You’ve heard of horsepower under the hood of your car, but bird-power?
Clairemont couple Ed Sayers and his wife Eva said they heard what sounded like chirping coming from under the hood of their new Ford Fiesta.
“About two weeks into having the car, the dashboard starts chirping like a bird,” said Ed Sayers. “At first when the wife told me I said, ‘Nah, come on. And then I went to drive it and the car was chirping.”
Sayers said he took the car into his mechanic. They checked out the car and found that the chirping noise wasn’t coming from birds taking refuge under the hood but the sound was coming from an aftermarket anti-theft device that the Sayers had added on when they bought the car.
The mechanic disconnected the device and told Sayers to take it back to the dealership.
Sayers said he took it to the Ford dealership.
“They told me it wasn’t their problem,” said Sayers. “They said that I’d have to take it to the device manufacturer and it wasn’t included in my warranty. “I said, ‘Really, so I paid 13-hundred dollars for a dead item?”
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Sayers called Ford headquarters in Michigan.
“I started leaving voicemails,” he said. “They never responded. I sent emails. They never responded. That’s when I contacted NBC 7 Responds.”
We reached out to Ford and they contacted the dealership.
The very next day, Sayers said he got a phone call.
“They said that since it’s not a factory item they can’t force the dealer to do anything, but they can make a strong suggestion they do.”
Not long after, Sayers said the dealership contacted him and, as an act of goodwill, offered to pay to reactivate the device.
“Somebody put their feet to the fire and I think it was you guys.”
