here here, a very good news story and great to see buyers are interested and they have 2 more orders on the way too, it'd be such a shame to take a big hit like that to the local economy.

Great stuff Austal

well why I'm ranting is I took up the Ford Special offer on the G6, only to find out now that when I signed for it, they did not have stock, and have to wait for it to be built still!!!
WTF....the car industry is crying that they can't sell cars, hey wake-up, it helps if you have stock ready to sell. And all that was in stock in WA, is the standard government issue white model!!!
How often do we hear of companies crying how hard they doing, yet try and buy something and it needs to be ordered from the East Coast, or still to be imported or in my case not even built yet. So my new car arrives around the 15h April, that's nearly four weeks after I signed the offer to purchase!!!!
Wake up Australian companies. follow Austal and maybe you will survive!

I used to work at Austal, and they work you like a dog.. i was forced to work extra hours, work thru easter breaks for no extra pay..
Once i worked 45 hrs in 3 days.

They actually laid plenty of people off in early 2009 and they employ alot of foreigners for low pay.. There are plenty of disgruntled employees working there.

I know a few guys who were done wrong by Austals!!!!

by Austal, that's probably one side of the story most wont hear. 

used to be in the industry and beleive me the storys heard were not so rosy !!!

Actually the funny thing about it is Austal's old competition for big cats went tits up by doing exactly the same thing.

I hear they're already getting screwed for the last cat they built in the yard and now they are silly enough to do that again?

They very nearly went broke awhile back, but that ship for greg norman saved their bacon that time.

They're also responsible those awful boats that went to the navy as civilian vessels, and thengot semi pimped to defence spec.

Well thanks for the eye-opener on Austal,

As for having a car for me, well I expect Ford to have at least one of each of the five colours, of each base model in the range in WA, that would be only about 60 cars tops in the sedan range, funny how between over two dozen Ford dealers in Perth metro, not one G6 LTD in three of the colours we where prepared to take??? oh besides the basic white!

Holden are just as bad, as when I bought my Crewman back in 2004, they delivered that two and a half months late!
The imported dealerships are better, as they have a good idea whats in the state and whats being shipped in when, where Ford, Holden, Toyota are big culprits at selling whats not even been built yet.
I would have just appreciated the honest word from the dealer to say that they will have to order from the factory!
I was originally told when signing's that it was a model on route from the east coast, but that was not true!
oh well, too late, I've signed and must wait. :-(

Have a look at the list of options you get nowadays and you expect them to carry exactly what you want. FOUR weeks is bugger all time to wait for what you want. Get some patience and htfu. I'm sick of whingers sooking cos they can't get what they want imediately. Get over yourself Tony 

I think if you sawhow much money Ford and GM do not have, you would know why they are not building cars until they are ordered.

It was these big companies taking on big debts from the (now rescued) big banks that went a long way to causing the GFC.

Reading this story, if Austal were  publicly listed and I was a shareholder I would be livid. Very reckless stuff.

they are listed on the australian exchange.. code is ASB..

 and yup they got shafted by Greg Norman they dont call him the Shark for nothing hehehe..

I worked for Oceanfast(owned by Austal) when I first moved to Oz,they lost some of the best cabinet makers i have ever seen because they treated people so badly!

Billcollector, I took a standard model, no extra, their advertised special. Everything standard.Oh yes, there are no extras and options on the Ford Special Ltd edition mate... go check your facts before you loud mouth off at me, to cover for crappy service!

ps I have the money, I am the customer, I have a right to winge about the delivery!
The only reason I did not go to another brand was there are only two real options in a large family sedan with rear wheel drive these days without breaking the bank!

I don't know about you guys, but we have just gone through an economic down turn. Admittedly WA was not effected to the extent the rest of the world was.
I'm a business owner and to me it makes sense to reduce your excess stock during difficult times as this is money sitting round doing nothing. (Oh! I'm talking about Tony's car and not Austal.)
Once confidence comes back into the car/general market, I'm sure dealers will get their stock numbers back up.
I'm not a big fan of car dealers but reducing their stock levels during tuff times makes good sense to me.
No offense Tony, just my view mate.

but we have just gone through an economic down turn.

I think the stimulas has just started to wear off.  Different sectors are impacted to different levels.  

There's so much model choice and so much product range these days trying to stock everything is a recipe for disaster.

One vehicle manufacturer produces such a big range these days and they are so big, such as Ford global that having loads of stock means loads of debt.

Korea's Hyundai ship building executives take $250000 a year. 

While public companies around the world pay their executives millions and in Australia also their share holders.

We'll never compete agaianst the likes of Korea based on that way of thinking..

Could be worse Tony.

You could be one of the many customers who had waited for vehicles for a large amount of time, only to have them destroyed in the yard by hail only days away from delivery. And i am pretty sure that the east coast was hit with a similar hail stom (not as severe) that could have had an impact on vehicle availabiltiy.

Perhaps you could join our industry and share your wealth of knowledge??... Also vehicle sales have just started to increase with more confident buyers, the stock will increase with sales.

In my opinion the vehicle you purchased was

1.Exactly what you were looking for and suited your needs

2.The right price

3.Obviously worth waiting for, considering how many other australians are patiently waiting

"The imported dealerships are better"

Obviously not. otherwise you would have bought your vehicle from one of those.

Clearly from my post count here you can see i dont normally post, but bloody hell Tony all you have done for all the years ive been on fishing forums is whinge.

 Mate if you dont like the way we do things in australia, Go home..

better price and quicker pick up - the reason you'll have to wait is most of those carsare hail damaged and have been sent back to the factory for repair

I like the Ford, it's the right car for us.
..........

ok, my rants, over. No more comments.

Cmon fellas, stop playing the man and just deal with the issue, you may not agree with Tony but please keep it on topic or don't comment at all.  

Cheers,

Adam

Play the topic not the man.

A few posts in this thread are boarderline personal attacks so lets all agree to either agree with Tony on the car delivery issue or disagree with him. He is entitled to have a whinge and we are entitled to agree or disagree, read or ignore. Simple really.

As someone who has been in commercial and corporate finance for many years, stock management is a big factor in business success/failure. What the car yards / manufacturers do in that space is good fiscal management. It is however poor customer service if one is led to believe that stock is available when it clearly isn't.

Picked up Tony's dummy placed it back in his mouth  got my bat and ball and stopped playing, enough said

Are we still talking about Austal??

No now were talking about the eagles cobba !

They might win their first game this week.

might close Freo's premiership window