Get restitution for your Lemon Volkswagen vehicles with Lemon Law Help.

If your Volkswagen car or SUV has an issue that affects its use, value or safety, and it has not been repaired to conform to the manufacturer’s warranty within a reasonable number of repair visits, your Volkswagen could be considered a lemon under the California Lemon Law.

Your Volkswagen could be covered under the California Lemon Law if you bought the vehicle new from a dealership in California with the original manufacturer’s warranty and set it aside for personal, family or household use. Certain exceptions to these Volkswagen lemon law rules exist for small business owners and members of the Armed Forces.

Your Volkswagen may be presumed a lemon if within the first 18 months or 18,000 miles (whichever comes first):

•   You had four or more repair attempts for a vehicle issue,
•   You had two or more repair attempts for a serious safety issue, or
•   Your Volkswagen was in the shop for more than 30 cumulative days for an issue, and,
•   You went through arbitration and did not get a favorable outcome.

Learn more about common lemon symptoms in these Volkswagen models:

•   Volkswagen Tiguan
•   Volkswagen Jetta
•   Volkswagen Atlas

Then, read these lemon law resources:

•   Lemon law blog
•   California Lemon Law Guide

Volkswagen Vehicle Defect History

Dieselgate

To date, the most notorious case of Volkswagen’s company-wide fraud is the aptly named “Dieselgate” scandal that came to light in 2015.

Volkswagen developed a line of diesel cars that sold well in Europe, and wanted to expand their market to the United States. However, the United States had fairly strict regulation of diesel vehicle emissions such as nitrogen oxide (NOx). On top of that, restricting toxic emissions from diesel cars could result in a decrease of fuel efficiency, thus defeating the purpose of their appeal.

Volkswagen’s diesel cars were found to have software that allowed the cars to cheat federal and state emissions tests. When the diesel cars were in test environments, they passed the tests with flying colors. However, when those cars are on the road, the software shuts off emissions controls and allows the diesel cars to emit close to 40 times the legal limit of NOx and other toxic pollutants.

Volkswagen’s misconduct did not stop there. In 2015, the company issued a recall of the diesel cars. As part of the recall, the company installed new cheating software that allowed the diesel cars to fraudulently pass more sophisticated emissions tests. Not only that, Volkswagen set up a research company in order to carry out fraudulent research on the effects of diesel pollutants on human health.

Volkswagen only came clean about the cheat devices after the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) threatened not to certify its 2016 lineups for sale in the United States. Volkswagen later plead guilty and was charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States, wire fraud, violation of the Clean Air Act, obstruction of justice, and importation of goods by false statement.

The settlement to the lawsuit filed against Volkswagen cost the automaker $14.7 billion. Roughly $10 billion from the Volkswagen lemon lawsuit went to compensating American owners of Volkswagen diesel vehicles.