Dieselgate: VW compensation backfires

Americans think Volkswagen’s $US1000 no-strings compensation package, which won't be offered to Australians, isn’t commensurate with the Dieselgate offence, while Europeans are starting to wonder why they weren’t offered anything either.

Welcome to another day in Volkswagen’s attempts to work its way out of the depths of the Dieselgate emissions-cheating scandal and back into public confidence.

A Volkswagen spokesman at the Los Angeles auto show confirmed that there had been tense feedback from European owners of affected cars, demanding similar compensation packages.

But, he said, Volkswagen had no intention of offering direct financial compensation to its European owners, largely because of the enormous differences in the volumes involved.

“The cost isn’t nothing, but it’s less than half a million cars in the US and Canada,” the spokesman said.

“If we were to do the same thing in Europe, at €1000 a car, that would add another €8.5 billion to the cost.”

The estimate is based on a European equivalent of the package offered to North America of three years of roadside assistance, a $US500 prepaid Visa card that can be spent anywhere and another $US500 prepaid Visa card that can be spent at Volkswagen dealerships.

The compensation package is not contingent on customers giving up other legal recourses to compensation through class-action lawsuits or direct lawsuits.

Admitting Volkswagen had received backlash from both European and American customers, he said the company was instead tailoring a different style of compensation for Europeans.

“The American customers were buying into a niche technology, that was specifically advertised as a ‘clean diesel’, but Europeans bought a mainstream technology,” he justified.

“For the European customers, they will be less inconvenienced because their recall solutions are almost ready and their cars will be repaired faster.

“The solution to the problem for the American cars is at a less advanced stage than it is for the European cars. The only version we don’t have the solution for yet in Europe is the 1.2-litre version.”

Full run down of Dieselgate stories here on motoring.com.au