Looks like another set of confirmations went out!

[karltrev]

#1244. Not yet recieved confirmation.

Located in Idaho. That may be the reason.

[sharonlee]

Teapots,

Yup...that was mine 2 weeks ago and as I recall, I think your time of day was before mine but looks like we're both in business now....except for waiting.

Sharon

[omahanut]

There no longer seems to be any logic in how the reservations are being sent out. I know someone on this forum who lives in the same shouting distance as myself with 1226 confirmed two weeks ago. They keep telling me it is the order in which the deposits were made but we know that is a bunch f bull! Does anyone know for sure what is going on. Calling doesn't do any good and they appear to be ignoring e-mails

[spdickey]

Originally Posted by omahanut

There no longer seems to be any logic in how the reservations are being sent out. I know someone on this forum who lives in the same shouting distance as myself with 1226 confirmed two weeks ago. They keep telling me it is the order in which the deposits were made but we know that is a bunch f bull! Does anyone know for sure what is going on. Calling doesn't do any good and they appear to be ignoring e-mails

Its load balancing amongst the dealers. Seems to be a two week delay for the same reservation date. They're using ZIP codes, and I've heard of examples where adjacent ZIPS have been assigned to different dealers.

[SmartCard]

wow, they're really jumping around now! I'm actually really suprised that Smart is doing this now. It would have seemed more appropriate to have started this earlier, based on dealerships that may be open early January. But evidentally must also have to do with the dealership allocation - which relates to geography.

Here I was thinking I was safe until February, but who knows - with my dealership opening Jan 8th, maybe I'll get the email in January instead?

[spdickey]

Originally Posted by SmartCard

wow, they're really jumping around now! I'm actually really suprised that Smart is doing this now. It would have seemed more appropriate to have started this earlier, based on dealerships that may be open early January. But evidentally must also have to do with the dealership allocation - which relates to geography.

Here I was thinking I was safe until February, but who knows - with my dealership opening Jan 8th, maybe I'll get the email in January instead?

I don't think they were holding back confirmations waiting for dealers to open, but to balance where in the country (and to what dealerships) they would be shipping the cars for the most efficiency. The road shows would have left in their wake a big chunk of reservations from one part of the country, leaving elsewhere with nearly nothing. If a dealer can't handle all the cars at once, why make someone, somewhere else wait until that far away dealership was caught up?

[tipo158]

Originally Posted by spdickey

I don't think they were holding back confirmations waiting for dealers to open, but to balance where in the country (and to what dealerships) they would be shipping the cars for the most efficiency. The road shows would have left in their wake a big chunk of reservations from one part of the country, leaving elsewhere with nearly nothing. If a dealer can't handle all the cars at once, why make someone, somewhere else wait until that far away dealership was caught up?

Then give us an option of selecting another dealership that is not close but has less demand. My most recent auto purchase was in Maine (I live in the Seattle, WA area), so I obviously wouldn't have a problem with getting a car from somewhere else.

[spdickey]

Originally Posted by tipo158

Then give us an option of selecting another dealership that is not close but has less demand. My most recent auto purchase was in Maine (I live in the Seattle, WA area), so I obviously wouldn't have a problem with getting a car from somewhere else.

Delay is usually only two weeks, chill.

[CruisingAZ]

We also need to keep in mind that at this point we are looking at the second half of 2008 and in the big picture that is a small time span.

[SmartCard]

Originally Posted by spdickey

Delay is usually only two weeks, chill.

I'm wondering how (if?) the production rate will keep pace with the confirmation rate. Don't have the figures at my fingertips, but if confirmations are into May/June rezos now, that will be approaching the 15,000 mark. Assuming dropouts, maybe 12,000 confirmations now in four months time? But that's about 6 months worth of production (assuming 24,000) , so its seems if confirmations continue at the current pace, the lag between confirming, production and delivery will grow. So a few weeks difference in confirming now may translate to twice as long delivery wait.

By and large, I think SmartUSA/PAG has done a good job tryinig to stick to the que; let's just hope their use of "load balancing" (a nice way of saying allocations) doens't go too overboard resulting in 4 - 6 month geographic delivery differences seen with the release of other hot new cars (PT Crusier, MINI)