NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Some car shoppers are finding that their
trade-in vehicles, which qualified for a Cash for Clunkers rebate last
week, don’t this week thanks to changes in the EPA’s fuel economy
ratings.
In some cases, car buyers say, dealers are backing out
of sales they’ve already made because the EPA changed the fuel economy
figures on their trade-in.
“My wife just received a call from the
sales manager saying that our clunker doesn’t qualify anymore, and that
we could either pay the extra $4,500 or return the new car (and get our
old car back),” a car buyer wrote Tuesday on a message board at the
Edmunds.com automotive Web site.
The buyer said he had signed a
document agreeing to provide additional documentation needed to process
his trade-in, but had not done so yet.
Another car shopper
emailed CNNMoney.com saying he went to the Environmental Protection
Agency’s fueleconomy.gov Web site on Saturday to double-check the fuel
economy rating for his 1987 Mercury Grand Marquis. When he had visited
previously, the car’s combined city and highway fuel economy was rated
at 18 miles per gallon, making it eligible for the program.
But
on Saturday, he found something different: The fuel economy for his car
had been raised to 19 mpg — one mile per gallon over the maximum
fuel-efficiency allowed under the Car Allowance Rebate System (aka Cash
for Clunkers). As a result, he became ineligible for a trade-in credit
worth up to $4,500.
Even though the program’s basic
requirements have been known since it was created by Congress earlier
this year, Cash for Clunkers didn’t become official until July 24. So
as part of the official launch, the EPA conducted “quality assurance
and quality control effort regarding fuel economy calculations on more
than 30,000 vehicle model types spanning the past 25 years,” according
to an e-mail sent by EPA spokesman Dale Kemery.
As a result,
eligibility for roughly 100 vehicles was affected, Kemery wrote.
However, roughly equal numbers became newly eligible and newly
ineligible.
Car shoppers have been posting comments on various Internet message
boards, including several at the automotive Web site Edmunds.com,
describing their frustration with the changes.
The owners of a
1993 Camry V6 wagon, a 1995 Saab 900S and a 1988 Toyota 4Runner all
describe their vehicles becoming suddenly ineligible for the program
around the time the rules officially went into effect.
Consumers
who believe their eligibility may have been hurt by EPA’s changes
should contact the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration,
which administers Cash For Clunkers.
“They should call our
attention to it,” said Rae Tyson, spokesman for the NHTSA. He did not
promise, however, that the agency would bend the rules.
Cash
for Clunkers benefits are retroactive to July 1, so dealers have been
able to make deals since that date. But they had to wait until July 24
to file for their reimbursement checks.
Hyundai Motor America has
been helping its dealers close Cash for Clunkers deals since July 1 by
providing them with cash advances equal to the expected CARS rebate, a
Hyundai spokesman said. As of last Friday, about 14% of Hyundai sales
were Cash for Clunker deals, according to the automaker. Last month,
Hyundai sold about 38,000 cars.
It is unclear if any of Hyundai’s
deals so far were made ineligible by the changes, said Hyundai
spokesman Phil Leinert, or how the automaker might deal with situations
in which a car’s eligibility changed.
Brian Benstock, owner of
Paragon Honda in New York City, said he’s done 33 Cash for Clunkers
deals since July 1. So far, he said, he has had no problems because of
altered fuel economy numbers.
“Fortunately, most of our customers
weren’t on the edge,” he said. The average fuel economy of his Clunker
trade-ins has been about 16 mpg, he said.
Dealers who entered
into agreements with customers before last Friday, based on a fuel
economy figure listed at fueleconomy.gov, have only themselves to
blame, said Tyson.
“We made it very clear that they would be
holding themselves out to some risk if they consummate a deal before
the program officially begins,” Tyson said.
Read More About Cash for Clunkers:
– Cash for Clunkers 101
– Cash for Clunkers Q & A
– Which Cars Qualify?
– Search and Read Stories at AOL Autos