US forces VW to correct fuel economy on 98,000 cars

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Friday reached an agreement with Volkswagen for the carmaker to correct fuel economy labels on almost 100,000 vehicles.

The EPA and the California Air Resources Board found that transmission software in the gasoline-fueled cars switched gears differently in tests than in real-world conditions, to produce better mileage than consumers received on the road.

Sticky situation

The software was installed on roughly 1 million automobiles, but only 98,000 were found to have lower mileage than what was declared on EPA stickers, according to the environmental agency.

The faulty equipment is due to cost the VW group $96.5 million (€87.6 million). Owners will get payments of between $5.40 and $24.30 for each month that they have possessed the vehicles.

Any money that does not go to vehicle owners will be used to remedy environmental damage. Legal fees are not included in the financial penalty and will be settled later.

Fuel economy labels on models from 2013 to 2017 will be corrected, not just for Volkswagens but also Audis, Bentleys and Porsches, which are all sold by the VW group.

Friday's announcement completes a turbulent four years for VW, which admitted in September 2015 that up to 11 million cars worldwide had been fitted with software intended to deceive emissions testing.

jsi/sms (Reuters, AP, dpa)

Every evening, DW sends out a selection of the day's news and features. Sign up here.