Buyers will be offered the choice of a debit card or an extended warranty.
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GM said most of the debit cards would be worth $450 to $900 for owners of 2016 SUVs that overstated fuel efficiency by 1-2 miles per gallon.
Another 30,000 to 35,000 of the crossovers were sold to fleet customers.
General Motors will offer compensation after three models of SUVs were sold with overstated mpg.
The expansion will better position GM to compete with services such as Zipcar as more people move into crowded cities, which could eventually weigh on demand for new vehicles.
“We want all of our customers to have a great ownership experience, so we designed this reimbursement program to provide full and fair compensation in a simple, flexible and timely manner”, a GM spokesman said in a statement.
If you are an owner of the latest GMC Acadia, Chevrolet Traverse or the Buick Enclave, be prepared to write down your bank account number because you are about to get paid by General Motors.
The plaintiff of the lawsuit alleges GM purposefully hid the actual fuel economy, but GM categorized this issue as an “inadvertent mistake” caused by new “emissions-related hardware” required for emissions testing on new vehicles. The EPA makes similar assumptions with fuel-economy window labels, GM said.
GM said Wednesday that some pollution-control hardware was changed for the 2016 model year, which resulted in a recalculation of the EPA ratings.
Last week, GM halted sales of its entire inventory of the SUVs – almost 60,000 – because the vehicles had incorrect Environmental Protection Agency window stickers that overstated fuel economy. The reimbursement also factors in the EPA formula that assumes a fuel price of $3 per gallon and 15,000 miles of annual driving for five years.
The company wouldn’t reveal the total cost of the payments and warranties but said it will not materially affect GM’s earnings.
GM engineers discovered the error while working on labels for the new 2017 Acadia.
The GM SUV fuel economy problems occurred near the same time the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) sent GM a letter informing the automaker it will be watched closely for another year.
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GM said the correct fuel economy information is as follows: 18 mpg combined city/highway for front-wheel drive SUVs, or 15 mpg in the city and 22 mpg highway; all-wheel drive models have a combined city/high rating of 17 mpg, and 15 mpg city and 22 mpg highway.
