Back in March, we learned that the Federal Trade Commission had begun warning car dealers about deceptive pricing practices. The agency warned 97 car dealers, saying “you may be advertising prices for cars that are lower than what you actually charge consumers.” Recently, the FTC released the full list of dealers involved in the warning, which we’ll detail below.
The warning letters outlined six pricing practices that could put a dealer on the wrong side of the law:
- Advertising a price that does not reflect all required fees
- Advertising a price that reflects rebates or discounts not available to all consumers
- Advertising a price that fails to take into account the amount of an additional required down payment
- Conditioning the advertised price on consumers using dealer financing
- Requiring consumers to buy additional items not reflected in the advertised price
- Advertising unavailable or non-existent vehicles
Dealers are advised to review their pricing strategies, but the letter was clear that it does not represent a firm conclusion that laws have been broken. The FTC also warned that the letter “is not intended to be a comprehensive statement of concerns that may exist about your dealership or dealership group.”
Below is the list of dealers that received FTC warning letters. While there are 97 entries on the list, it’s important to point out that the number of unique entities is slightly smaller due to there being multiple stores from a single dealer group involved.
