Indiana?

We had an interesting experience yesterday.  We called for a status update on our van (since we'd been blown off the past few weeks), only to be told that nobody knows anything.  We were then offered to purchase a van that could be transferred from another dealer in the region.  But the only available van that was fairly close to what we wanted had already been reserved.  There was only one other van that might suit our needs, and we were told that we could have it here by Thursday, but it would mean adding on some aftermarket accessories to get all the essential items that we had ordered on our special order van.  At first we thought, "Great, problem solved."  But then we did the math.

This transfer van needed a backup camera, so that we can easily line up on our trailer hitch.  We were quoted a cost of $975 for that, despite a new factory stereo with backup camera only costing $250!  The transfer van also didn't have a trailer hitch, but we were told we could get a cheap hitch at U-Haul.  We checked into that, and it would cost about the same as the factory hitch, but if we wanted it sooner than late next week it would cost an additional $140 in freight.  In eight days the chances will have improved that our van will be here.  Of course on top of all that, they added $562 to cover their additional expenses, plus there were additional unwanted accessories on this van that totaled over $500.  So we'd be getting a deal that was $1,000 or $2,000 (depending up how you wish to characterize it) worse than the deal that we have waited the past 169 days for (though we would have spent less out of pocket than our special order van will cost, since it has thousands of dollars of other accessories on it).

So we frantically tried to cancel the transfer and keep things on track for our special order van, but I couldn't get anyone on the phone.  Being in a bit of a panic, I worked my way up the food chain, first leaving a message with the salesman, then the sales manager and finally the owner of Corwin Ford (and I threw in a nasty-gram via their website for good measure).

After a few hours I finally got a call back from the owner, who now miraculously tells me that the van, which nobody could find yesterday, is in Indiana.  He also tells me a fairy tale about how it is being held there (presumably in Indianapolis, where Ford has a plant), possibly to add some recall item before being delivered.  That sounds suspiciously like someone is simply telling a story so that they have something to tell us.  After all, we got the same line of BS about that being the reason that the van sat in Spain for a couple of months.  So we are hoping it is actually on a railcar in transit, but we simply don't know.  But Indianapolis does happen to be on a main freight line that connects to St. Louis, Kansas City and then Salt Lake City.  If we can believe what we are being told, then it is about 1,800 miles east of here, so it's getting closer.  That could be just a few days travel time, so the van might be here by the end of next week.