MSE News: Was your car affected by the VW emissions scandal? You could claim £1,000s

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Drivers left fuming after buying a VW car that pumped out more pollution than advertised could pocket £1,000s in compo...

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'Was your car affected by the VW emissions scandal? You could claim £1,000s by joining group lawsuit'

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BeenThroughItAll

Oh dear, more encouragement for the compo-crew.

Nasqueron

In other words, pretend you bought your car purely for environmental reasons* and specifically because of the NO2 emissions even though these aren't part of the UK sales process and aren't given by the car companies routinely as part of their advertising process.

*Even though if that was the primary reason you bought the car you would have gone for a hybrid, electric or similar

Johnmcl7

This is a really badly written article and I'm surprised it's from MSE, I don't know the background to it but it comes across as an advert for that law company with no proper background information or explanation.

It meant consumers were paying extra for VW diesel vehicles (also including Audi, Seat and Skoda brands, part of the VW group) that they believed were more environmentally friendly, but in fact the NOx emissions (a combination of pollutants nitrogen oxide and nitrogen dioxide) produced by the cars in question were far higher than the company stated.

This makes absolutely no sense at all to single out VW, most cars through some method or other are doing this as well and in some cases far worse than VW:

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/apr/21/all-top-selling-cars-break-emissions-limits-in-real-world-tests

A Department for Transport (DfT) study of cars made by manufacturers such as Ford, Renault and Vauxhall found there was a vast difference in nitrogen oxide emissions measured in the laboratory and under normal driving conditions.

In terms of affected resale value, I've yet to see any VW or siblings have a big drop in value although if there are VW's with a £3,000 drop or more in value I'd be interested to see that particularly for Superb estates. Also I don't recall any successful actions against other manufacturers for devaluing their brand, Toyota's errors caused several fatalities a few years ago which I didn't think was healthy for the brand but aside from it not affecting their resale value (I've even seen people 'disgusted' by VW wanting to buy a Toyota, short memories I guess) no-one was suing them at the time.

The situation is radically different in the US and the article should clarify this instead of using that to make it look more favourable here. The US have far tougher limits on Nitrous Oxide emissions which means the cars must have a Select Catalyst Reduction system (such as Adblue) to pass the strict laws. VW fitted the cheat device so their US cars could pass the tight US emissions without the SCR system their rivals needed. This meant the VW cars have been running above the limits while their rivals haven't and also they can't easily fix the affected cars, hence the large payouts in the US.

The EU situation is different because NOX limits for the EU5 cars (the ones affected by this) are much higher than in the US as the EU has traditionally focused more on CO2 and mpg, the EU cars can pass the rules without an SCR system and crucially most EU rival cars are well over the tested limit and some far more than the affected VW's as well.

Stoke

Hilarious.

wakeupalarm

What about all the extra pollution caused by these cars? Shouldn't a claim be made by the Government to recover the lost higher road tax?

smitchy73

wakeupalarm wrote: »

What about all the extra pollution caused by these cars? Shouldn't a claim be made by the Government to recover the lost higher road tax?

You would think so.

dannyrst

Problem with no win no fee is that people have nothing to lose by going for it.

Johno100

wakeupalarm wrote: »

What about all the extra pollution caused by these cars? Shouldn't a claim be made by the Government to recover the lost higher road tax?

Road Tax (VED) is based purely on CO2 levels, this is all about NOX and the other pollutants. But I'm sure if the government either directly or via the EU could shake down VAG for some dosh then they surely will.

mjm3346

Fair enough, if they can pass a "lifestyle" test that shows the owner was "green" at the time of purchase and since - as in always recycles, every appliance they have is top rated for energy efficiency, insulation measures (double glazing, loft, cavity walls etc) are the best available, they try to use public transport or walk whenever possible - that would be a start in convincing that "actual" emissions were the main reason for purchase.

mattytun

I've got a "2.0 Skoda Yeti 2016 Model", and it went into the local Skoda garage last month to get a fix or whatever they do.

Got a letter first from Skoda.