We consider the numerical solution of boundary value problems for general neutral functional differential equations by the collocation method. The collocation method can be applied in two versions: the finite element method and the spectral element method. We give convergence results for the collocation method deduced by the convergence theory developed in [S. Maset, Numer. Math., (2015), pp. 1--31] for a general discretization of an abstract reformulation of the problems. Such convergence results are then applied in Part II [S. Maset, SIAM J. Numer. Anal., 53 (2015), pp. 2794--2821] of this paper to boundary values problems for a particular type of neutral functional differential equations, namely, differential equations with deviating arguments.
