DDE just moved 11 months!

[paroyboy]

Made my reservation OCtober 1, 2008. The other day, I checked the DDE and it was Feb 2010 April 2010. Now it says 3/16/2009 to 6/14/2009. The reservation is for an orphan for the dealer. (they said they want the orphan) The DDE was moving up a little each month or so but 11 months! Has this been others experience too or are reservations drying up?

[Smartdavis]

The economic news is discouraging, layoffs continue, people are holding back major purchases. My 2009 cabrio arrived last week at the dealer and I decided to stick with my orphan and not take delivery so another orphan was created. Hopefully there are enough other reservations holders out there to keep up the demand until the economy picks up again.

[SuperGeek]

Add to that something they're calling Smart Express or something like that. A better orphan allocation program. Some dealers have 50 orphans each, some have a waiting list a mile long. So with orphan delivery optimized, new deliveries will be faster as well.

Your new car may be an orphan today in some other state, sill a new car, but exactly or very nearly matching the config that you ordered. I can't imagine them delivering something other than what you configured, so maybe if you added options that another close car didn't have, they'll add them on at the dealer without changing the cost you were quoted.

It just seems logical that if you have an orphan that only lacks, say, the instrument pods, that they can take that orphan, add the pods and ship it to another state - the new owner gets the car faster and the podless car doesn't sit on a lot for 60 days while someone tries to negotiate their addition for free.

[Old Panda]

I read somewhere on here that smart was going to start 'matching up' orphans as they arrived in the US to current reservation holders and then sending the car to the corresponding dealer.

BUT if you haven't configured yet, I have no idea why it would move up, unless it's just doing one of those crazy DDE things again.

[Celt88]

MY DDE has been moving forwards and backwards by a few days for last 3 weeks. On day its 2/4/09 then 2/7/09 and now 1/29/09.

[SuperGeek]

Originally Posted by Celt88

MY DDE has been moving forwards and backwards by a few days for last 3 weeks. On day its 2/4/09 then 2/7/09 and now 1/29/09.

If it's this close to today, it's time to call the dealer and find out the details.

Make sure they have the right email and phone # or your precious may be orphaned.

[Celt88]

Originally Posted by SuperGeek

If it's this close to today, it's time to call the dealer and find out the details.

Make sure they have the right email and phone # or your precious may be orphaned.

I have talked with them 3 times this week. My car is expected 2/16ish, but they have a orphan that is close to what I ordered they just need to send me the details, either way i got about 2 weeks max

[JPaul]

More details about "smart Express" in:
smart usa to introduce "smart express" to better handle orphans

[Rob and Steph]

We got an email yesterday saying that our due date for our reserved car (hasn't been "configured" with manufacturer yet) was sometime from December '09 to February '10. Glad we were blessed to get an orphan exactly like we wanted. Rob wants to change our original color/options scheme to a black on black Cabrio, with black rims. He thinks he'll name it "The Shadow". LOL!

Steph