't feel we were) then I probably should have collected our deposit and either found a different dealer or a different car.

To everybody else I apologize for taking up such bandwidth on a personal matter. It's been, overall, a fun 9 months since I put together a little site which was only supposed to chronicle two people's wait for a (green) Boxster. I've ended up meeting some great people and I've really enjoyed sharing this common interest with all of you. This whole thing has worn me out, however. I've put the site on hold until further notice. My apologies for any crimp that this puts in your daily surf - thankfully Pete's here to provide most of the banter anyway :-)

Reply by CHRIS HUCK on Wednesday, 17 December 1997, at 2:39 a.m.

I had a customer walk into the dealership and chastize me for having offended you. I check .org almost daily and spent 10 minutes finding a link to Petes' without.org to find out why. I understand your frustration and please don't think that at any point I was upset for receiving part of your frustrations because beleive me, I'm every bit as frustrated with Porsches'lack of customer service as you are! I had only responded to your previous post asking folks everywhere to remember the "poor salesmen" :-) out there that really are caught in the middle of "official" Porsche statements and info published in reputable car mags. (Not to mention outright rumors we find from all kinds of sources on the net.) We salesmen want our customers to be happy, but are only able to parrot the party line as its been told to us. I've easily learned as much about the product in dealing with you and following posts from all around the world as I ever have from Porsche. I very much appreciate all the heartfelt effort you've put into carrying others through their own waiting periods. I have ensured hard copies of some of your efforts have made it "up my chain of command." While I can't change PCNA's policy on importing colors, or my dealerships policy on discounting the price, I've been planning for months to refund my commission to you as a way of thanking you for your business and to thank you for the referrals you and .org have generated. That's about as far as my power/pull with Porsche extends. Thanks again for all your efforts!

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