GM trying to get out of warranties, your thoughts

While everybody squabbles over which President or polical party is at fault the truth is that clowns on both sides are responsible for every mess that exists today.
The things they’re arguing and finger-pointing about are the same things they were arguing and finger-pointing about 10 years, ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago, ad nauseum.

Odds are GM will win this although I don’t agree with it. If you take over a company it seems to me that you have to accept the liabilities along with the assets.
It wasn’t too many years ago that Chrysler was offering a full lifetime warranty on all of their vehicles. My comment at the time was that this policy won’t last long. Note it’s disappeared into the pages of history.

If you’re against using tax dollars to ‘bail out private industry’, are you also against parents helping out their children that have lost their jobs and need to move back home, and all aspects of the welfare system?

History has proven (twice now with Chrysler) that each time the government has done this, it has MADE money from the deal. The banking industry, admittedly a different story…

OK, back to the OP’s post:

First, a “defect” implies some sort of saftey issue - and what the lawsuit is about is rapid tire wear.

I think GM is being unfairly singled out here. The problem - excessive camber - exists in many cars, both foreign and domestic - and I don’t hear much about those. Are there lawsuits about those vehicles? Probably, but they aren’t making the press.

I think this is more about lawyers making money. The lawyers saw an easy opportunity to cash in on a situation. “Easy opportunity” because GM fixed the poilce cars, so it would be hard to argue that they couldn’t fix the others. They probably fixed the poilce cars to assure future sales.

Now, I’m not saying GM is totally blameless, but there are other car manufacturers who have similar situations and you just don’t hear about it in the news. I’m sure the plaintiffs lawyers planted this news item to help their case.

But the GM lawyers - being lawyers - are going to provide any argument that might work. The lawyers never know what argument will be successful, so they try them all. In the end there will be a negotiated settlement - there always is - and the lawyers will make a ton of money, GM will will have to pay a bunch pf money, but the poor suckers …er owners will not get much out of this. It’s sad, but true.

I think GM is being unfairly singled out here. The problem - excessive camber - exists in many cars, both foreign and domestic - and I don’t hear much about those. Are there lawsuits about those vehicles? Probably, but they aren’t making the press.

The reason there’s a lawsuit is because GM is refusing to honor the warranty to fix them…saying it was on cars built before the warranty. Other manufacturers may have the same problem, but other manufacturers ARE HONORING the warranty…thus the difference.

While everybody squabbles over which President or polical party is at fault the truth is that clowns on both sides are responsible for every mess that exists today.

No, the voters are responsible. We keep putting those, as you correctly put it, clowns in office. We never demand better. It’s easier to complain after the fact than to think before it.

"MikeInNH August 22 Report

I don’t think MB is dismissing Bush…I agree Bush left us with a MESS. Started with a 400 billion dollar surplus and ended with a 1.2 Trillion dollar defecate. "


Freudian slip?

I don’t care… I’m still laughing my tail off… “defecate”… Thanks, Mike! :slight_smile:

MikeInNH 9:56AM Report

The reason there’s a lawsuit is because GM is refusing to honor the warranty to fix them…saying it was on cars built before the warranty. Other manufacturers may have the same problem, but other manufacturers ARE HONORING the warranty…thus the difference.


I don’t believe that Mazda is helping out owners of the first few years of Mazda5s, when they were wearing through tires too fast… A coworker owns a BMW that has the same problem, but they aren’t helping him, either…

Well, the reason why Gm doesn’t want to pay for these cars is obvious:

Having to acknowledge that the cars are defective, and having to send noticed to several hundred thousand owners of these vehicles will be a publicity nightmare in the face of their new claims of how great they are at building well designed and built cars.

Are they going about this wrong?
They certainly are, in my opinion.

It would be better for them to have a silent TSB/Recall that whenever a client with an effected car shows up, complaining about tire wear, they replace the faulty parts free of charge, and make a customer very happy. So happy, their first stop when they need a new car might be right back to that same dealer.

Instead, “New GM” is functioning exactly the same way that “Old GM” would have.
So, for them to say “We’re not ‘Old GM’, and you can’t sue us for something that ‘Old GM’ built badly”, but yet keep acting exactly like “Old GM” did kind of casts a very bad light on them.

As for the whole political nonsense, Obama didn’t create this mess, GM did.
GM then took advantage of the economic situation that was unfolding when they saw that the US Gov’t was handing out free money to the Banks hand over fist with no strings attached, whatsoever. They thought they could get free money hand over fist just like the banks did, but they didn’t get their hand in the coffers while Bush was still in office, and the till was wide open for the taking, just like the Banks did.

Obama at least had the strength of character to put in some form of requirements on the deal.

I would say that the only reason why GM got a deal at all is because of the link between the Democratic Party, and Labor Unions. That would be the very same reason why Bush didn’t allow the deal to go through on his watch, since the Republican party would rather watch Labor Unions members lose all their jobs and power than help them in any single way.

That would also explain why the Banks got free money from the Gov’t without any strings attached, and only slaps on the wrist when bank execs were getting huge bonus’, and massive golden parachutes, walking away very jolly, even richer men after destroying the financial system.

Neither here nor there, but that’s my view on the whole mess.
I don’t hold anything against Bush or Obama for the GM bailout.

Odd though, that when I bought a new car earlier this year, it was a Mazda.
Or maybe that’s not really that odd, when you think about it closely enough.

BC.

I don’t care… I’m still laughing my tail off… “defecate”… Thanks, Mike! :slight_smile:

Yea that is funny…Good one…I didn’t catch it…Damm spell checker…

Mike

Spell check will not show you that you have made a spelling error if the word in question is an actual word, like “defecate”. Using a real word inappropriately is not something that software currently in use will flag. Well…at least no software with which I am familiar will do this.

Incidentally, I was thinking of commenting on that…interesting…substitution of words well before eraser did so. However, if I did it, I would have been accused of “being on spelling patrol again”. As a result, I resisted the urge to comment.

I know exactly how spell checker works…I actually wrote one years ago.

But what it will do is if you spell it wrong…then when you right mouse click it shows you a list a correctly spelled words to pick from…In this case there was only one word…and without thinking I just clicked on it…

Every election it’s the same thing; vote for the lesser of 2 evils with that being a subjective opinion.
Not one year has spending ever gone down or remained constant. Through Bush and Obama both gov. spending has skyrocketed and as far as I know Congress, in spite of the sniping, has never failed to not a appove what’s thrown in front of them.
Republicans borrow against the future and Democrats tax now but the end result is the same.

As far as I know the government has never made money on any bailouts except theoretically. GM and Chrysler both should have been allowed to sink IMO. Corporate mismangement and UAW strong arm tactics is what put them in the position they’re in.
Some careful reading about the GM bailout will show it was not a matter of “we borrowed a dollar so here’s a dollar and interest back”.

Same thing with the airlines. They should have been left to flounder. The strong will survive and the weak will be acquired and service will continue on.

The now closed GM plant in Oklahoma City is a prime example of the back room, tax incentive and tax skirting game playing that goes on with the end result being that nothing in the big picture really changed at all.

Oblivion, I’m sorry to hear that you equate helping one’s kids out when they have a financial setback with the welfare system. I help my kids out of love, not mandate, and I use my own money to do it, not other people’s money.

It also saddens me that you equate using tax dollars to bail out a muti billion dollar global business with welfare for needy people who need the help to feed their families. There are people out there who truely are needy through no fault of their own. I don’t consider General Motors to be one of them.

No, I am not against all welfare. But equating GM with needy people, especially one’s children, is rediculous. The statement is simply “baiting”.

I’ll be there for my kids as long as I’m on this earth. GM should be on their own.

Two different companies . Old GM and New GM .
The point of bankruptcy is a fresh start .

I don’t consider General Motors to be one of them.

MB…Didn’t you hear Mitt Romney…Corporations ARE people.

“But what it will do is if you spell it wrong…then when you right mouse click it shows you a list a correctly spelled words to pick from…In this case there was only one word…and without thinking I just clicked on it.”

But, that is the point, Mike.
You spelled defecate correctly.

It was your use of a real word in a non-valid usage that was the problem, and just as spell-check will not flag the use of “loose” in place of “lose”, or “effect” in place of “affect”, or any of scores of currently flagrant misusages, it did not flag your use of the word, defecate.

And, if we were in a forum devoted to bodily functions, you might have used it correctly!
;-))

Edited to add:
You are correct about good old Mitt Romney.
Yup! Just a week or so ago, he reminded someone in an audience that “corporations are people”. That should give us some clues as to how he would distribute government money if he was to be elected POTUS.

Grammar Check
The correctly spelled verb was used incorrectly as a noun.
CSA

Both GM and Chrysler had to pledge to the US and Canadian governments who bailed them out that they would honor all warranties on those new cars bought before the reorganizations. Where I live this is happening. On the other hand, lawsuites about alledged defects are not covered by this agreement.

When GM bought the assets of bankrupt Daewoo, any warranty claims by Daewoo owners or requests for parts were declined. That’s one reason these pledges were requested.

Genex, there are basically two types of bankruptcy, chapter 11 and chapter 7. Chapter 11, which requires that major creditors agree to accept some reduced value on the dollar before the court will approve it, allows a “fresh start” with a reduced debt load. Chapter 11 is liquidation, wherein the corporation ceases to exist and its assets are liquidated (auctioned or otherwise sold off). A chapter 11 bankruptcy does not relieve a company of its warranty obligations. Another corporation acquiring a company in chapter 11 is not relieved of the company’s warranty obligations. A company purchasing the assets of a liquidating company does is not obligated to honor the defunct company’s warranty obligations. Therein lies the difference between the GM warranty and those of liquidated companies.

Mike, I did hear Mitt Romney. If GM were a “people” it would be in prison for fraud, just for claiming publically that they’ve paid us back.

Sorry I didn’t check back earlier, that whole work thing got in the way.

“New GM’s warranty obligations for vehicles sold by Old GM are limited to the express terms and conditions in the Old GM written warranties on a going-forward basis,” wrote Benjamin Jeffers, a lawyer for GM. “New GM did not assume responsibility for Old GM’s design choices, conduct, or alleged breaches of liability under the warranty.”

If they can get out of this by saying it’s a “design choice” and not a defect, then they can get out of most if not all warranties with the same reasoning. There is a fix for the problem and the New GM used that fix on police cars of the same model years.

If this was Old GM we would expect a recall and a fix at no charge. It was heavily implied that New GM would take care of the cars built under Old GM. Legally, they might not have to fix the cars, but if they don’t it’s going to come back and bite them, once people realized they can’t trust New GM to take care of the Old GM cars, why buy from New GM at all?