Cheap and Close to Insulting

I got a call from one of the major Ford service department folks this morning. They needed to cut keys for a customer’s Windstar minivan. Unfortunately the key code they had on file for the vehicle which had been sold new through their dealership, that code cut key would not turn in the locks and when they called Ford’s data base it was determined that there was no key code on file. They had my phone number on file and I was asked to come up and help them out. “We only want the code, don’t cut the key”, was what I was told over the phone by the woman working in the dispatch office. They already had a code, not that it was doing them any good. What she meant to say was “We only want to know what the cuts on the key are supposed to look like. Our mechanic will do the rest”

I realize that they can purchase their own key blanks, even cut them on their own key cutting machine and then use their own programming computer so that those fancy new keys will actually start the vehicle. All that having been established, it came across as being cheap and close to insulting when the told me not to cut the key, “We only want the code.” The mechanic didn’t want to miss out on his share of the money so he instructed the dispatcher to obtain the information needed to cut the key and leave him something to justify his being paid the lion’s share. Pardon me; but, that’s just not right.

I think I’ll take my truck in for an oil change. I’ll wait for them to drain out the old oil and take off the old oil filter. Then I will tell them, “That will do, I have my own oil and my own oil filter. I can get mine at WalMart for half of what I’d have to pay you. Thanks for doing the dirty part. Will you take a dollar for your trouble?” You don’t think for a moment that something like that would fly, now do you?