Tuesday, May 08, 2012

Happy Open Recall Day! Be safe: Check your car for open recalls.

Carfax, a company that provides vehicle information so that you can make an informed decision when you're shopping for a used car, has designed today as Carfax Open Recall Day.  What they want to do is to bring awareness to the need to take care of any open recalls on your vehicles in the interest of safety.  They've even provided a way to do so via their website by entering your VIN on their Recall Check page to see if any recalls show for your car.

My results

A bit disappointing, when I entered my VIN, I was offered a Carfax report and directed to check with a Nissan dealership to ascertain whether I had any open recalls.  It left me wondering if this free service wasn't just a marketing ploy to sell more Carfax reports since none came up for me and having provided a VIN, I was expecting to see recalls specific to my car.  I have, in the past year or so, had my car at the dealership and had them check for any open recalls to verify that the seat issue and gas pedal issues that affected only a small percentage of my type of vehicle a few years ago were taken care of or didn't affect me.  I was expecting to see those old recall notices, but instead was referred to a Nissan dealer to check for recalls and given the opportunity to buy a Carfax report for my car.  Perhaps your experience will yield a different result. 

Check for open recalls without your VIN

The government will gladly let you check for open recalls on vehicles of your type for free, and they don't even ask for your VIN.  Go here to search for open recalls, though it's a bit more cumbersome to get through all the screens.  Use the search feature in the left-hand box and choose your year, make, and model from the drop down menus presented to you. 

At any rate, it's always a good idea to check for open recalls every now and then.  People move and those post cards may not make it to you.   Often, you'll hear about a recall on TV long before you are notified by your manufacturer.  Take a moment today and check for any open recalls that may affect the safety of your vehicle.

2 comments:

Erin said...

Checking for recalls is a life-saving idea! My friend was driving her truck recently and her breaks failed her on the fwy, turns out one of the mircochips that controls the breaks was recalled on her truck BEFORE she even bought it from a Nissian dealership a couple of years ago!! They are thinking that is what caused it! If it is, there will be quite a few dealerships in big doo-doo I'm sure for NOT fixing it before they sold it to her!! Luckly she, nor her daughter in the truck were hurt, as they were just merging onto the fwy, so were only going like 30 something miles an hours.... BUT STILL, it should not have happened and the part should have been fixed if it had been recalled so long ago before she even bought it! SO CHECK FOR RECALLS EVERYONE!!! IT COULD SAVE YOUR LIFE!!! :) Thanks for posting this!!! OH, by the way, I found you through the SITS #springfling!!! :)

Pinching Abe said...

So glad this had a good outcome! I had a recall once on my Chevy that I found out about late because I'd moved and it had been past the Forward Order and my car was paid off, so they didn't have a way to find me very easily, but I figure they must have found me when I registered my car in my new state.