Volkswagen Prepares To Pay Over 500,000 Cheating Claims

Will be interesting to see how many owners settle out of court versus going to court. I suspect accepting a quick fix and quick money in hand
will win out over protracted legal process. We will see.

What's the real number? 11+ million cheating vehicles...no wait....247 cheating vehicles....no wait exactly 500K...what is the real number.

If I had a TDI I would want my down payment back, all payments refunded, and a bonus of some sort that does not involve another VWAG product.

MDarringer you must be a bleeding heart liberal with all the nonsense you post all the time.... take a look at the last few years of VW's reliability, durability and repair costs they are one of the better brands out there..

The only fair way to do it, is to (1) fix the vehicles and (2) pay the owners for the deterioration in the fair market value of their vehicles as a result of the scandal.

Here's what will happen - first you take your car to the dealer to get it fixed and then the dealer enters your info into a web-based computer system noting the year, model, trim level, mileage, and condition of your vehicle and you will be given a claim number. The vehicle owner then goes to a claims website with their claim number (in KBB.com or Edmunds.com form), probably enters a whole bunch of information (some meaningful and some useless), such as what they paid for the vehicle, when they bought it, what they think the condition is and then the claims website will calculate a value of the reduced value.

For example, if you have a 2010 Golf TDI with 120,000 miles on it that is in beater condition, VW will cut you a check for like $300. If you have a 2014 Audi A3 TDI with 6,000 miles and in perfect condition, you will get a check for $2,000 to 4,000.

That's it - no more magic than that!. No, VW will not buy back your vehicle, VW will not give you $20,000. No way.

Plus VW will probably throw in a $1,500 gift card to be used for vehicle service at a VW dealer.

There will probably also be an "opt-in" choice where instead of the cash, the owner gets a huge ($1,000's of dollars) discount on a new VW or Audi product in lieu of any cash payment.

The goal of the whole process will be to make the consumer feel they are getting much, while in reality they are getting little.

The buying public may have a lot of sheeple among them--God bless their existence--but there will be a ripple effect even if VW placates the current owners. Non VW buyers will have yet another reason not to buy a VW as if stupid pricing, poor durability, mediocre reliability, and frightening repair costs weren't enough. VWs on used car lots will not command good prices and buyers there will hesitate.

VW needs to placate the current customers and then as rapidly as possible replace their line with cars with new names, with radically different styling, a Hyundai warranty, and with hybrids and PHEVs available at the get go with good pricing.

A simple thing VW could do would be to extend all of its non-expired warranties to a 10 year 100,000 mile protection.

If VWs are built so well then why not?

VW will never extend the warranty because the present value calculation will be a limitless cost! The charge they would have to take would bankrupt them - plus it would kill their profit-margin on "parts" they sell to out of warranty people who come in for repairs. I bet they will only "cap" their liability by offering a "gift card" for repairs and then they will gamble that only a small portion of people will actually redeem them on the repairs.

It will be funny if the generous payout is in the form of a new purchase discount.

Which might be the outcome. Very little cost to VW. It props up sales and cash rapes consumers like VW loves to do. Then they can send all their smokers to the crusher. Problem solved.

While personally I believe VW needs to be made an example of for various reasons (lying, misrepresentation, arrogance, etc etc)I read an interesting fact in TOP GEAR magazine today that puts the pollution aspect in a somewhat different light for me. There are 90,000 large ships at sea at any given time. In one day just one large ship pollutes the air as much as 50 Million cars combined. Compare that to how many ever VW's polluted above the legal limit and when was the last time you heard the earth is warming get rid of car fanatics ever mention ships?...me neither.

One 1000 megawatt natural gas fired electric generation plant puts out as much NOx as the entire 500,000 USA offending VW TDIs.