Fredintexas

An article in Automotive News told how Ford had been offering cash bonuses to its salespeople for writing Red Carpet Leases. Typical bonus amounts were $75 to $100 per lease, but the bonus was increased if the new lease was a renewal. Some bonuses were as high as $500 per vehicle, and this was in addition to their normal salary and/or commission. The bonus program was started in 1989 and was supposedly discontinued in 1995.
So Ford’s salespeople were presenting themselves to customers as “trusted advisers” and telling them that leasing was the smart thing to do, while they were being paid generous bonuses for convincing people to lease. (And they still got bonuses, and bigger commission checks, if they overcharged customers on leases.) Of course, their customers weren’t told about the bonuses, or the fact that so many of them had been overcharged.