If you rented a van from Zipcar a while back, there’s a chance it failed to meet the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s safety standards.
The NHTSA hit Zipcar with a first-of-its-kind fine for “renting vehicles with open, unrepaired recalls,” the agency announced on Monday. The federal safety agency regulates vehicle recalls in the U.S. It named one recall in particular in public investigation documents.
The recall concerns 2015-2017 Ford Transit vans. It states that the “coupling between the transmission and driveshaft” may “deteriorate and crack,” causing power loss in the vans while driving. The issue may also cause “unintended vehicle movement in park,” according to a 2017 NHTSA report. At the time, Ford said 373,000 Transits were “potentially involved” in the recall.
Zipcar said in an email to that “less than 50 vehicles out of its 12,000 global fleet were found in violation” of the NHTSA’s policies. The company added: “Since 2017, Zipcar has implemented new policies and process improvements to address recalled vehicles in its fleet.”
The NHTSA’s civil penalty totals $300,000. Zipcar must pay $150,000 upfront, but it can avoid paying the other half by meeting some NHTSA demands, including updating employee training materials, per the agency’s order.
In other recall news, the Justice Department announced a lawsuit against eBay, claiming that it sold and distributed “hundreds of thousands” of products that pose environmental and public health risks.
