An Arkansas Body Shop has filed a case with the Attorney General over Carfax reporting issues.
Carfax has long used its advertising dollars to convince the consumer that car dealers are out to get you, and the way to combat us from taking advantage of you is the Carfax. The problem with this and the reality is the carfax is next to useless. It does show some things, and most of the time the reports are close to correct. But, their advertising would lead you to believe the carfax encompasses the whole history of the vehicle accurately, that it’s free (which it’s not), and that if you find something incorrect or inconsistent, that it’s the dealer trying to hide something from you, the consumer. When in reality, we, the dealers, do not and cannot, change anything on a carfax report, all we can do is pay for the report and hand it to you. It’s marketing genius really, so kudos to Carfax for getting everyone to buy their bull advertising and taking it to the bank.
Here’s a link to a couple of blogs with more information about CarFax:
Show me the CarFacts: http://wp.me/p1zOBk-St
Why We Switched to Autocheck: http://wp.me/p1zOBk-VU
We’ve always been happy to provide the CarFax to our customers because first and foremost, we value our customers, and we want to make our customers as comfortable as possible with the entire purchasing process. We now do Autocheck reports rather than CarFax. No reporting is going to be the end all for knowing about the vehicle you’re purchasing, but information, as much as you can get, does help.
Here’s the article I am referencing:
Golden’s Paint & Body Shop said its identity was stolen and could not come to any other conclusion after a customer’s repair appeared on a CARFAX report and listed “repair facility” as the source of the information, even though Golden’s did not report it.
Source: Arkansas Body Shop Files Case with Attorney General over CARFAX Reporting Issue