Call For Manufacturers To Reveal All Recalls

Thursday, 30. September 2010

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Auto Express has launched a campaign to force manufacturers to disclose known problems with their cars. At the moment the manufacturers only have to make public known safety faults that are subject to recall. For all other problems, such as reliability issues, these do not have to be made public. The AA, RAC and Retail Motor Industry Federation have all joined with Auto Express to put pressure on manufacturers to make public their technical service bulletins – the documents that detail the symptoms, causes and fixes for known problems, in the same way that they do for safety recalls. The initiative has been taken following an investigation, carried out by Auto Express, into known problems that could have caused cars to breakdown but the drivers were unaware. In one case a Jaguar XJ8 owner found out through a forum that his car had a known fault and the engine could cut out at high speed. The report also revealed how many independent garages had to send customers to main dealers to have the faults rectified as they were unable to access technical data. I agree with the parties involved in this initiative. It’s a disgrace that manufacturers are not more transparent about known faults that could leave motorists stranded. Have you had experience of a car with a known fault that you were not advised about? Let me know? By Graham Hill