Congratulations! Do love that interior combo.

 

Rather than make one large write-up, I decided to break this up into pieces. Therefore, this report is about the drop-off process.

First, some foundation...

I picked up the car in Sindelfingen at the Center of Excellence (one more thing I found out that Herbert arranged). As this will be relevant to the drop-off part, I will say that while I put a sizable amount of money down on the car, I did finance the balance through Bank Of America. This is important as when one pays cash for the car, the Mercedes delivery center folks will give you a piece of paper called the Manufacturer's Certificate of Origin. In a finance or lease situation, they are supposed to send that to the dealer. This is to ensure the title (which is derived from the origin certificate) reflects the lien holder. They wanted to give it to me but after I inquired if that was right, they kept it as they are supposed to do. Keep that in mind as it will come up again.

I planned on dropping the car off in Nice with the TT Auto agent at the Nice airport. They are located in Terminal 1 of the Nice airport. I contacted TT via email about 5 days earlier to arrange an appointment. They gave me a time and sent me directions. If you go to Nice, look at these carefully as the small lot for TT is access controlled (which they will give your the code via email). The email from TT also gave me the GPS coordinates of the lot and the NAV found this perfectly after I took a few loops around the airport because I did not pay attention to the NAV very specifically (In Europe, keep right directions could look like what we would call an exit).

The agent came out to the lot and did an inspection of the vehicle. I had previously removed the first aid kit, the fold-up warning triangle and the safety vest. That went into my luggage. The owner's manual and license plates stayed with the car but nothing else.

There was a guy from Miami with a very black BMW 5 series doing the same thing. He told me I should wash the car if I could as it could delay things by a day or two. He mentioned there is a place in Nice called American Car Wash. I did not go there as I did not want to run my car through machines so I left it with 2 weeks of road dirt. They accepted the car OK and if they need to wash it before they put the shipping film, they can do that I guess. It's up to you. I made sure to wash any bird bombs off when they happened as I brought a microfiber cloth with me. If you have room in your luggage, I would recommend bringing two microfiber cloths and a small spray bottle of waterless wash/detailer. I should have done that but I forgot. That would be the safest thing presuming you know how to use waterless wash properly.

After the lot inspection, we went inside to the terminal for paperwork. I supplied my passport, the order from MB, basically any paperwork that MB have me, my social security number, phone number and email address (for status emails).

Remember the story about the certificate of origin? The agent from TT asked me for this. He said he needed the bill of sale or the origin certificate. I explained that since it was financed that MB kept this (as they are supposed to do). The TT agent had to call his office in Paris to confirm he could accept the car without this. That took a few minutes and the small panic of "OK, what do I do now if they do not accept the car?" I knew if I needed to, I could contact MBUSA to get it handled.

I signed a form that indicated the condition of the car and an Authorization for Car Shipment. I left with my paperwork and these two forms. They only wanted one key so I have the other one at the moment.

Now, there is some old MBUSA paperwork that states the shipping forwarder (International Freight Forwarders) will send you three emails; one upon acceptance, open at the dock and one when it clears customs. After about 1 week, I had not received anything so I emailed a contact address I had to inquire. I was told that I must be reading some old documentation as they email me once when they get the car to the dock in Germany. I am supposed to get an email with a user and password so I can track the vehicle via the freight forwarder. I have not received that yet. If you drop the car off in Germany, that might arrive quicker, but my car has to be moved from Nice to Bremerhaven in Germany (via truck I was told by TT).

That is what I know now. I will update this part again when I get the email. It has been one week since drop-off so far (hard to believe as the end was a bit of a blur).

If anyone has any questions about drop-off in Nice, l just let me know.

Tom

 

The IFF form should have login info somewhere near the top right. However, best way to track is on the wallenius wilhelmsen site.

Once your car is in their hands before loading onto ship, you will have accurate and up to date info on car location.

On the Site, look for search cargo and type in your vin under "cargo" i believe.

 

I don't have the IFF form yet. My form is from BLG Logistics to get it to IFF as the Port Agent. This might be because I dropped it off outside of Germany.

 

I found the site, but no record is found when I enter my VIN as the CargoID. I will have to wait until it gets to the port and gets loaded on a ship I suspect.

The URL is here I believe: https://att.2wglobal.com/gstattweb/o...uickSearchPage

 

My oh my....that interior!!!

 

Hi all...something just occurred to me. I ordered the option 735 Exclusive Trim Package (and it is confirmed on my final order sheet). Isn't that supposed to add the walnut on the rear seat back below the headrest? Looking at these pictures, I do not see the walnut.

If anyone can confirm that, I would be grateful. My car was built at the end of January just in case this was a production change.

What other indicators can I use to see if Exclusive Trim is there?

Thanks,

Tom

 

One thing just occurred to me. I wonder if it is possible this is added at the VPC for some reason? Maybe if someone else ordered EDP and has that option, they can comment. Adding it at the VPC seems doubtful though.

 

Exclusive trim is a factory installed option. It comes in the form of:

1. Wood trim under door armrests (front and rear)
2. Rear climate control surround in wood trim
3. Additional trim on front seat backs

Do you have option code 735 "Exclusive Trim" on your build sheet? If so, can you verify that #1 and #2 are also present in your car.

 

I have 735 on my build sheet. From the pictures I took, I can see the trim on the rear doors and around the vents in the rear. The only place it appears to be missing is on the back seat. See my earlier pictures in this thread to see an example. I do not have the car yet so I cannot walk outside and check anything except for the pictures I took.

I have a call into Herbert too to see how this would be addressed.

 

Attached is what you should expect from 735 on S550. Please let us know what Herbert has to say about it.

 

Wood trim on back of seats are only for certain interior wood trim colors. I think up until now its only for the metallic ash and the light brown. Otherwise if you have burl wood or black, you only get the exclusive wood on 4 doors and rear center vents.

 

The DOG says wood is available on the back of front seats in conjunction with all trims.

 

Initially, that wood behind the seats were only for "designo" trims. That DOG posted above looks recent, thats why it shows "new" when stating that it is available for all trims. This could be for orders after a certain period. I ordered my car sometime september 2013 and picked December. It does not have the trim on the back of the seats.

 

Looks like this is for 2015 MY S's.

 

EDIT: Already answered...

 

I checked my 2014 DOG an I see several cases where the walnut does not have the trim on the rear of the seat. I missed that subtle difference. I agree it should be there in the 2015 and beyond on all trim pieces.

 

Thanks to all for the comments. I should have known that German manufacturing did not forget something in the bill of materials

 

You all helped me recover from a memory failure. Yes, I now recall a comment on the DOG for MY14 S550 that additional wood trim on front seat backs is only available for certain interior options. The picture I posted earlier was from MY15 DOG, hence a discrepancy.

 

Well, I just received my tracking email from Emily at IFF. The ship is scheduled to leave tomorrow and arrive in Brunswick on 4/22. So, I dropped it off in Nice, France on March 27th so that is 13 days to get to the port and on a ship. The ship is the BRILLIANT ACE 026A. Woo Hoo!!!

So, just for kicks, any of the EDP folks that went through Brunswick, how long did your car take from port arrival to dealer? I ask EDP as I understand the US Customs process is a bit different for private EDP cars.

 

Yea! The ship left port. I really to find something to keep me busy while I'm waiting .

I noticed the next port of call for the ship is Halifax. I guess then it makes the run down the coast. Slow milk run indeed.

 

Well now that the ship left, I went to the WW site, entered my VIN under cargo ID but no records are found. That is the way you did it?

Tom

 

Unfortunately that vessel may not be on the WWL site since it may not be owned by WWL.


I attempted to find the Brilliant Ace on the WWL site and it is listed but no voyage is listed. When I looked at a picture of the Brilliant Ace it does not look like a typical WWL vessel (maybe WWL is contracting to use it or MB is simply using another shipping company then WWL).


Therefore, you may not be able to track in on WWL site.

 

The Brilliant ACE popped up on MarineTraffic 190 NM from Halifax. Let's hope it's not hitting all the VPCs on the East Coast

It's still scheduled for 4/22 in Brunswick.

 

Tom, I sure hope that you have a lot better luck than I did with the VPC. That was agonizing.