Cars are going fast, but…

Nov 16, 2010 Editorial

There is the danger of Guyana having more cars than roads. The last three series—PLL, PMM, and now PNN—tell a story of people buying cars like bicycles. For example, less than a month after the new PNN series came into effect, four hundred cars have been sold. The new series officially came into effect on October 22. By November 14, the series had indicated that cars were being sold at a rate of 13 a day.
This suggests that there is a lot of money in the system, that people have more disposable income. It also suggests that people recognise the need for their own transportation system largely because public transport is not what it should be.
There is another side to this story. In recent years there has been a significant in car dealers. These are the importers who more often than not, import used cars, do some body work so that they appear in a very presentable manner and then retail them.
More often than not, some of these vehicles develop problems soon after they are purchased. There have been numerous complaints against dealers. To their credit, the dealers offer a warranty so that they accept liability for any defect that may develop in the interim. What is stunning are some of the defects. They range from transmission problems to braking to even engine problems. And the warranty is often no more than three months.
When one considers some of these problems one must wonder at the money charged by the dealer for the vehicle. One must also wonder at the short warranty. And every dealer can sell what can only be described as substandard vehicles because there is no bureau to which affected consumers could turn.
The Guyana Consumer Association has no legal standing and while it has been known to represent the interest of affected consumers, it has been largely ignored by the parties guilty of the infringements.
The consumer, for years, has been calling for an entity that could protect them. Many have been known to buy household equipment that went bad and they could not get a replacement. Of course there is always recourse to the courts but in the absence of hire purchase legislation many of these court actions would collapse. The buyer would be hard pressed to show that a contract has been violated.
Then again, court actions take an inordinately long time, sometime years. In this time the company could go out of existence or the product could become redundant.
But it is the number of vehicles being imported that should be cause for concern. Forget that there could be congestion on the streets to the extent that it would be better to walk; forget that there would be increased pollution; forget that parking would be a nightmare in the city. There is the problem of foreign exchange expenditure on spares and replacements.
There was a reason for the regulation that allowed people to import vehicles that were no older than five years. All that changed with the stroke of a pen and there is no restriction to the age of vehicles that could be imported. This is what the dealers are capitalising on.
Some of these dealers have their own body shops. They import pieces of vehicles, pay precious little duty on them then weld them together. This welded vehicle is then sold as reconditioned having been sanded and sprayed. The buyer pays good money but is unaware of the danger. One day, heavens forbid, the vehicle could separate and kill the driver and the occupants.
The very body shops allow pieces of junk to be sold as new vehicles because of the spray jobs and the pressure washed engines. The competition to sell these vehicles has led to lower prices but it has also led to the drive to import even cheaper vehicles. But this is not often reflected in the retail price.
Profits abound and while cars seem to be going like bicycles on a rack, the public needs to be protected.

Discover more from Kaieteur News

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Latest News