Ford Credit Cutting Staff Costs

Ford Credit's new cost-cutting program won't hurt dealer services, Chairman and CEO Gregory C. Smith tells dealers.

Calling the plan to slash personnel costs a “restructuring,” Smith says no jobs will be eliminated among the captive lender's 22,000 employees — unless efforts to curb overtime and travel costs and hiring cutbacks fail to achieve substantial savings.

“They told us the idea is to trim personnel costs by more than 15% by the end of next year, but not sacrifice dealer services,” a Ford dealer tells Ward's Dealer Business. “They can't bite off the hands that feed them.”