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Louisiana Flooding
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Houston in Top 3 Auto Insurance Fraud Cities
Sub-water: Flooded Cars Overwhelming
by Amy Davis, KPRC-TV, Reporter/ Consumer
by Ken Stickney, The Daily Advertiser
The destruction of some 100,000 vehicles—maybe more—due to recent flooding may have left the southern Louisiana automobile market out of balance. Bob Giles, owner and operator of Giles Automotive in Lafayette, said on September 6 that area auto dealer business is brisk, but many customers who lost their vehicles to high water in the unnamed August 11–13 storm have no trade-in vehicles to offer when making their purchases, leaving some dealers short of available prod-
Credit: Scott Clause/The Advertiser
ucts in their used car lots. That situation may affect auto dealers far beyond Louisiana, he said. “It’s tough to get pre-owned veSee Overwhelming Flood, Page 13
Honda ProFirst Certification Reaches 700 Shops by Ed Attanasio
Gary Ledoux is pleased to see that 700 body shops are now members of American Honda’s ProFirst certification program, but he also knows that there is still much work to do to reach the goal of 1,200 shops
we heard from roughly 100 shops right away, asking ‘How can we join, and what do we need to do?’ We got a lot of the top shops in the country onboard quickly because they were already doing all of the things required by the program.” A lot of collision repairers were skeptical about the value of OE certifications in general, but pretty soon they changed their minds, Ledoux said. “Initially, not everyone thought that certifications were going to be around very
See Honda Certifies 700 Shops, Page 25
Change Service Requested
P.O. BOX 1516, CARLSBAD, CA 92018
When body shop number 700 recently became a member of American Honda’s ProFirst certification program, assistant national manager of Collision Parts and Service Marketing Gary Ledoux took a deep breath, knowing full well that there is still much work to do. To Ledoux, the ultimate goal of getting 1,200 shops in the program within the next 18 months seems very reachable. “When we first launched this program in April of 2015,
VOL. 34 ISSUE 10 OCTOBER 2016
L.A., New York and Houston—you might think we’re hanging with the cool crowd when you hear we all made the top three in a recent study, until you hear it was for cities with the most auto insurance fraud. “We knew that this was a problem in Houston,” Fred Lohman, with the National Insurance Crime Bureau, said. Lohman said the fraud in our area begins at the scene of car accidents with the tow. “The goal is to get the car to the shop,” he said.
Not just any body shop. KPRC Channel 2 News found tow truck drivers steering accident victims’ vehicles to body shops of the wrecker driver’s choice, not the customer’s. “Did you tell the tow truck driver where you wanted him to take your car?” Davis asked Doris Babineau, who was involved in a car accident. “No, he volunteered,” she answered, talking about the tow truck driver who drove up on the scene. “’I’m gonna take it to a good place, and we’ll be sure (to) guarantee that your car will be fixed,’” she said he told her. KPRC 2 News discovered that the See Insurance Fraud, Page 14
Truck Carrying Takata Air Bags Explodes, Burns Houses, Kills Texas Woman
a nearby home, killing 69-year-old Lucida Robles. It also burned 10 A truck carrying Takata air bag infla- other houses and injured a driver and tors and propellants exploded in South passenger in a passing vehicle. Texas last week, killing one person, News 4 San Antonio said the the company said on August 29. explosion was not caused by a collision with another vehicle, suggesting it was caused by a problem in the truck, its trailer or the cargo. Takata has a warehouse in Eagle Pass that stocks inflators manufactured across the border at a plant in Monclava. Takata said it sent personnel to the site to help investigate the incident. File photo of a Takata airbag that exploded in a vehicle The Takata recall is the in South Carolina largest in the history of the The inflators and propellants auto industry. Prolonged exposure of are at the center of a global recall in- the inflators to hot conditions can volving exploding airbags. The de- cause airbags to explode, spraying fective bags have killed at least 14 shrapnel into the passenger compartpeople in the U.S. ment. The truck in last week’s inciMore than 100 million vehicles dent, operated by a subcontractor, worldwide with Takata inflators are was bound for a Takata warehouse being recalled. in Eagle Pass when the accident occurred. We thank the Dallas Morning The ensuing explosion destroyed News for reprint permission. by Terry Box, Dallas Morning News
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