A Maserati Gets 'Clunked'

Comment

Comment by David Ruggles on August 18, 2009 at 9:57am

Dealers tell me the program would be a lot more effective if they could get paid the clunker incentives by the government. The program has put a terrible strain on dealers already short of working capital.

However, as is usually the case, "We have seen the enemy and they are us!" The government said the No. 1 reason dealers are seeing transactions rejected is they are not writing "junk automobile, cars.gov" on both sides of the trade-in vehicles' title. Many dealers had thought they were following instructions to make sure the titles had a "label" when they affixed stickers (Post It Notes) with those words to both sides of the titles. But those stickers could be peeled off, so the NHTSA officials said dealers need to hand write the words. Take a tip from Terrell Owens and use a SHARPIE!

Other top reasons for a deal's rejection included missing signatures on paperwork, absent proof of insurance for the trade-in vehicle or mismatched vehicle identification numbers for the trade-in.

It seems to be a major problem that when they reject paperwork they don't identify each packet as to what they rejected it for.