In what can be declared as a “Good News!” moment and win for
common sense, “major U.S. car rental companies have agreed to support
legislation banning the renting of recalled vehicles.”
Most Americans may not realize that, while dealerships are
barred from selling/reselling vehicles that have been recalled, rental car
companies are still allowed to rent such recalled vehicles without fixing them.
This had tragic consequences when the rental company Enterprise rented a
recalled Chrysler PT Cruiser to Raechel and Jacqueline Houck who were killed
when the car began leaking steering fluid, caught on fire and crashed into
oncoming traffic. The PT Cruiser had been recalled for issues with the steering
column but had not been fixed by Enterprise.
The rental car bill is named the Raechel and Jacqueline
Houck Safe Rental Car Act of 2012, after the girls.
"We
couldn't bring my daughters back so we had to go forward and we had to look at
stopping this unsafe and disastrous process," Kelly Houck, mother of the
girls, said.
Enterprise is one of the major car companies that is now
supporting the legislation to ban car companies for renting recalled vehicles.
Other car companies include Hertz, Avis Budget, and Dollar Thrifty.
“I had no idea rental car companies could rent you a
recalled car,” said Andrew Miller of Puyallup, a frequent business traveler.
“That’s really scary. That’s really scary that they could do that and customers
really would have no idea that they are driving a potentially unsafe car. At
least if you own the car, you get notified of the defect. If you’re just
renting the car, you don’t know there’s a problem and you are still behind the
wheel. This legislation should have happened sooner, if you ask me.”
One of the sponsors of the bill, Senator Barbara Boxer of
California, said car companies would implement the necessary policies before
the bill was actually passed, which should happen during the lame-duck session
after the presidential election.
According to one article, “The new Senate bill would require
that rental companies ground a recalled vehicle no later than 24 hours after
the rental company gets the recall notice. Rental companies will have up to 48
hours for recall that include more than 5,000 vehicles in their fleet.”
David
Strickland, administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration, said in a statement that the agreement was "a major win
for safety on our roadways and in our communities."
Burien Toyota commends these rental car companies and legislators for
doing the right thing and encourage everyone else to follow suit and endorse
this legislation.
Understanding A Rental Agreement
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