New car retail industry on notice: ACCC releases final report

Australian car dealers and importers will need to upgrade their consumer law compliance to avoid ACCC investigations particularly in the areas of consumer warranty rights; vehicle emission claims and access for independent repairers to vehicle software and technical data.

Having sounded the warning bells in its draft report in August and continued to ramp up its enforcement actions within the retail vehicle sector, the ACCC's final recommendations from its new vehicle retailing industry market study clearly identify both Australian Consumer Law and competition law compliance deficiencies that are likely to form the basis of future enforcement actions, in particular against manufacturers, unless changes are made to what are currently standard industry practices.