质检总局召汽车三包听证会

Mr. Cheng spent years of his hard earned savings to buy a Beijing Hyundai VERNA. After only 18 days, he new car with only 100 kilometers' mileage caught fire and became a wreck within minutes.

Based on the initial investigation, the police excluded the possibility of arson and informed staff at the dealership store, but the car company says there's nothing they can do.

"The next evening when we called the dealership store, they told us the car company says the accident was caused by a non-manufacturing problem based on the photographs from the scene, that is to say, the factory will not send staff to come help us."

Mr. Cheng had no choice but to entrust the local fire department to determine the cause of the accident. The fire department ruled that the cause of the accident was due to a problem with the car. But 4 months later, even after much negotiation, the car factory still refused to take responsibility. The dealer explains:

"The factory doesn't accept the authenticity of the fire department's report; it can be faked."

Mr. Cheng's case is by no means unique. Due to the lack of regulations guaranteeing customers free repair, refund and replacement of problem autos, the China Consumer's Association says the number of complaints regarding automotive purchases has increased by more than 30 percent in 2011. The latest statistics show there are 44 complaints about automotive products everyday in the third quarter this year.

Wang Qianhu, Assistant Secretary-General of the China Consumer's Association, says they support drafted policy on the refund, repair and replacement of automotive products, but some of the articles, like the period of validity, still need to be improved.

"It's unfair to count the period of validity from the date that a receipt of purchase is issued, because receiving the receipt doesn't mean that the customer has received their car. The customer should not shoulder the responsibility before the property has been transferred into their hands."

According to the draft, dealers should provide a back up car or transportation compensation if repair time lasts more than 5 days.

However, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers thinks the time is not yet right for this new policy. Ye Shengji, deputy Secretary-General says that the current system would not be compatible with the new policy.

"Cars are used for longer periods of time under complex situations. It's difficult to judge when disputes occur. Currently, no independent authoritative third party organization has been established, making it very difficult to make a scientific and correct evaluation regarding the quality of automotive products."

Ye Shengji also points out that the excessively high requirements proposed in the draft will lead to an increase in manufacturing costs, resulting in price hikes for automotive products.

Yang Xueliang, director of PR at Geery Holding Group, expresses his concerns.

"If our products really have problems in terms of quality, who is responsible for figuring out the reason for these problems, the possible damage, and the necessity to refund, replace or repair. We hope the government can set up an organization to deal with these issues, and we also hope customers can use the policy properly to protect their rights, and not for personal interests."

There is no easy solution to problems debated at the hearing. The public stil hopes there will be a regulation that can benifit customers, auto dealers and manufacturers.

For CRI, I'm Zhang Wan.