soulsea

Hi,

Have a seat, grab your favorite beverage, it’s story telling time. It is the very long story of how a multinational corporation interacted with one lowly customer in an honest effort to be better. It is an improbable story, some might even have a hard time believing it, so I have included as much documentation as I possibly can to satiate the suspicious minded. I have been wanting to share it with you for some time but I gave my word that I would keep everything confidential until the information was made public by GM. In the grand scheme of things it really isn’t that important, it just might be slightly noteworthy to those like myself who are into car culture and who find the behind the scenes machinations interesting. I do encourage you to read through the whole thing, as it's really the only way it makes sense.

It all started when GM decided to announce and implement what is known as their ‘flipper’ policy which amongst other things, voided all the major warranties of a C8 Z06, Escalade V, or GMC Hummer sold within a year of purchase. The topic has been discussed ad nauseam and I expressed my personal feelings on this post: https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...post1605483021

The same day I made the above post I went on the google and found the publicly listed email of Steve Carlisle who is the Executive Vice President and President General Motors North America and who authored the flipper policy. I decided to send him a similar email to what I had posted because I wanted to be on the record, and quite honestly because I wanted to vent and shake my fist to the clouds. It was really the same motivation as those who write to the White House with their random opinions, and just like them I fully expected that my email would get buried in tens of thousands of others that Mr Carlisle’s public email address must get inundated with … I certainly did not expect it to be read by anyone in a decision making position, much less hear back from anyone.

But then, a day later I did hear back.

First, this is a full copy of the email I sent to Mr Carlisle which is a near replica of my post on CF that same day 8/1/22:

Dear Mr Carlisle,

I hope this letter finds its way to you and finds you well.

I write to you because as a business owner myself, I often don't know why one of my customers stops purchasing my products and services, they walk away unhappy and there’s no way for me ascertain if there’s anything I can do on my end to remedy the situation, or that it even happened at all.

First, my recent GM purchase history along with my current orders:

2009 Tahoe Hybrid
2010 Yukon Denali
2011 Escalade
2012 Escalade
2015 Z/28
2015 Corvette Z06
2016 Corvette Z06 (Callaway)
2015 Z/28 (2nd one because I missed my first one)
2022 CT5V Blackwing (current daily driver)

2023 Escalade V (Status 3400 - Baker Motor Company)
2023 Z06 (Status 1100 - Rick Hendrick Charleston SC))
2023 CT5V Blackwing (was waiting for matte black color availability to order)
2024 Silverado EV (reserved)

I note the above not to impress but just to convey that I have been a good customer to the brand, nothing special as there are many others who dwarf my purchase history with theirs, but hopefully good enough to merit a few minutes of your time. I also note it to make the following point ...

All the above cars (along with most cars I buy from other brands) were sold by me within a year of purchase, none of them for profit ... in fact all of them lost tens of thousands of dollars in the transaction, not to mention the sales tax hits on top of that. There was no complaint from me, I enjoyed the cars a great deal and understood the price of admission for my vehicular addiction, it is my primary passion in life. I am an enthusiast to the core both on the street and at the racetrack who is blessed to be able to afford this fun habit.

I will now have to do it purchasing cars from other brands that do not restrict or penalize me for doing with my possessions as I wish after I have paid for them with my money through having to sign a agreement that I acknowledge that my warranty will not be transferrable if I sell my cars within the first year. This whilst I do not see a similar form asking dealers to agree that they will not sell these cars over MSRP. It would take me ten pages to explain why this double standard is so wrong and so insulting.

My plan was to keep the 2023 Z06 for more than a year, and despite that I am withdrawing my order anyway as I reserve the right to change my mind without restrictions or penalties. My Escalade V was likely to be driven for 10,000 or so miles and be sold within a year as is my practice, obviously not a flip as it was going to be my daily driver, so that purchase would directly be impacted by this policy. I was already reconsidering my purchase of that vehicle as GM decided to price it at $150k whilst constraining Supercruise on what is Caddy's halo model, and also constrained my color choices to black and white ... this just makes that decision easier. I will also not be ordering the second CT5 V Blackwing that I was getting to replace my current one not the upcoming Silverado EV.

I have enjoyed my GM vehicles a great deal, my current CT5V Blackwing is one of the best and most fun cars I've ever driven. As a long time Ferrari 458 Spider owner, I know how magical these engines can be and I was really looking forward to the Z06, as I was to the Escalade V ... but I am cursed with this principles thing that's going to make me miss out on them, and I deeply resent you and GM for forcing me in this situation that I have to make these choices, but in the end I didn't work my butt off all my life to be restricted in my use of a product I purchase with the fruits of that labor, by a car company no less. It is so infuriating.

My choices will undoubtedly make other customers very happy to take my spots in line for all these highly desired vehicles. That doesn't bother me one bit ... that's because I am indifferent as to what other people do with their money and purchases. I don't care if a stranger flips their car just like I don't care if a stranger gets my spot, those are other peoples lives and I wish everyone the best. My responsibility is to myself, my mirror, and my ethics, and I refuse to give a penny of my money to a company that penalizes my loyalty and continuing business in such a fashion.

And I am just a small portion of your customers that you’re taking out with strays trying to address a flipper problem that’s supply based and beyond your reach. God forbid we enter into a serious recession or another round of lockdowns are good people have to get out of their cars for valid financial reasons, you’re going to devalue their asset even further by making their warranty non transferrable. I can think of dozens of additional reasons one might wish or need to sell their vehicle within the first year, only one of them is flipping … so you’re potentially impacting tens of thousands of good customers acting in good faith to address a few hundred flippers, if that. It’s like burning down your house to kill a few roaches.

In the end GM will sell out the Z06 and will sell out the Escalade V. Be very mindful that those are not the only cars you sell, and this supply chain distortion will not last forever. I am not the only one with a long memory.

This is a quote from a forum I belong to from one of the top sales associates at Sewell Cadillac in Dallas, one of your biggest dealerships:

"I have multiple customers that buy so many cars and don't keep them but maybe six months... they aren't flipping them, they just love cars and can afford to constantly change.... These customers have been buying from me since well before this shortage....... This could be a problem……."

Anyway, congratulations to GM, your company took me and many other of their best customers out of their brands with this policy (yes, we talk to each other), and are about to cause financial harm to a lot more who don’t deserve it. I hope it is worth it in this poorly thought out attempt to address a tiny subset of people who flip cars that only exist because GM can't currently produce enough cars and will organically fade away as you gradually go back to your historical production numbers.

I wish you and GM the best ... but I'm done purchasing products from your company with no path back to it no matter what you do, say, or build moving forward.

Although I doubt this email will make any dent or if it even matters to you, I thought it was worth trying to pass along why and how you lost this one pretty good customer.

Thank you and kind regards.

________________________________________ ________


As you can see my tone was’t very good … I was still upset and couldn’t hold it back. Why anyone would respond to me after reading that is beyond me, but someone did … that someone was Scott Bell, Vice President of Global Chevrolet, who did so the next morning. (redacted my name) I didn't know who it was at the time, it was just a Michigan area code, I input his name in the address book later.



Needless to say I was very surprised. How my email didn’t get lost in a sea of others, that it was read by Steve Carlisle, was passed on to the VP of Chevy, and he took the time to reach out to me in person was really shocking, almost unbelievable, but was definitely appreciated to a great degree.

Scott and I spoke later that day for must have been almost an hour, which again was amazing to me given that I am just one customer and he must be super busy running his division. I think my letter resonated with them not only because it was heartfelt, but also because it mirrored a significant and unexpected amount of negative feedback that came to them from concerned customers like myself, and echoed some of their own internal concerns they had with the policy. My sense was that they were already getting a lot of blowback and had already started contemplating tweaking the policy. Without inflating my own importance or speak for Scott, I think it also became evident to him that I am passionate about cars and that I was able to articulate my concerns logically and eloquently, so he gave me the time to express my thoughts.

So much so that that he asked me to compose an email with a more detailed description of my concerns that he could share with the other division heads in an effort to better refine their policy. What follows is the email I wrote to him. Please keep in mind that it speaks honestly about not only the flipper policy dynamic but also about the marketing behind such decisions and other factors, and that some of you may not like this level of honesty in regards to how you are being marketed to by car companies, or the way some customers are described by me. These are my thoughts not GMs, and I have no way of knowing to what degree anyone at GM agreed or disagreed with any of them. (a few personal details have been redacted)

Scott,

Thank you one more time for reading my original email and taking the time to contact me.

As per our conversation, the following is the sum of my thoughts about the policy as it affects your broader customer base and its relationship with GM rather than my own situation that was outlined in my original email to Mr Carlisle, which you are familiar with and have already addressed. I should note that I am not a lawyer, accountant, or have any marketing training. I am one car enthusiast with a small business background who is fortunate to have your audience for a brief moment, during which I hope I can make a small difference. I also do it because I care about cars and access to them to an unreasonable degree. Now retired, I spend a lot of my time on online forums, moderate several of them including tahoeyukonforum.com which is the largest GM full size SUV forum online. This is to say that I already volunteer my time to assist automotive enthusiasts and try to contribute to the automotive community at large, and this letter is an extension of that practice. My apologies for the long nature of it, I tried to be as brief as possible whilst making sure that I am clear and comprehensive in my approach.

Enough about me …

First let me say that I am cognizant of the current supply chain challenges afflicting not only GM but the automotive industry at large, and that fundamentally the issue your policy is trying to address is rooted in the projected limited availability of the highest desired vehicles under the GM umbrella. This is unfamiliar territory for many car companies and it’s understandable that you are trying to mitigate the most negative byproduct of the situation, namely ‘flippers.’ I am sure you have been getting feedback pressure from many of your customers frustrated to see cars being flipped when they can’t get one themselves. I share their frustration, and although I object to this policy in its current form, I do acknowledge that flippers are a real problem, and that everyone who has reached out to you to ask you to do something about it is expressing a valid concern. I’m also sure you’re getting feedback from MSRP dealers who get infuriated by some customers buying a car from them just to turn around and sell it for profit. Those dealers are leaving money on the table by charging MSRP in order to create long standing relationships with their customers, not to serve flippers who won’t buy another car again from them unless there’s profit in it. I also have a small degree of empathy for dealers who do charge ADMs. Over the last two years many brands including GM understandably struggled supplying new vehicles for sale for a plethora of well known structural reasons. The only way some dealers could make up for the lack of new inventory was to sell each unit at a higher price. Obviously some push the greed envelope more than others, but it’s hard to ascertain what the reasonable line is there, so for most people even a dollar over sticker is too much, forgetting the S in MSRP … of course many of those same people had no problem negotiating every discount they could when the market was on their side, but that intellectual inconsistency is for another discussion.

I should also note that a big part of the problem is that there is a confusion and lack of consensus about what a flipper actually is. The way I define it is a person who purchases a vehicle with no intention of using it other than for a couple of hundred miles and only purchases to sell at a profit. It is a cold business transaction without care for the car which is simply a commodity to them. It is effectively as if you add another dealer in the transaction between you and the customer. Concurrently, in the current market and because of the aforementioned short supply, a lot of people purchase cars to enjoy, drive them for thousands of miles, and their cars are still worth over MSRP when they sell them. Those people are not flippers, they’re well meaning customers making use of their vehicles as they always have, and they just happen to benefit from the temporary market distortion we’re in. However to a lot of people looking from the outside without context, because they just see used cars for sale over MSRP, they just conflate the two as one and call everyone a flipper. So a lot of the pushback you are getting from customers is in part them misreading the situation because they don’t take the time to parse the data to accurately separate those two groups, leading them to conclude that the flipper pool is much greater than it is. They then come to you to fix a problem whose scope they are vastly overestimating. A problem that GM has already partially addressed via the Z06 pricing, and even more so the Escalade V pricing.

Yet in order to address this relatively small but highly visible subset of flippers, here are some of the other subsets of customers who will be affected by the part of your policy that makes their warranty non transferable in the first year:

- enthusiasts who rotate through numerous cars like myself
- people who buy a car and for whatever reason don’t like it (let’s note that no one has driven the Z06 yet, there’s still a moratorium on reviews, so they’re purchasing this car sight unseen … no matter how awesome the car may end up being, some folks may decide it’s not for them)
- people who have unexpected changes in their income
- people who’s health fails and can no longer drive a high performance vehicle
- people who are getting a divorce
- the estate of a deceased owner
- people who buy the car second hand not knowing the car has no warranty
- people who may wish to gift the car

There will be others as well. As an example of an outlier situation that one wouldn’t conceive of unless it happens to you … I crashed my 2015 Z06 at Circuit of the Americas about six months into ownership. It wasn’t too bad, it got fixed, and it was perfect for the road but I didn’t trust it at $150mph. So I sold it and bought another one.

All the above examples should be enough to give any company pause about the merits of potentially financially harming any of their customers in those situations, all in the name of trying to stop a few flippers that will naturally fade away as supply challenges ease, or even if they don’t ease and flippers remain a problem.

And keep in mind that a great deal of these people in the above situations will have paid a significant ADM to get into their car, and would lose money even if they sold their car over MSRP within the first year. Why would GM punish their own customers who are losing money on the transaction as if they were flippers that profit?

All this with an uncertain economy as a backdrop that is impossible to project a year out, where another Covid outbreak or recession might force a lot of folks to sell their secondary vehicles to make ends meet. Should their cars be devalued as well at their most vulnerable moment because they have no warranty attached to them?

Fundamentally, please consider coming to terms that flipping is an unwanted but natural byproduct of success, and one that you cannot fix through policy unless the policy addresses the entire system. You know that water finds its level. When supply is short prices go up, be it through ADM, flipping, or other means like dealers forcing customers into unwanted add-ons. If you think about it, your policy actually helps flippers and unscrupulous dealers who harm your brand just as much as flippers. You can only produce a finite amount of cars, if you restrict valid reasons for customers to sell their car within a year you are choking off the natural used car supply. That means that ADMs and used prices will go up even more, making them even more profitable and attractive for flipping. This isn’t a hypothetical, this will happen. The emphasis is because other that the cited groups that will be unjustly affected by the policy, this is the most important point I can make. It is the point that this policy would not only not stop what you are trying to stop, but will in fact likely make it worse.

It must be so frustrating to have your hands tied by NADA, franchise agreements, and state laws that prevent you from exerting control over the bad dealerships that harm your reputation, I know you would if you could, and I know you are using pretty much every tool in your toolbox including withholding allocations to try and rein them in. But because you can’t stop them from charging these high ADMs it means you cannot seal the whole system, so the market will find a way to reflect the short supply. The flippers will do their thing as long as they can until you catch up with enough supply to normalize the market to the point that there’s no incentive for them to do it … until then, there’s really nothing you can do about it. They’ll get around it with aftermarket warranties, they’ll withhold information from the buyer even if they signed a paper saying they’re liable if they don’t disclose the lack of warranty, they’ll sell with a side contract to keep the car registered in their name until the one year mark (happens a lot in the Ferrari world), they’ll find other ways, and you’ll be running around trying to plug each loophole just as they figure out another way around it. I know when a company is looking to solve a problem ‘do nothing’ is rarely acceptable, but do something for its own sake and a few short lived PR headlines should be even less acceptable if it causes more harm than good, both for GM and many of its valued customers.

I hesitate to mention other companies because their business model isn’t analogous to GM’s, but I will do so just for the applicable consumer psychology of it. Porsche, Rolex, and many other companies value desirability. Even when there are no supply chain constraints they historically manage their supply to achieve that which GM perceives as a drawback. To them, there’s value in people fighting over their product rather than thousands of cars (or other products) sitting on dealer lots unsold, discounted, and trying to convince people to buy them with advertising, discounts, and other means. It doesn’t work with a Traverse, but on higher end purchases ie positional goods, people want what is hard to get, not what’s readily available. You have been so successful in creating so much interest in the amazing vehicles you are building that people are fighting over each other to get them. It’s like owning a restaurant that has a one year waiting list rather than one that has to advertise to talk people to go eat there. I’m not suggesting that this should be your core strategy, just noting that what is happening, flippers and all, may not be the worst thing in the world, and may not need massive policy swings to address, especially since so far as I could tell no one was blaming GM for the worlds supply issues as every reasonable person knows that every company is in the same situation. I just throw that out there as a thought … I personally would rather every enthusiast got instant gratification, but in a world where that’s impossible because of supply chain issues, maybe in the bigger picture flippers are an infuriating but natural consequence. Please do not construe what I am saying as a defense of flipping, I deeply resent the practice myself … I’m just noting the above for context.

Speaking of other companies, I have seen Ferrari and the fact that they make their new car customers sign an agreement that they cannot sell to anyone but the dealership within the first year of purchase mentioned as an example and precedent for a company controlling their product after it has been sold. This is true. However, and not withstanding that Ferrari is a very different company to GM selling much lower volumes at much higher price points, their customers accept it because they simultaneously prevent ALL their dealers from charging a dollar over MSRP. On some models, the demand is so high and the supply so limited that the dealership is leaving hundreds of thousands of dollars on the table that the car would be worth if sold in the open market, so the fair tradeoff is that the customer can’t abuse this privilege and profit from the MSRP policy for at least one year. But without the ability to make all their deanships adhere to the MSRP policy, that system would also fail.

One last thing you might want to consider is some of the feedback I have been seeing from the automotive community since the policy announcement. Obviously most people do not have the opportunity to have the conversation we had where you can take the time to explain to them your reasoning behind the policy in more detail and with nuance, and there is currently a significant lack of specificity and information surrounding the policy, leaving room for uncertainty and for people to fill in the blanks with their own biases and predisposed beliefs. You should know that many people see this policy as targeting them, the customer, and letting the dealers get off easy, free to proceed with their ADMs. In fact many are perceiving this policy as singularly created to take out flippers in order to push profits to ADM dealers who stand to benefit the most. Others perceive it as a way for GM to deny warranty work. Essentially this is splitting the automotive community in two, those who are defending the action believing it will stop flippers, and those who believe it will do nothing and the whole thing is against them, including being conditioned into the idea that a company can dictate what one does with their possessions after they’ve purchased them. Neither side applies any nuance, neither side allows for the fact that there may be a place to have a policy but maybe just a slightly better thought out one. The response has been filled with hysteria since the announcement and people on online communities are at each others throats on this issue. That’s not too surprising as everything these days brings extreme division, but just another small thing to note that is a consequence of this policy. To be honest forums are not the best place to gage customer response. The vast majority of people who purchase these vehicle don’t visit there and the places are full of people who were never going to buy the car saying whatever they please to stir things up. But there is a portion of those communities that are actual customers. In the end no matter what you do or don’t do someone will always be somewhere online to criticize you anyway, so I mention this element for minor consideration.

Solutions wise, so far as I can tell there are only three possible ways forward from here for GM in regards to this policy:

1. Keep the policy as is and live with all the above noted consequences. Maybe define flipping a little better like saying once the car has more than a thousand or x amount miles the policy no longer applies. Mileage is the enemy of flippers more than anything else.

2. Amend/refine the policy in some way. Maybe take out the punitive warranty clause but keep the black list clause. That would be my suggestion if you want to appear to be doing something without penalizing the segment of your customer base you’re not targeting. If you want to do more maybe find a way to exclude some of the above mentioned situations. Maybe make the warranty transfer part subject to providing both bills of sale and make the policy applicable if there’s more than say a 5% profit in it. But all of this is clumsy, time consuming, requires resources, and eventually fruitless … like I said if there’s enough profit in it flippers will find a way around it.

3. Do away with the policy and go back as you were. The problem will solve itself as supply increases and you don’t have to entangle yourselves in tracking people’s orders, creating databases, endless warranty disputes, maintaining black lists, never ending legal issues, never ending social media complaints that people can’t get their car fixed or being punished when they have to sell their cars for personal reasons. If you don’t do away with it you’re going to be dealing with the wake of this policy long after there’s enough meat on the bone for flippers to bother. And in the end, do you really want to be fighting and be adversarial with your own customers?

It’s clear that in my humble opinion this is a can of worms that should have been left unopened … perhaps you can figure out a clever way to close it without too much of a PR hit. Can you frame it in a positive way that doesn’t make the whole thing appear clumsy? I’m not qualified or smart enough to suggest how to do that. A big to do was made about the policy when it was announced, a lot of people have embraced it even though they haven’t given it the required degree of thought simply because the word ‘flipper’ triggers them. You start clawing it back without a really good way to frame it you’re going to get hammered by all the folks who have been reaching out to you to thank you for the policy.

I know, that was way too long … my apologies. Not knowing what will register I just wanted to make sure that I covered as many potentialities and gave as much context as I could envisage, and I wanted to make sure I passed along as many concerns as I have observed from others.

I really appreciate the time you’ve taken to talk to me, and if you’re still here, to read all this. It is great to know that you and GM care for the enthusiast community, the customers who embrace your products and want to purchase them for the right reasons, and are willing to take my and their concerns into consideration. You were kind and generous enough to address my concerns directly, but I wrote all the above on behalf of all your other potential customers who are not as fortunate to have had your personal attention. I just hope I didn’t forget or sell anyone’s valid concerns short.

I hope you find a way to navigate all of this in a positive way that does the least damage to you customers and your brand. As mentioned in my text, I for one am a fan again if only for the fact that you took the time and effort to entertain my own concerns. I withdraw my personal embargo of GM products as a result, in fact I will now seek them out and favor them over others. In the end, if this policy were the biggest problem in anyone’s life it would be the most blessed life. For my part, cars are meant to be a source of joy, and although this particular process hasn’t been particularly fun, it’s at least comforting and rewarding to know that not only are you as the VP of Chevrolet willing to discuss policy with one solitary customer, but that there might be a small chance that you might consider the merits of anything I have to say on the matter.

If you have the time please send me a brief note to let me know how it all ends up, after typing all this out it’d be nice to have a little closure.

And know that I am available should you wish to discuss this topic further.

I also have opinions about how the C9 execs should let go of their obsession with golf bag storage to free up the designers … can’t wait to have that discussion with you.

All the best!

________________________________________ _____________

Over the next few weeks, as they were trying to find the best solution, Scott as well as Tom Kinney (head of Cadillac US Sales) who also reached out to me, continued to communicate with me via text and phone as ideas were being bounced off of me and I was thinking them through and responding.







If it’s a little hard to follow basically the two ideas being considered by GM were to reduce the term of the policy to six months and to offer dealers the right of first refusal at msrp, and if they refused the customer would be clear to sell the car any time with its full warranty. My response was six moths is a good thing, but if you’re going to give dealers the right of first refusal it should be at the sale price not msrp so as to not reward ADM dealers, and consider a mileage number past which the policy becomes null.

I’m not going to bore everyone even more than I already have … there were other considerations as well but everything becomes very complicated and hard to do once lawyers get involved.



As we now know the final version of the policy was to simply reduce it to six months and retroactively make it applicable to anyone who had already signed the one year waiver.
Now that the information is public I was finally given permission earlier today to share the story:



I know that all of this has been somewhat messy, and I know that for some this isn’t going far enough. The issues raised by many and in my original email haven’t actually gone away, they’re simply applicable for a shorter term. Conversely there will be many who will be unhappy with this reduced term because it isn’t as aggressive as what was originally enacted and what they were very happy to see. In a world in which there’s no way to please everybody I personally find this imperfect solution acceptable. Perhaps that is because I’m being selfish and six months is enough to account for the way I go through cars. I certainly don’t feel great about accepting it because I was originally standing on principle and the revised policy hasn’t addressed my main objection of being influenced by a company in regards to what I do with my processions after I have purchased them, so that hasn’t changed.

What has changed is that I cannot speak highly enough or give enough credit to GM, Scott Bell, Tom Kinney, and anyone who worked behind the scenes to make this revision possible. For that reason alone I am more than happy to continue giving them my business. Multinational corporations are not known for being this nimble, this self aware, and this quick to change course when they have made an error in judgement … heck, to get a group of executives to even consider that they might have erred is usually an exercise in futility. To read a random person’s email, respond to him, engage him for weeks and respect his opinions on major corporate decisions is simply incredible and humbling to me. And it’s not because it’s me, I’d have been equally awed if it happened to anyone else.

I’m not one to carry water for a company, as you can see in the way I express myself I tend to be super honest and blunt. I also try to be fair, and GM deserves a huge amount of credit because they do listen to their customers. They listened when so many of you complained about the flipper issue and they listened when so many of you expressed your concerns about the policy as it was originally announced, and in the end they are doing their best to get it right. That’s actually important … to me more important than my original objections to the policy.

One last thought. Please do not interpret any of the above as me wishing to take credit (or blame) for the change in policy. If I were the only one against it it would not have made a difference. I know for a fact that my voice merely echoed what thousands of folks here and around the automotive world had already expressed to them, and all of this would have happened even if I never wrote my original email. My role in all this truly ranges from minute to insignificant. In fact I felt somewhat uncomfortable throughout the process because I was worried that I wasn't doing a good job expressing everyone's concerns beyond mine ... I'm sure many of you will be more than eager to let me know what I bad job I did on =numerous levels. The only reason I tell the tale is because in my estimation their engagement with me is actually more noteworthy than the change in policy. It speaks to the fact that there are people at the very top of General Motors who actually listen to their customers and are willing to entertain their concerns, and also because I think it’s interesting. In the end, I shared the story not to put attention on myself, put to shine the light and give credit where it is deserved, the GM executives who are doing their best to make the best policy possible.

- soulsea

ArmchairArchitect

Awesome, thank you for your efforts, really appreciate you being an agent of change here.

Now onto how to actually convince GM to strip away allocations from dealers charging ADM and instead give those allocations to dealers charging MSRP...

AustinVetter

Thank you sir!! Well done! And thank you GM for trying to find a more fair solution. Still hoping GM hits dealers hard who auction or sell off slots meant for customers who have been waiting years at MSRP.

AustinVetter

Soulsea, can you now write a letter to GM about the price increase? gearing? color options? LOL j/k.

gve

Thank you for contacting GM, I’m impressed that GM listened to your suggestions and responded with the modified the warranty restrictions.

Panfish

As previously noted by me here, the “flipper” policy results in more collateral damage to “enthusiasts” than it does to true flippers who are the extreme minority.

Thanks to the OP for at least rounding off the edges to what was (and still is to some degree) a hastily conceived knee-jerk reaction, especially when dealerships have a green light to gouge buyers with monster ADM’s.

AustinVetter

Now just waiting on GM's updated memo about the $20K price decrease...

Zjoe6

6 months is a big improvement. The fact that GM is listening to their customer is really nice to see. And you have been a very good customer. That was quite a list of vehicles. So it was just the 12 to 6 month change, and the 1000 miles was not part of it, correct? Sorry if I missed it. That was a lot to read.

soulsea

Yes, so far as I know the policy is exactly as it was but now for a shorter term, miles are not a part of it.

I think in the end, considering how much the legal dept is involved in these discussions and that because Escalade Vs were already being delivered, it was just the simplest thing to change what they had already approved rather than going through the lengthy process of legal clearance of newly introduced policy elements. But this is just me speculating as other than what I posted I have no other information as to how all this came to settle where it did.

Johnnyrare

During your phone call did he address dealerships selling for over MSRP

zero478

I mean, I only care about removing the golf bag storage so I can see the engine through the back of the car. Took me a while to read everything to get to the most important point LOL>

Near Miss

Well done.

QUIKAG

Very well done, Soulsea!!!

soulsea

He did not. Our conversations very much echoed what I wrote in my second email. I started by acknowledging how limited GM is in enforcing MSRP with their dealers. Keep in mind that it's easy for us to say 'withhold allocations', but GM also needs these dealers to sell a gazillion Silverados and Traverses ... the whole franchise dynamic is super complicated and is skewed towards dealer leverage. All of that really didn't need saying other than in the context that it isn't right to penalize their customers for something they can't control with the dealers, and my takeaway is that GM was very conscious of that, and their frustration with some dealer practices was evident to me. I know it's little comfort to us customers but I'm pretty sure they are using every tool at their disposal to address the ADM practice, but in the end just like the flipper issue the only way to solve that is with more supply. Ultimately we as customers have the ultimate responsibility ... if enough people refuse to pay ADMs then they will go away. We shouldn't need a 'salary cap' to have the discipline not to overspend on a vehicle.

UnhandledException

Thank you very much for doing this. Its impressive (and encouraging) to see GM take note of your concern. I believe this policy will be abandoned completely in a few months because it will not hold up in court and there will be far too many cases of people needing money for various reasons (from their significant other becoming terminally ill to losing their job to many other reasons).

Johnnyrare

Thank you so much for doing this btw. You are correct what we fail to realize is GM sells millions of cars per year. Corvettes are a tiny percentage. They need dealerships to push the millions and millions of other cars that keep GM afloat.

TRANS DAMM

Nice work! Glad to have you back!!

soulsea

You guys are very sweet, and I appreciate you. But it's honestly not a 'humble brag' when I say that my role in this was minuscule at best. My original email was obviously one of great many GM musty have gotten by customers feeling unfairly targeted by the policy. It was really just happenstance and completely to his credit that Scott Bell reached out to me, and I tried my best to pass on all the concerns I had read and not just mine, as well as trying to be fair to those who like the policy as it was even though I may have disagreed with them.

As I already said none of this takes place just because I was personally vexed, it only happens because you guys expressed your concerns en masse, and it happened because GM was willing to listen to you and try to adjust accordingly. The credit is all yours and theirs, I'm just a random silly person who typed something up mostly out of frustration and self interest.

Now someone please have a go at me and say something mean ... I'm disoriented by CF members being this pleasant.

AustinVetter

The usual suspects have been silent... which is very nice.

Higgs Boson

It's so easy to complain and like the adage goes, "don't bring me problems, bring me solutions." Your communications were well written and well thought out and the folks at GM obviously saw the ability to find a reasonable solution to something they were also obviously keen enough (kudos to them) to understand may not be the best move made without understanding their real customers.

You can't win the game if you don't show up and honestly, you're the only one who showed up, even that alone is ultra commendable while the rest of us bicker with no solution in sight.

I'm proud that you're a member of this forum and I am appreciative that you took the step needed to make clear and rational points to GM to address and correct what may have turned out to be a horrible decision.
Honestly, it also renewed some faith in GM that they do listen to the customer and have real people there willing to continue to learn as things change.