For years, laws have been put into place to discourage distracted driving: no texting while driving, no talking on the phone while driving, the list goes on. General Motors is taking things a step further by commissioning a vehicle that detects and alerts drivers to their distracted behavior. [More]
general motors
GM Ignition Switch Compensation Fund Received Claims For 107 Deaths In Less Than A Month
By 8.27.14
Less than a month after General Motors’ victim compensation plan began accepting claims, the company has received notice of 107 deaths possibly related to its ongoing ignition switch defect. That figure far surpasses the 13 deaths the company previously acknowledged and the 74 deaths one report found could be tied to the defect. [More]
Latest Federal Probe Into GM’s Delayed Ignition Switch Recall Centers On Company’s Legal Department
By 8.22.14
We know, we know: Broken record here, but the legal woes for General Motors are far from over and new probes are announced every day. Now federal prosecutors are looking into whether the car manufacturer’s legal department concealed evidence that could have led to an earlier recall of vehicles with faulty ignition switches that ultimately led to at least 13 deaths. [More]
Woman Sues GM Over Claims That Car’s Seat Heater Left Her With Third-Degree Burn
By 8.18.14
A 26-year-old Maine woman is suing General Motors after she claims a seat heater in one of its vehicles burned her so badly that she had to get a skin graft and was bedridden for months while she healed. [More]
GM Recalls 269,001 Saturns, Chevrolets, Cadillacs, Buicks, And Pontiacs
By 8.8.14
Well, it’s the end of business on a Friday afternoon, so that means it must be time for another General Motors recall! As part of their apparent effort to recall every GM vehicle on the roads at least once, this afternoon the company announced the recall of 202,115 cars from current brands Buick, Cadillac, and Chevrolet, and from defunct brands Saturn and Pontiac. [More]
Feds Subpoena GM Over Subprime Auto Loans
By 8.4.14
After recalling more than 30 million cars and facing a number of investigations, it’s probably safe to bet that General Motors Company would like to put 2014 in the rearview mirror. Before that’s possible the company will have to get through five more months and a new federal investigation into its financing unit regarding subprime auto loans. [More]
Rental Car Companies Asked GM To Look Into Ignition-Related Crashes Years Before Recall
By 7.31.14
It’s becoming harder and harder for GM execs to claim that the company was largely unaware of the problems with the Chevy Cobalt and other vehicles with an ignition problem that has resulted in at least 13 deaths, dozens of accidents and the long-delayed recall of millions of cars. A new report shows that car rental companies have been telling GM to look into the issue since at least 2005. [More]
Notice Shows GM Knew About Bolt Issue In Camaro, Other Vehicles A Year Before Announcing Recall
By 7.29.14
The latest woe for General Motors may sound a bit familiar. It appears the car manufacturer knew of a potential safety problem — in which a loose bolt could cause loss of the driver’s seat function — before affected vehicles ever hit the market, but didn’t take action until issuing a recall earlier this month. [More]
Former GM CEO Thinks Congress Would Have Gone Easier On Him Over Ignition Recalls
By 7.28.14
In the short time that she’s been CEO of General Motors, Mary Barra has repeatedly been called before federal lawmakers and investigators to answer for the car company’s record-shattering recalls, including the ignition-related problems that went ignored for more than a decade. But her predecessor at the GM CEO gig says he probably wouldn’t have received such tough interrogations from Congress. [More]
GM Orders Dealers To Stop Selling Used Cadillac CTS And SRX Vehicles Because Of Ignition Switch Issue
By 7.21.14
If you’re in the market for a used Cadillac, you might be out of luck. General Motors ordered its Cadillac division dealers to stop selling a number of older version models because of the ongoing ignition switch recall. [More]
GM Admits Some Employees “Didn’t Do Their Jobs” Handling Ignition-Switch Defect
By 7.16.14
GM executives will be back in the hot seat on Capitol Hill tomorrow. This time, they’ll be getting a grilling from the Senate Commerce Committee about the ignition switch defect that killed at least 13 people and the decade it took to publicly identify the problem and issue a recall. [More]
Last Chance To Send In Questions For GM CEO Mary Barra
July 11, 2014
Earlier this week, we told you that our colleagues at Consumer Reports were going to feature General Motors CEO Mary Barra in the magazine’s first Ask the CEO column. They are still accepting questions for Ms. Barra through today at asktheceo@cr.consumer.org, so get yours in ASAP before this opportunity shuts off like the ignition on a 2003 Chevy Cobalt. [More]
GM Hasn’t Recalled Millions Of Trucks And SUVs Despite Four-Year Investigation Into Brake Line Failures
By 7.8.14
Although General Motors appears to a be on a safety recall-announcing spree, it has resisted recalling 1.8 million trucks and SUVs despite a four-year long investigation by federal regulators into an issue that can cause the brake lines to fail. While brake failures could lead to crashes –which one would assume is a safety issue – the manufacturer maintains the problem is a simply matter of routine maintenace [More]
Explosion At General Motors Plant Leaves One Dead, Eight Injured
By 7.2.14
General Motors received more bad news on Tuesday evening: A chemical explosion at the company’s metal-stamping plant near Fort Wayne, IN, left one person dead and eight others injured. [More]
GM Has Officially Recalled More Vehicles In 2014 Than It Has Sold In The Last 7 Years
By 6.30.14
Pretty soon there won’t be any General Motors vehicles left on the roadways that haven’t been part of a 2014 recall. On Monday, the company announced the recall of 7.6 million vehicles in the United States – 8.4 million worldwide– most of them for the same inadvertent ignition key rotation that has been linked to at least three fatalities. [More]
GM Compensation Plan Could Pay Ignition Defect Victims $20,000 To Several Millions
By 6.30.14
How can you put a price on price on a life cut short? It’s not exactly an easy question and there really is no right answer. But General Motors’ compensation plan attempts to do so, starting the process at no less than $1 million when it comes to those who died in accidents caused by a defective ignition switch found in thousands of vehicles. [More]
Docs Show Current GM VP Aware Of Ignition Problem In 2005; Federal Grand Jury Probing Recall Delay
By 6.26.14
General Motors’ internal investigation claims that no top executives at the car company were aware of the defective ignition switch that has resulted in at least 13 deaths (and likely many more) and the recall of nearly millions of vehicles. But newly released documents from the Congressional investigation into the debacle indicate that one current GM Vice-President was made aware of the problem as early as 2005. [More]
