The German automaker will offer a $500 Visa debitcard, which can be spent on anything, and a $500 dealership credit to owners of 482,000 diesel cars embroiled in the emissions scandal.
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A global recall of 1.6- and 2.0-litre diesel engines tied to the emissions scandal, which broke after the US EPA found software had been coded to recognise if they were being emissions-tested and run in a special low-emission mode, has scooped up nearly 100,000 Australian customers since news of the software cheat codes broke.
Volkswagen Group of America’s financial offering comprises a $US500 ($A710) pre-paid Visa credit card, a “store credit” to the same value and an additional three years of free roadside assistance.
On September 22, the company admitted to installing cheating-emissions devices on their Audi and Volkswagen diesel vehicles since 2009 and apologized for the fraudulent act that will result to the largest recall in its history by January 2016.
“We are working tirelessly to develop an approved remedy for affected vehicles, ” Michael Horn, VW’s U.S. chief executive, said in a statement.
“Locally we haven’t announced a program as Volkswagen AG is putting together a package of measures for each market created to achieve high customer satisfaction”.
The company programmed vehicles to trick emissions testers into believing its diesel cars released a much lower volume of nitrogen oxide than they actually do.
Volkswagen owners can go to vwdieselinfo.com, and Audi owners can visit audiusa.com/about/diesel-information.
Can owners use the dealer gift card to get their emissions systems repaired? They will also have to take their auto to a dealer to activate the gift cards to prove that they own the vehicle.
The gesture will cost Volkswagen almost $250 million – a fraction of what the automaker has warned investors the scandal will costs.
Volkswagen is working to earn back customer loyalty. Richard Blumenthal of CT and Edward Markey of MA on Monday decried VW’s consumer program as “insultingly inadequate” and “a fig leaf attempting to hide the true depths of Volkswagen’s deception”.
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Steve Kalafer, chairman of the Flemington vehicle and Truck Country dealerships in Flemington, N.J., said Volkswagen’s offer is a welcome first step after a long silence between the automaker, its customers, and its USA retailers. The EPA’s director of the Office of Transportation and Air Quality, Christopher Grundler, told the Times that, “Manufacturers have asked us what the test conditions would be, and we’ve told them that they don’t have a need to know….”
