Phone Contact from the Ford Blue Cruise team

[fvineyard]

I tried calling this number today. It is Ford. The message for the phone tree menu said it was Ford Pro. Spoke to a friendly fellow, who went over every connected service feature on my truck. Pretty certain he was required to follow a script.

Hoping he follows through with providing another number that can answer my question. Time will tell.

@PrimeRisk Thanks for sharing the contact number and information!

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[PrimeRisk]

I tried calling this number today. It is Ford. The message for the phone tree menu said it was Ford Pro. Spoke to a friendly fellow, who went over every connected service feature on my truck. Pretty certain he was required to follow a script.

Hoping he follows through with providing another number that can answer my question. Time will tell.

@PrimeRisk Thanks for sharing the contact number and information!

What question are you trying to get answered?

 

[PrimeRisk]

I personally would not welcome automatic lane changing. There are only a few places where that would work safely in the area where i mostly drive. With so many bad drivers on the road I am certain there would be a wreck. Even if it were the other persons fault, like trying to fly by on the right I bet Bluecruise would loose in the courts.

I don't have any experience with BlueCruise and automatic lane changes, but my Teslas are very conservative with lane changes. It always leaves plenty of room for lane changes and actually uses the turn signal so you know before it starts making the move. With the most recent release, if you put it in "Hurry" mode, it is finally becoming a little more aggressive with lane changes.

My experience with Tesla's automatic lane changing has always be safe, but sometimes not very intuitive. It sometimes wants to get in the left lane when there is no one to pass and sometimes is super conservative when it is approaching an exit and wants to get behind slower traffic long before it needs to instead of going around.

Of course you are correct, you are always responsible for what happens if you are in the driver's seat. if the software made a mistake and collided with another vehicle, you would be on the hook for the ticket and damages.

 

[fvineyard]

What question are you trying to get answered?

I wanted the Blue Cruise one-time pricing option available at purchase. Dealer did not know how to sell this option nor were they aware it was an option until I asked for it.

I want Blue Cruise active, but not with a monthly or annual subscription.

 

[AlaskaFlash]

Tonight I got a call from the Ford Blue Cruise team from the number (888) 898-1969‬.

I Googled the number and it traces back to accounts on X and Facebook that claim that they are the Software Sales support for Ford Telematics Software & Fleet Monitoring Systems. The number also shows up on a few other actual Ford websites. While it's super easy to spoof phone numbers, the person I talked to seemed to be legit.

His specific call was to gain feedback on how I liked my free trial of BlueCruse on my 2024 Lariat. This was my first indication that the call was legit. They knew my name and what vehicle I had. I confirmed that I had used it as much as I could during the 3-month trial. Then he wanted to know if I was aware of the recent price drop on the feature. I confirmed that I was. He asked if I was going to subscribe.

I said no, and I would never consider it. What followed was a volley of different questions about why I found the product to not only be deficient, but dangerous considering it's habit of disengaging at the worst possible time and annoying due to the incessant nagging when clearly looking at the road. He suggested that it was a simple case of needing to have the system calibrated, but I countered that my experiences are very consistent with others on this forum. He was not aware of this site, so I provided the URL.

He was very interested in what version of BlueCruise I was on, so I let him know that I couldn't tell him as there was no way to find that information in the app or in the vehicle menus. I suspected I was on 1.2 or 1.3, but certainly not 1.4, but until Ford saw fit to share this information, I really didn't know. He assured me that 1.4 would be rolled out soon, and I countered that I would be more than willing to try it again once it is actually on the vehicle, but I wouldn't pay to test their software, so they need to consider the Tesla approach of offering free trials to get people hooked. He said he would be able to look at my account to confirm my BC version and would call back within a few days with that information.

Overall, the conversation was positive and he thanked me for the feedback. He asked if I would be interested in participating in a longer conversation with the Ford team, probably lasting 60-90 minutes, in a few weeks. I said I'd be happy to and he said he would reach out again with scheduling.

I am thrilled that Ford is starting to take a look at why subscribership numbers are low. Has anyone else gotten a call from Ford?

I did get a call about a month ago asking if I was going to subscribe to Blue Cruise since the price had dropped. I explained that I live in Juneau, Alaska and BC was not available here. He said "Thanks, I understand" and quickly ended the call.

 

[PrimeRisk]

I wanted the Blue Cruise one-time pricing option available at purchase. Dealer did not know how to sell this option nor were they aware it was an option until I asked for it.

I want Blue Cruise active, but not with a monthly or annual subscription.

I understand why you want to talk to Ford to confirm this, but I don't believe you are going to like the answers:

From Ford's website: https://www.ford.com/support/category/technology/bluecruise/

In a nutshell, you can only purchase lifetime at time of sale for purchases made on or after 10/1/2024. I see from your signature that you did make the purchase after 10/1/2024, but you didn't get it as an option when you purchased it. I'm not sure if Ford will honor this pricing because the Dealer was uninformed, but they certainly should have been as this program was out for 2+ months before you purchased. I would take this information and go back to the dealer and demand they fix it from their end as they absolutely should have known.

Maybe @Ford Motor Company can help you if your dealer refuses to.

It's a stunningly stupid move on Ford's part not to offer lifetime subscriptions to existing owners, but hey, here we are.

 

[fvineyard]

I understand why you want to talk to Ford to confirm this, but I don't believe you are going to like the answers

I agree with everything you said, and you are probably right that I will not like the end result. But that will not prevent me from trying

I shared all of the same screenshots you posted with the dealership when making the purchase. Did not really help.

 

[PrimeRisk]

I agree with everything you said, and you are probably right that I will not like the end result. But that will not prevent me from trying

I shared all of the same screenshots you posted with the dealership when making the purchase. Did not really help.

I'm not trying to dissuade you in any way and I hope you get it.

This is a situation of incompetence on the part of the selling dealer. You asked for it, you even showed them the info, but they couldn't figure it out. They should have contacted Ford at that time. Since they did not, they should be the ones trying to find the right people at Ford to make this right. I hope very much that Ford will look at this situation and sell you the lifetime license as you made a more than reasonable attempt to purchase it at the time of sale and the "buy it now, because you can't later" isn't particularly clear.

 

[evowner]

Isn’t great that Ford is making that option controllable by the end user. You can turn it off and I can turn it on.
If I ever get a chance too.

Righto

 

[evowner]

I appreciate your perspective and that you find BlueCruise useful. I am coming from the experience with a 2021 Tesla MYP with HW3 and a late 2023 Tesla MY with HW4. I do have true handsfree in these vehicles with the in-car camera. It certainly isn't flawless, but has performed better IMHO than Ford's attention monitoring that is virtually non-functional if it is sunny out. For me, Tesla's solution vs Ford's is like comparing apples and ball-joints.

It's not that it doesn't work in some places, it's that it drops out in places and times where it shouldn't. My daily path to work includes a significant stretch of I-25 in Denver-Metro. Not exactly your biggest metro area, but I think I have a reasonable expectation that I-25 through the city should be completely mapped, but unfortunately there is a section that is not (or at least not correctly) mapped. My '24 Lightning will drop out of BC at the same place every single time I drive it, day or night. It is on a curve at 55MPH and the drop is abrupt. Sure, if I head South out of Denver to Colorado Springs I can drive the straight line without changing lanes with BlueCruise engaged for 60 miles without a glitch, but so can virtually any car with TACC and Lane-Keeping assist. I still drive that way today in the Lightning since my BC trial ended in early November.

This is the entire point for me. If all BC does is allow me to remove my hand from the steering wheel instead of just hanging my left hand on the wheel, it is of very low value to me as I typically rest my left hand on the wheel anyway.

I know 1 - 200 mile trip does not make me an expert on Bluecruise. It was very sunny the whole trip down, not sure about that. Time will tell. But compared to the other vehicles I have it is hands down better for me. It has everything I need as of now.

I will never move to a vehicle that has more than hands free, unless every vehicle has the technology and can communicate with each other. I don't know about Texas, I haven't been there for over 20 years, but around here in Ohio there are more bad drivers than good ones. They are running red lights, driving on the wrong side of the road, ignoring road markings, passing where they shouldn't. It's almost total chaos. I don't think there are enough sensors and algorithms for every bad driver.

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