Renting out recalled cars

Follow up from an earier post.

Found on www.kansascity.com and brought to you by Car Repair Salinas

By HUGO MARTIN

Los Angeles Times

 

Federal lawmakers are considering legislation to require car rental companies to immediately take cars off the road that have been recalled for safety defects. Rental agencies object, saying the bill is bolstered by inaccurate numbers.

The controversy over recalled rental cars was sparked in June when an Alameda County, Calif., Superior Court jury ordered Enterprise Holdings Inc. to pay $15million to the parents of two young women who died in a 2004 crash involving an Enterprise rental car.

A month before Enterprise Rent-a-Car rented a Chrysler PT Cruiser to Raechel Houck, 24, and her sister Jacqueline, 20, the rental agency had been notified that the car was being recalled because power steering fluid could leak and ignite under the hood. The sisters died in a fiery crash.

Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., cited the accident as a reason Congress should adopt his bill to bar agencies from renting out cars that have been recalled because of safety issues. Current law prohibits car dealers from selling a recalled vehicle, but the law doesn't address car rental agencies.

Schumer also pointed to a study by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration that is still under way. Looking at 10 recalls by General Motors Co. and Chrysler Group from 2006 to 2010, the study showed:

Hertz Rent-a-Car fixed only 34 percent of its vehicles affected by those recalls within 90 days. Avis Car Rental and Budget Rent a Car fixed 53 percent and Enterprise fixed 65 percent in the same time frame.

"The study suggests that tens of thousands of rental car drivers have unknowingly rented vehicles under recall, posing a serious threat to safety on the roadway," Schumer said in a statement this month when he offered his bill, the Safe Rental Car Act.

An Enterprise spokeswoman said her company believes that the law would be unnecessary, adding that Enterprise already fixes recalled cars quickly.

Five major car rental firms - Alamo, Avis Budget, Enterprise, Hertz and National - dispute the NHTSA study. In a letter to the agency, they said the repair rates cited on its website were based on inaccurate information submitted by auto manufacturers.

The car rental companies sent NHTSA letters showing much higher repair rates for the recalled cars.

Enterprise told NHTSA that in one GM recall last year, for example, it fixed 72 percent of its affected cars within 30 days and 93 percent within 90 days.

A spokesman for NHTSA declined to comment, saying the study was ongoing.

Read more: http://www.kansascity.com/2011/03/21/2742293/renting-out-recalled-cars.html#ixzz1HLR2uoPN