Ford Dealers Donate 4 Vehicles To Service Tech Training Centers

A group of Ford stores in New York donated vehicles to a community college and trade schools for service technicians as part of their new Ford Future Techs program. The Western New York Ford dealers are a group of 37 Ford dealerships in Western New York state. The WNY group donated four 2013 Ford Fusion vehicles to technical training schools and a community college in Cheektowagg, East Aurora, West Seneca and Buffalo, New York The dealerships also donated diagnosis and repair equipment commensurate with the demands of newer vehicle technology.

One of the dealerships that donated to the trade schools was DeLacy Ford in Elma, New York Peter DeLacy, Vice President and GM for DeLacy Ford. In a statement, DeLacy explained the FFTs program saying, “The purpose of the Ford Future Techs program is to better prepare students for the field of automotive diagnosis, repair, and maintenance. In conversations among the dealers, we kept coming back to the fact that there is a gap between qualified job candidates and the number of positions we’re looking to fill.”

The Ford Future Techs program is meant to train the next generation of dealership service employees since vehicles are getting more technologically advanced and the need for tech savvy service employees is becoming apparent. Ford used to have regional tech training centers across the U.S., however many of those have been closed raising the question as to how would-be techs will get their job training.

Dom Genova, President of Genese Valley Ford, which is participating in the program, spoke to the Democrat and Chronicle about why his store feels this initiative is critical. Geneses, speaking to D&C said, “There is a gap between qualified auto tech repair job candidates and the number of positions we’re looking to fill. We’re confident that Ford Future Techs will make strides toward closing that gap by encouraging interest in the auto tech field by giving students access to current vehicles and technology.”

The Western New York Ford dealers have chosen to help pay for localized tech education, since there aren’t better options available. The FFT dealerships may even save money by donating. In an email to DrivingSales News, a longtime Fixed Ops Director spoke about how much time and money dealers put into their technicians. In an email, the Fixed Ops Director described his experience saying, “We would pay for hotels and travel and meals along with paying them 8 hours per day at the rate they earned as if they were at the store. A typical expense for someone to go for a week to train would be $600 hotel – $300 to $500 for flight – $150 in meals and then their wage – $900 to $1200 per week for a total of close to $2500 for one week per tech. In order to get master certified, a tech would need to do this close to 5 times. Huge investment for them to just up and leave and go to another store.”

Do you have a similar experience at your store while sending your techs to get their required certification? What kind of costs do you typically have when it comes to certifying your techs? Would a program such as Ford Future Techs be of interest to you at your store?