How Lemon Law Cases are Handled

When the investigation is absolutely finished, the lawyer will confront the manufacturer of the car, present a very thorough statement about your case and then demand a full recovery for you. If the manufacturer agrees with your position, and you are satisfied with the offer, the case can generally be resolved very quickly.

It is entirely your own choice whether or not to accept or reject any offer. If you choose not to accept the offers made, the case next moves on to litigation which happens by your lawyers filing a lawsuit on your behalf in court.

No matter what you may think, it is not your word against the dealers either. Though this is what the manufacturers want you to feel, it just isn’t the case. Lawyers have the means to get all documents, repair records, service bulletins and names of witnesses to prove your case in court.

Good lawyers frequently take advantage of the services of Master ASE certified mechanics and appraisers who are can act as an impartial aid in understanding the nature of the non-conformities. If it's necessary, the things that they find are then used in the testimony at trial to prove your case in the event it cannot be settled.

Lawyers use a large number of tools to prove your claim, so it is never your word against theirs. In this sense at least, you should feel at ease. You might be wondering how you can win a case when the repair records given to you by the dealer say the problem was never found. Well good lawyers are ready for this too.

Manipulation and/or poor preparation of repair records is one of the biggest concerns in lemon law cases. What most people don’t know is that when a car is taken to a dealer for a warranty repair, several copies of the repair order are made within the service department, most of these the customer will never see, even if you ask.

Each repair that is performed contains the following copies: customer; warranty payment; accounting and even a hard copy that shows all of the mechanics notes that were made for each repair. Most of the time these notes are not available to the customer; however, the customer copy will list a problem that is the most often complained about but the dealer’s actions might read “could not duplicate customer concerns.”

For that matter, it’s not entirely common for the hard copy to show you that the mechanic found the problem but has also been instructed not to try to do any repairs because no simple procedure can actually fix it.

When this happens, you, the customer get left with the wrong idea that the car is operating properly and will unknowingly drive it anyway; with a potentially dangerous defect.

You may be wondering why this happens so often. Well, it could be that a certain make or model in specific may suffer from a uniform problem such as a defective door latch which the manufacturer still hasn’t corrected.

Since there isn’t a factory authorized repair that was completed at the time, the dealer is told to either write “could not duplicate” or maybe “vehicle operating as designed” and the next thing you know the dealer sends you home with repairs still needed, but not performed.

Another reason that always seems to pop up is time. This is particularly the dealer’s time. Many dealers simply don’t have the resources or the mechanics that they need to properly diagnose and address a concern.

Other times, the manufacturer may limit the amount of time used to diagnose the cars for repairs and in many other cases, the dealer has to use unskilled mechanics who lack the knowledge to perform their function in an effective manner.

The bottom line here is that while repair records are always helpful to a case, they are not the only thing that will determine the outcome. If you feel you are not getting what you paid for in regards to your car's quality and reliability, then no amount of misrepresentations on a repair invoice should convince you of anything else.

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▫ What is a lemon vehicle? ▫ How to recognize a lemon car? ▫ Do I have a lemon? ▫ Car VIN number revealed ▫ What about Motor Homes and Motorcycles? ▫ The lemon law complaint process ▫ Is a Used or Leased Car protected? ▫ Lemon car manufacturers responsibilities ▫ Do I need a lawyer? ▫ How lemon law cases are handled? ▫ Who pay the lawyer? ▫ What should I do if I have a lemon? ▫ When can I take action? ▫ State by State Lemon Law Summaries ▫ Tips to Protect your inverstment! ▫ How to pick a lawyer or attorneys