cyellen said:
If anyone is like me, I quickly realized that entering all those details about my order history (many of which were just guesstimates) would eventually be used to fuel the entire "jumping the line conversation." When it eventually gets used against me and/or Nissan, what's the point?
Yeah, what's the point of getting a better idea of when we're getting our cars? What's the point of asking Nissan to honor it's commitments made in press announcements and elsewhere? What's the point of getting a better idea of when our car be delivered and how predicatble / unpredictable that will be so we can make plans for our other vehicles, charger installation, finances, etc...?
I find it humorous that some of those who got premature deliver of their cars are so biased? unhelpful? - trying to come up with a polite term to not offend those who have gotten so lucky, and are advocating not sharing the delivery data when they realize they got lucky and that data can help those who were unfortunately caught in this order sequencing mix up by Nissan. (A few people on the forums were admittedly less polite, out of frustration, to those who ordered months later but got their LEAFs months earlier. That treatment was uncalled for, but it's not a good reason to not share your data or go burn all the library books. I for the most part referred to the premature deliveries as lucky, and would be happy to meet another LEAF owner, including those that got out of sequence, early delivery.)
Ultimately, this data benefits all future LEAF customers, as I know Nissan has changed their internal processes to have a more fair delivery order for all of the new orders.
For those of us whose LEAFs got delayed by the mixup, Nissan is making some effort to get us vehicles that are still in port and that they know are orphaned. I suspect that once the car gets to a dealer, and it's orphaned at the Dealer that Nissan corporate has very little control of it. It's a new process for Nissan, there's been a few mis-steps, and we've let Nissan know, in part because of the spreadsheet and Nissan has taken some corrective actions process wise and on individual orders as a result.
Even if we did not have the out of order issue, the spreadsheet combined with the information willing shared by LEAF enthusiast, owners, etc. has helped people understand the process of ordering, maufacturing, shipping, port options, transport to dealer, etc. fostering some understanding that the LEAF you order today won't be ready tomorrow. In this initial phase it takes a few months. (or a year, or some are even waiting to be able to order in their states) I was amazed at the amount of data available in the Tracking ships thread! The information in the spreadsheet has also helped to understand the magnitude of devastation caused by the Tsunami and what issues are a result of it and what issues are not related to it.