A couple of thoughts.

1. What is your typical trip length? If you are taking shorter trips (under 30 minutes) the engine and catalyst may not be getting warm enough to allow engine shutdown to occur when it should.

2. Do you have another dealer in your area you could go to for a second opinion?

 

Trip length certainly lowers the FE on the vehicles, especially in the cooler months. But 24 or 25 mpg?

My wife has been driving the '05 since I got the '06 in June. Her average trip is less than 15 minutes - getting groceries, going to the mall, etc - all within a couple miles of the house. She still averages 30-31 mpg.

Something seems to me to be wrong with copyboy's car and if Ford doesn't step up and at least investigate what is wrong then they are letting us all down.

What is the time limit on Lemon Law cases in your state, copyboy? Make sure they aren't just buying time to get past the deadline.

 

In certain driving conditions, (lots of accelerating and decellerating) we've seen 25mpg. In this type of driving condition it helps me a lot to drive in low instead of drive. You can switch to it any time, at any speed - because it's only a programming change. What it will do is engage the regenerative braking sooner, so you use that to slow down instead of normal brakes. So far on this tank, we're reading right at 39mpg - all in low gear...

We also spend a lot of time in low gear at 30-35mph in electric mode. Starting off slowly to use only electric as long as possible, then using the gas and brakes sparingly, and playing with the speed to keep the gas engine off...