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Update: GM Will Retrofit Heated Seats When Chip Crunch Eases

By 11/23/2021 8:16am

Just a week ago, General Motors announced that a shortage of microchips would force it to sell some trim levels of more than two dozen vehicles with certain creature comforts missing. Now the automaker has clarified that, in some cases, dealers can add them later at no additional cost.

A worldwide shortage of microchips has forced automakers to pause or slow production of many vehicles in 2021. In some cases, they have turned production lines off entirely for brief periods. In others, they have continued to build the cars but left out some features that would otherwise be available to save microchips for more critical uses.

Most recently, GM announced that the company would soon ship more luxurious trim levels of many vehicles to dealers without heated or ventilated seats and heated steering wheels. The company told dealers to discount the cars by up to $500 to compensate buyers for the missing comforts.

GM Can retrofit Seats, Not Steering Wheels

Now, GM says, it will be able to add some of the features later. The company expects to send dealerships the microchips they would need to retrofit most of the affected cars with heated seats sometime in the second quarter of 2022. So buyers can purchase a new car now and bring it back to have heated seats added next year.

Unfortunately, GM says, the same method won’t apply to heated steering wheels.

GM will discount most vehicles missing heated seats by $50 now that the features are only temporarily missing. Cars missing heated steering wheels will get a $150 discount since that feature won’t be added back in a retrofit.

Affected Vehicles:

The list of affected vehicles includes some but not all trim levels of 2022:

In most cases, GM managed to build some models with the affected features. So, if you’re in the market for one, call around. A local dealership may have a model in stock with the missing parts.