Did you recently take on (or consider) a loan of 84 months or longer on a car purchase?
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Find me at kirstie_h@edmunds.com - or send a private message by clicking on my name.
2015 Kia Soul, 2021 Subaru Forester (kirstie_h), 2024 GMC Sierra 1500 (mr. kirstie_h)
Review your vehicle
I debate the merits/results of this program but am happy to take advantage of it while it lasts. We were planning to buy at the end of 2009 or early 2010 so this incentive moved our purchase up a few months.
My poor CRV is being test driven by others ..
Please take this to a political forum. You're spilling kool-aide on my shoes.
2019 Kia Soul+, 2015 Mustang GT, 2013 Ford F-150, 2000 Chrysler Sebring convertible
Provide some sources to back up your claim or don't bother.
And Driver33 is right your grandmother already has health care through the gov't with medicare.
That decision came today from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in response to dealers' complaints about dwindling inventory on lots. The news came amid reports that the agency has rejected about 80 percent of cash-for-clunkers transactions.
Dealers who want to file deals for an ordered vehicle must first obtain the new car's vehicle identification number from a manufacturer, NHTSA said in a statement. Reimbursement requests still must have all required documents for the trade-in vehicle.
The announcement came a day after a NHTSA conference call with dealer group leaders. During the call, NHTSA officials said the government is rejecting four out of every five deals made under the incentive, according to three dealer group heads who listened.
In addition, NHTSA said dealers have only received payments for 2 percent of the processed voucher requests, said Jim Appleton, president of the New Jersey Coalition of Automotive Retailers.
"Dealers cannot continue to operate without getting paid," Appleton said.
Even the dealers who have received some payments are "flipping out," according to Appleton. The payments that appear in their bank accounts don't indicate their corresponding transaction number.
"You just got $4,500, but you don't know for which deal," he said.
Karen Aldana, a NHTSA spokeswoman, said she couldn't yet confirm any news from the conference call.
Dealers must apply
The clunkers program gives consumers up to $4,500 for trading in gas-guzzling vehicles for replacements with better fuel efficiency. Dealers must apply for reimbursements for the consumer vouchers.
The widespread rejections are "an indication of a broken system," said Pete McNamara, president of the New Hampshire Automobile Dealers Association, who was also on the call.
"If 80 percent of your kids fail a test, that means someone's either not teaching you to write, or it's a confusing test," he said.
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, according to McNamara. Many dealers had thought they were following instructions to make sure the titles had a "label" when they affixed stickers with those words to both sides of the titles. But those stickers could be peeled off, so the NHTSA officials said dealers need to handwrite the words, according to McNamara.
"The advice to my dealers was, 'Break out the permanent marker,'" he said.
Dan Smith, NHTSA's associate administrator for enforcement, was among the agency officials on the call, said McNamara.
Reasons for rejection
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.
A top 10 list is posted at cars.gov/dealersupport with explanations of how to avoid making a mistake on a transaction.
NHTSA rejected about 13,000 deals overnight for having at least three errors on their "summary of sale" form, McNamara said. Those rejections will not come with explanations of how the dealer erred.
"They just told us to have the dealers go through the whole thing," he said. "The dealer's got to start from scratch."
NHTSA, which oversees the $3 billion cash-for-clunkers program, said dealers have submitted 338,659 transactions into an online system. Those reimbursements would total $1.4 billion.
NHTSA officials told conference call participants they are increasing the number of people processing the transactions to 1,200 from about 200. The officials also said NHTSA is still seeking a way to wind down the program before funding runs out.
McNamara's suggestion? "Even if there's money left in the program, that's fine. Just don't let it run out and have dealers and consumers harmed at the end of it."
haven't seen any dealers not getting paid with in 10 days of when the deal was submitted and accepted by the CARS system.
Notice I said accepted deals. I get that a lot of dealers are having problems with this program but I don't understand why. Yes, it is additional paperwork but most of it is just the same stuff we submit to the DMV or a bank. You have a finance or lease contract all of the signatures must be in the right place. All your DMV paperwork must have signatures and fees in the right place or the DMV rejects it.
To get the owner loyalty rebates from the manufactures you need a copy of registration and usually an insurance card copy too. Ok so now to prove the car was registered and insured for a full year you might need two reg copies and two insurance card copies.
When you do a trade you better make sure the title is signed in the right place and assigned properly or you won't be able to re-register the car when you sell it.
This is just basic deal stuff here that dealers do every day. If the names don't match on all the paperwork the DMV will reject the paperwork too.
The only hangup we have had IIRC is a couple of titles didn't have the proper stuff written on them that they were clunkers. Both our mistakes there as the instructions were not that clear and someone should have thought to write on the titles in permanent marker or something.
I said that because there was someone here who said customers should try and trick the dealer by holding on on informing them they have a clunker to get a better deal. I'm untrickable!
Instead of selling and making commission on 5 cars, you are now selling and making commission on 30 cars instead
I wish that were the case. Unfortunately, that is not reality.
And I am not even working on commission like you!
I'm on salary. One of the perks of being in mgmt!!
I find it sad, and rather disgusting, that you would rather cheat the customer by raising your prices (oh wait, its never "raising" prices, but instead, "lower" incentives), based on whether they would use C4C, rather than work hard and sell more cars, and thus earn the extra cash the proper way.
See, this is where you got it all wrong. I take it you did not read my post carefully.
I do not "raise" prices one red cent. My price never goes higher then what the window sticker says. I just won't lower is as much now because of lack of inventory and the added work and frustration on my end. Supply v demand, remember? I work for a mfgr that does not allow the dealer to keep any incentives. They are labeled as "customer cash" and goes directly to the customer. I also run a clean and honorable business. I do business the right way, and I am proud of it.
What happens if the CARS rejects a deal and the title is marked up? Can you get a new title and give the clunker back. Or have their been any cases of destroying engines are clunkers not accepted? Does the dealer have to put a new engine in the clunker?
Aren't the titles scanned and sent electonically? With todays high quality copiers a non ethical dealer could make a copy of the title and write on the copy to send and keep the original unmarked.
Seems like this would be a more likely situation of someone trying to "cheat" rather than peeling a sticker off!
No on both counts. This program leans towards the customer so much it is ridiculous. If the claim is denied we cannot try to recoup from the customer, The dealer is on the hook for every cent of it.
It seems not too bad to wait. I still drove the clunker until this evening, gave it to dealer and took the new one. The dealer didn't mention about scrap value and I didn't bother to ask for the scrap value either. I feel too cheap to ask for it.
$4500 for an almost stop working clunker + $1000 college graduate rebate + 0% tax (6% sales tax will be refunded) + 0% finance. I am also paying for the car only about 400 > invoice. That is enough for me to have a party ... Thank for C4C to put me the first time on a brand new car
C4C paperwork is far greater then both the bank and DMV paper work combined. It's not even close! Bank approvals are done online and there is one bank contract. We are also on line with DMV as where we issue and print vehicle registration. It takes all of 5 minutes. With C4C, there are numerous documents that need to be scanned and submitted via PDF. Keep in mind, all this paperwork and time is needed in ADDITION to normal business. That is the problem. Also, there is an issue with the submission system. It is inefficient and complicated. It also has a sever tendency to boot you out of the process and you have to start it all over again.
There is also to process of "killing" the cars as well. My tech's have to do it and we already have a super busy shop to begin with. They don't have enough time to do it and keep customers happy as well.
I have had a couple deals rejected and I have reviewed them, and I cannot figure out what happened. I have yet to be funded on one and we are highly considering not accepting any more C4C deals until we start to get reimbursed.
I can't comment on the 80% being rejected or the only 2% accepted as we aren't having that problem. We were having problems getting claims submitted like everyone else when the system first went live but things have been going ok now.
I mean seriously its basic deal discipline that you make sure everyone signs in the right place. Banks reject contracts for signing in the wrong place and DMVs reject registration paperwork.
Joel is the F&I guy he can back me up on this. Much of the paperwork the gov't wants is just slightly different version of paperwork we do for regular deals anyway. Yes there is a little more of it and yes there is too much duplication but its still really the same idea.
Get signatures in the right places. Make sure names and addresses match up. Make sure the title is clear and assigned/signed properly.
The paperwork that goes over the base MSRP and some of the other info on the new car is even similar to a lease worksheet that most leasing companies require.
Sure it is additional paperwork above and beyond a regular deal, and so additional work, but it is still the same idea.
I don't really do F&I but I do the paper work side of deliveries when I do off-site deliveries all the time. Joel would know more then me and can correct what I am missing.
I'm pretty sure I need Black Ops clearance to get that information. I might be able to get you some Kennedy autopsy photos though.
Was the 4WD there?
Yes. Like I said about 6 times, the list seems pretty random.
There are only two reasons you would do a CFC deal out of sate....
1) they have the exact vehicle you want at said dealer
2) You saw a "add" or someone gave you a low price on the phone for a said vehicle... and are trying to do C4C deal
If I was betting I would go with option 2...
GP
I have to say I get a kick out the idea that the govt is going to tell the owners of dealerships how to run their stores....
If you had $500k held up becuase of the nature of this program why wouldn't you hold up vehicle....
GP
Eh its not even a holding pattern as it is static. The only reason they are going to move this time of year it is to squeeze more cars into the line.
Gone was a 1987 Isuzu Tropper with 230K miles, no AC, and the heater cannot be turned on either. It has been used for daily commute until the last day.
In came a 2009 Honda Fit Sport.
The deal was made on July 27th, the C4C application was submitted on July 30, and we picked the car up on Aug 13.
Who's had deals pending longer than 10 days?
MODERATOR /ADMINISTRATOR
Find me at kirstie_h@edmunds.com - or send a private message by clicking on my name.
2015 Kia Soul, 2021 Subaru Forester (kirstie_h), 2024 GMC Sierra 1500 (mr. kirstie_h)
Review your vehicle
First of all, I do not blame dealers for trying to make money. Who don't want to make money? Just because one is paid salary and does not need to haggle over price to make a living does not make this person more ethical than others.
Dealers have markups on the stuff they sell and that is not evil; of course, I believe there are indeed some salespersons out there would cheat their customers in order to make more money, and that, is unethical. However, I've also read inquiries from customers who want to find loopholes to take advantage the program or to try to trick or cheat the dealers. And a person gets mad when he cannot get the price he wanted and easily labels the dealer greedy, yet he himself tries to scrouge as much as he can.
The bottom line is car salespersons are also human beings just like anyone else. There are ethical and unethical human beings in every discipline, so, people should not pretend they are better human beings. Just my 2 cents.
You must be new here. We, car salespeople, get abused on a regular basis on this forum.
Nice to see someone say we don't always deserve it.
Yes. Listen to this reason.....
Among several of the documents scanned and submitted, one of them is a "side by side" comparison from Fueleconomy.gov for the car being traded and the car being purchased. Now, I printed that page, scanned it and submitted it. I have had several rejections because they want us dealers to use the link on the cars.gov web site labeled "fuel economy" and print that page instead, which is the same thing!!!
The government refers everyone to fueleconomy.gov, and they are rejecting that screen shot as proof that the vehicle meets the standards set by the NHTSA. I have had to resubmit several transactions.....
It's nice to see that someone thinks us dealers are not all bad. There are definitely those out there that give our profession a bad name. Same can be said for every other profession out there. Us car people are just easier to trash I guess!
The first thing I noticed is that there were almost NO new cars left. Two weeks ago there had to be 60+ new cars. Today there were only a few big 2500 trucks, a big Jeep or two and not much else. Even the 300s which probably don't qualify for the C4C rebate were gone. Not even any vans. The program seems to be working.
The whole back lot was filled with clunkers with big "CC"written on them. There were the usual suspects, big Explorers, quite a few F-150s and a sprinkling of vans.
Most of the vehicles were from the late 80s to mid 90s.
I was surprised to see a few post 2000 vehicles in the line up. There was a 2000 Town & Country van (heavy rust) which looked like it was worth less than $4500 to be sure. However there were two Kia Sedona vans, a 2002 and a 2003, that must have been worth close to the rebate.
The biggest suprise of all was a 1985 Maserati Turbo. :confuse:
So tell us car guys, what's the strangest car that's come in under C4C?
2019 Kia Soul+, 2015 Mustang GT, 2013 Ford F-150, 2000 Chrysler Sebring convertible
Everyone I know in the new england area all have deals pending over 10 days.... getting kicked back with out explaination.... I am not a big fan right now...
I know plenty of dealers that are on the cusp of not writing anymore deals
GP
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2009/08/14/delozier.maserati.cash...
But as for how they present the cost (as monthly payment vs. over all price), that's just marketing psychology in play. I do not see that as too different from all the $*.99 price tags in super markets.
As for "doc fee" etc. I definitely do not like them. But have you ever been to a doctor's office for scratchy throat and was told to go home and rest, and that visit easily cost you or your insurance more than $100? Such practice is everywhere. Most salary based people (myself included) are bitter simply because they do not have a chance to put a price on everything they do.