The secret’s out: Bethesda resident Danuta Wilson told Maryland car owners Wednesday that come this October, auto manufacturers will be required to inform customers when they extend warranties to cover car defects that occur after written warranties have expired.
Wilson’s car broke down in 2005, and her dealer told her she had probably caused the problem by using the wrong kind of gas. Stuck with a more than $900 repair bill, Wilson did some research and discovered she wasn’t alone — many owners of similar cars were experiencing the same problem and getting stuck with the bill.
“The manufacturer told me it was an isolated problem, but my Internet research said the failure rate for similar years in this model was 94 percent,” Wilson said. She later learned that unbeknownst to her, the automaker had issued a secret warranty that should have covered the repairs.
Wilson contacted her state representative, Del. Bill Bronrott, and he sponsored the Secret Warranties Disclosure Act, which the Maryland General Assembly approved this year.
“This will help ensure that all consumers in similar situations will be directly contacted each and every time by the car manufacturer,” Bronrott said. “They will have to send a hard-copy letter to a vehicle owner to make them fully aware of a warranty change.” Maryland Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler backed the measure after seeing trends in car defects in his consumer complaints office. Gansler said secret warranties are a multimillion-dollar issue in Maryland and a billion-dollar issue nationally.
“The consumer has no idea they’re dealing with a manufacturing defect, so they’ll take the car to an independent repair place that will also not realize it’s a manufacturing defect, and then the consumer is stuck with the bill,” Gansler said.
Maryland is the fifth state to require manufacturers to notify vehicle owners directly about policy adjustments. Similar laws are already in place in Virginia, Wisconsin, California and Connecticut.
