ABRA Auto Body & Glass (ABRA) joined the Quality Parts Coalition’s (QPC) effort to secure automotive repair clause legislation to curb OEM efforts designed to restrict the manufacture and sale of aftermarket crash parts.
The QPC charges that OEMs are attempting to stifle marketplace competition and drive up the prices of parts. The number of design patents held by the car companies has more than doubled since 2005, since Ford Global Technologies made its first attempt to restrict aftermarket competition by enforcing 14-year design patents on seven collision replacement parts for the 2004 Ford F-150 through a complaint at the International Trade Commission (ITC). As a result of the ruling, more than 2 million Ford F-150 owners in the United States no longer have an alternative option for quality replacement collision parts for their 2004-2007 Ford F-150 pickup trucks, QPC said.
“Higher parts prices will force insurance companies to declare more vehicles as ‘total wrecks,’ resulting in a great loss of business for the repair industry,” says Eileen A. Sottile, executive director of QPC. “More expensive collision parts benefit the car companies – not repair shops and certainly not consumers.”
In 2008, Ford filed another design patent enforcement complaint at the ITC, this time for replacement parts on the 2005 Ford Mustang.
“The QPC is fighting for the rights of the American consumer and for the livelihood of the auto repair industry in the United States,” says Tim Adelmann, executive vice president of business development, ABRA. “We at ABRA recognize the repair business will suffer if car companies gain a monopoly in the crash parts market. For this reason, we are dedicated to securing a permanent legislative change in 2009.”
In 2008, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (CA-16) introduced legislation (H.R. 5638), co-sponsored by seven members of Congress that would create a narrow exemption to patent law, allowing alternative replacement parts.
For more information, visit www.abraauto.com and www.qualitypartscoalition.com.
