1998 Cadillac Catera review from North America

General Motors Cadillac Catera tensioner pulley recall issued by NHTSA in 2002.

I took my vehicle to a dealer and received an invoice; no charge, parts replaced.

Four months later the engine destroyed itself, same as the recall warned could happen. GM instructed I had to take the vehicle to the dealer that did the recall repairs. If due to the recall, they would "assist" with putting a new engine in the vehicle. Nothing in writing would be provided. The dealership instructed I could not have a representative witness the tear down and determination of cause of damage.

I found an independent repair shop, and invited GM and the dealership to the tear down, but they refused to come. The tear down revealed the new parts invoiced to correct recall were in fact not replaced.

Two years later I found an attorney to file a lawsuit as neither GM or the dealership would talk to me.

General Motors settled for $5,000, and the dealership's insurance company paid the dealership's defense and I ran up a $60,000 attorney fee I could not pay, and had to give up, never got to trial.

The NHTSA that issued the recall was kept informed, and never responded except for receiving my status of lawsuit communications.

An auto recall is useless when all the manufacturer has to do is send the recalled vehicle to dealership that made the recall repairs, and the consumer is refused to have an expert allowed to witness the diagnosis of failure. No dealership is going to say it is a recall matter that failed when they invoiced for parts they did not put in.

The fact NHTSA allows this to happen at the American public's expense is my story. On top of that Iowa is the only state in the union that has no private cause of action for fraud, and consumer cannot sue dealership for fraud. In insurance it is illegal to direct an insured to a specific repair shop to get repairs, it is called steering, insurance companies are careful to avoid it. But it is OK for Cadillac to steer recalled damaged vehicles to same dealer that invoiced the recall repair to be diagnosed, which is a huge conflict of interest, and the consumer is going to bend over and take it, nothing you can do about it. They got more money for lawyers, and that is how the justice system works.

Ended up trading my Catera in; received $1,000 for the trade with no engine. Am now in debt paying for another vehicle.