Car Dealers Still Waiting On 'Clunkers' Cash Reporting

CBS 2 Chicago ^ | 09/01/09 | Mai Martinez

[MissesBush]

Here's the figure: $2.878 billion. That's how much money the government owes car dealers for the "Cash for Clunkers" program.

More than $200 million of that is owed to dealers in Illinois and Indiana, so CBS 2's Mai Martinez checked with some of them to see how much money they've collected from Uncle Sam.

Now that the popular program has ended, many dealerships are asking the federal government to "show me the money."

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"Out of 142 deals they owe us for, we've gotten paid on seven," Lou Tornabeni of Ettleson Hyundai said.

"We had 102 cash for clunkers," Carm Scarpace of Westfield Ford said. "We've been paid for one."

With each Cash for Clunkers deal worth between $3,500 and $4,500, many dealerships are anxiously awaiting their government payday.

Some, like Advantage Chevrolet, which sold cars up until the last minute, have more than half a million dollars on the line.

"It was chaotic towards the end," Jason Roberts said.

Roberts says his dealership sold 142 cars under the program -- for a total of about $568,000 in government rebates. So far, the dealership has only been paid about $68,000 for about 17 of the deals, which means Uncle Sam still owes them roughly $500,000.

"It's not crippling, but it definitely affects the cash flow on a regular basis," Roberts said.

Roberts says his dealership can handle the cash crunch, but others may not be as lucky, especially if they didn't follow the government's strict guidelines for the program.

"We know of one dealer that sold 40 cars under the Cash for Clunkers programs, and out of those 40 cars, he's expecting to get paid on eight," Roberts said.

But even those who did follow the guidelines say they won't rest easy until they have the cash in hand. For Westfield Ford, that's about $400,000.

"You're always nervous when the money's out there, but you've got to believe in the government," Scarpace said. "It should come back to us."

The million-dollar – or should we say, billion-dollar -- question now is when? Dealers say they don't know, but it can't come soon enough.

One of the dealers told us, originally, the government was supposed to pay them within 10 days of receiving their paperwork. But with more than 690,000 cars sold under the program, that dealer says he's not expecting payment for another 30 to 45 days.

(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

[MissesBush]

Eh let them suffer. That's what they get for sucking at the government t*t. I got so sick of their incessant "Cash for Clunkers" promotions and television ads heedless of the burden it was putting on taxpayers and future generations all for some illusory boost to the economy that was nothing but political.

[deport]

One of the dealers told us, originally, the government was supposed to pay them within 10 days of receiving their paperwork. But with more than 690,000 cars sold under the program, that dealer says he’s not expecting payment for another 30 to 45 days.

---

And not to mention that the program was initiated only 36 days ago. It required filings by the dealer, verification by the gov’t and corrections where data was wrong or omitted.

[Ueriah]

Gosh, if we could only somehow make our HEALTH CARE SYSTEM this effective...

/sarc

[ryan71]

What has this program achieved? Huge sales of new cars? Maybe. Is it safe to assume that most people who participated were or would have been in the market to buy a car any way?

Will new car sales dry up now? What has this program achieved that is beneficial?

[Sacajaweau]

And what about the dealers that got shut down. They got nothing, too....except the total shaft.

[Two Kids' Dad]

Good point. I actually considered getting a new car under the program, but chose not to take on the additional debt load. I think there’s now going to be a serious vacuum at car dealerships for a little while.

[Two Kids' Dad]

Government intrusion into the free market will almost always have adverse effects. The exceptions don’t outweigh the rule.

This was proven with C4C and will be absolutely disastrous if they get their grubby political hands on health care.

[ebersole]

“I would think this an eye-opener for doctors and hospitals”...
Anyone who has worked in healthcare administration for at least one minute is well aware of the pitfalls of working with the government through its already existing socialized medicine program called Medicare/caid. Hopefully, it’s more of a wake up call to those business owners who just ventured outside of the free-market to willingly suck on the government tit. Hope these car dealerships have hired a compliance manager to re-submit the government paperwork because they forgot to dot an i, and then an assistant to follow up with the non-existent government cash for clunks specialists via phone calls, faxes, e-mails and other specific government electronic submission programs!