Lawmaker Pushes for Stricter State Lemon Law
Lauded by consumer advocates as a crucial step in protecting motorists who get stuck with seriously defective cars and trucks, a proposed tougher auto “lemon” law for California would reduce the number of chances auto makers have to repair defects before they would be required to replace or buy back the vehicle.
The measure, which has come under fire from major auto manufacturers, would allow two repair attempts in place of the four allowed under the current lemon law.
After a second unsuccessful attempt to fix a life-threatening defect, the vehicle would officially be declared a lemon--branding it forever and requiring the manufacturer to replace it or give the owner a refund. In addition, the vehicle’s defects and lemon status would have to be disclosed to future owners.
The proposed bill is sponsored by Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety, or CARS, a Sacramento-based consumer group.
“No one should have to drive a car with a serious defect. We put our families in these cars. . . . If the brakes or steering aren’t working, it threatens our lives as well as others on the road,” said Rosemary Shahan, president of CARS. “Two chances to fix a life-threatening problem is more than enough.”
The proposed law passed the Senate but failed to win enough support from the Assembly Consumer Protection Committee to go to the floor for a vote, said the bill’s author, state Sen. Byron Sher (D-Stanford).
Blaming the committee defeat on heavy lobbying by the auto industry, Sher vowed to reintroduce the measure, known as Senate Bill 1718, next month after legislators return from summer break.
“I don’t see how auto companies and their associations could with a straight face oppose this bill,” Sher said. “But oppose it they do--and strenuously.”
Sher said his bill would extend the lemon law’s protection to small-business owners with five or fewer vehicles.
The tougher law would also close loopholes that have resulted in manufacturers reselling defective vehicles without disclosing the information to buyers, Shahan said. In fact, she said, auto makers have informed federal regulators that about 95% of the lemons they repurchase are eventually resold as used vehicles.
Maureen O’Haren, a Sacramento lobbyist for the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, insists that auto makers “support safe cars.”
The auto industry unsuccessfully sought an amendment that would have given the manufacturers a third chance to fix the problem before a vehicle would officially be declared a lemon, O’Haren said.
Under the proposed amendment, which was rejected by the bill’s proponents, the manufacturer would be allowed to step in after the second failed repair attempt by the dealer and have up to 15 days to try to fix the defects.
O’Haren stressed that if consumers believe that their vehicle has a serious defect--or that their dealership is being unresponsive and is unable to solve the problem--they should contact the manufacturer directly.
“We try to believe they [dealerships] are our partners, but they aren’t always,” she said. If consumers are dissatisfied with the dealership that sold them the vehicle, they are always able to have the repairs fixed under warranty at another dealership.
“We don’t want people driving unsafe cars. We want the cars to be fixed,” said O’Haren, who says problems involving auto repairs have been exaggerated.
*
Sharon and Greg Smit of Fremont may disagree.
When the Smits bought a new Volvo station wagon in December, they figured they had chosen one of the safest, most reliable family cars on the market.
“What we got was a nightmare,” said Sharon, a 31-year-old schoolteacher. “It was a true lemon.”
In the last six months, the Smits say, their 2000 Volvo V40 has been at the dealer 14 times for servicing. The most serious problems involved malfunctioning brakes--six times the dealership tried unsuccessfully to fix them, the couple says.
The brakes became such a problem, Sharon Smit said, that there were times she and her husband had to veer “off the side of the road so we didn’t hit anyone.”
The last time they took the car in, she said, “fluid was pooling in my car--it looked like it might have been brake fluid coming up through the carpeting.”
Despite failing to fix the brakes, the Pleasanton Auto Mall dealership, which sold the couple the car for about $35,000, would not refund their money or give them a new car, the Smits say.
Last month, they hired San Francisco attorney Mark F. Anderson, a lemon law specialist, to help them. Anderson said he wrote a letter to Volvo asking that a refund be given to the couple under the provisions of the lemon law. That was nearly a month ago, and the Smits have received no offer, Anderson said.
“We are, and have been, working with Volvo to resolve this situation on behalf of the customer,” said Ron Tye, financial officer of Hendrick Automotive Group, a dealership network that owns the Pleasanton Auto Mall dealership.
Tye declined to discuss the Smits’ claims about the vehicle, citing the fact they had retained a lawyer.
While acknowledging that many auto makers live up to their warranties and follow the law, attorney Anderson said: “The law says it’s mandatory that the manufacturers replace the vehicle or refund the owners. People aren’t supposed to have to hire lawyers [to get protection under the lemon law].”
“I don’t want to sue. I just want my money back and be able to buy a safe car,” Sharon Smit said. For the last month, the Volvo has been parked. “It’s too dangerous to drive,” said Smit, who now pays about $1,700 a month in combined rental car fees and payments on the Volvo.
“This is the kind of frustration owners of defective cars have to deal with,” activist Shahan said, noting that if California would decide to join about a dozen other states in passing a stricter lemon law bill, vehicle owners would be better protected.
*
Jeanne Wright can be reached at [email protected].
