Carfax email mistake. Wow, not cool.

[HardDrive]

So I wake up this morning and there is an e-mail in my box from Carfax. Its an email indicating that I recently purchase a vehicle, and the Carfax report I had purchased had indicated that my car was flood damaged. They were collecting information for a news story about why people purchase flood damaged cars.

We'll I nearly fall over, because the only Carfax report I have ran recently was the one for the pristine 27k Mach 1 I had recently purchased, and that report did NOT indicate flood damage. I log in to Carfax, but the report has expired, so the only way I could get a new report is to cough up $. I am getting late for a morning meeting, so I say screw that, nothing I can do about it now. I'm pretty pissed because I'm looking at diminished value on a car I paid a bit of premium for. At the same time, I'm finding it hard to believe, because at this point I have had my nose into every bit of the car, and its clean as a whistle. Zero indication of anything. Not a good way to start the day.

20 minutes ago I get the e-mail below. Seriously!? WTF? Someone at Carfax needs to extract their head from their back side.

[Por_sha911]

phishing?

[Noah930]

Is it April 1st?

Glad it's nothing serious.

[HardDrive]

I just found a reddit post that indicates a guy got the same e-mail. Perhaps Carfax is trying to churn old clients to get them to run another report?

[Noah930]

Possible. Or it could have been an honest mistake. If you ran an unnecessary Carfax, I would guess that you'd be able to get a refund or win a credit card dispute as long as you showed the report you ran was a repeat of the one you did before (or matched the VIN of the car you recently purchased).

[Steve Carlton]

So- who is the U-Boat Commander?

[HardDrive]

Originally Posted by Steve Carlton

So- who is the U-Boat Commander?

Errrr....I am the walrus? Coo coo cachoo.

[onewhippedpuppy]

I got the same email. Carfax is a joke anyhow.

[Steve Carlton]

How do you figure? If they show something bad, it's usually correct and a huge time-saver. Sometimes there's a lot of service history information in there, which can be very useful. Not easy to pull every service record or damage record when not all repair agencies report to them. Having partial information, especially if negative, is very useful.

[Fischer_76_911S]

All the rental car companies self insure and pay out of pocket for repairs. Nothing gets reported to car fax. If you pay with cash, I guarantee damage won't get reported either.

I almost bought a Navigator with a clean car fax. It seemed to pull to one side while driving. I'm thinking alignment? When my friend who owns a body shop put it on the lift the frame was bent. It was totaled, but had a clean car fax.

Save your money on that worthless site and take the car you are considering to a body shop. They'll tell you more about it.

My experience, your opinion may vary.

Bob

[onewhippedpuppy]

Originally Posted by Steve Carlton

How do you figure? If they show something bad, it's usually correct and a huge time-saver. Sometimes there's a lot of service history information in there, which can be very useful. Not easy to pull every service record or damage record when not all repair agencies report to them. Having partial information, especially if negative, is very useful.

Lots of accidents never get reported. There are lots of erroneous reports that Carfax doesn't bother to remedy. Maintenance records are almost always incomplete giving an unrealistic picture of the true history. If you want to piss away $40, send it to me. Otherwise apply your money to a comprehensive PPI. Carfax is 90% advertising and 10% actual content.

[bri450sl]

I bought 2 vehicles, both using Carfax. Both had clean Cafax reports. At home under closer inspection, they both had major repairs, but were done very well. But the point is, the repairs were not on the Carfax reports.

[Steve Carlton]

I said "if they show something bad." If you're looking for them to show everything, then pass. Consider the $40 as a first pass. If nothing bad shows up, go to the next step. If something bad shows up, stop and save your time and money. I'm not arguing that everything shows up there.

Matt, you were in the car business or soon to be out of it, right? Are you saying you didn't use Carfax?

[onewhippedpuppy]

Originally Posted by Steve Carlton

I said "if they show something bad." If you're looking for them to show everything, then pass. Consider the $40 as a first pass. If nothing bad shows up, go to the next step. If something bad shows up, stop and save your time and money. I'm not arguing that everything shows up there.

Matt, you were in the car business or soon to be out of it, right? Are you saying you didn't use Carfax?

It was a side gig, I quit in June. The only reason I checked the Carfax on a prospective purchase was because I knew how much the sheeple value it. Amazing how I can disclose that a car has prior paintwork, but if I advertise "clean Carfax" people really don't care. I never could determine if it was effective advertising brainwashing or just blatant ignorance.

I would say that probably half of the Carfax reports that I ran on cars were ultimately wrong when I inspected the car in person.

[Nickshu]

Originally Posted by onewhippedpuppy

Carfax is a joke anyhow. I would say that probably half of the Carfax reports that I ran on cars were ultimately wrong when I inspected the car in person.

This.

[Steve Carlton]

Okay. So let's say you go through all the drill without checking the Carfax and there was an accident on there (whether it belongs there or not), or something serious like "engine replaced," or 10,000 mile service performed at 16,000 miles. Smart move? I say no. You guys are throwing the baby out with the bath water.

[onewhippedpuppy]

Originally Posted by Steve Carlton

Okay. So let's say you go through all the drill without checking the Carfax and there was an accident on there (whether it belongs there or not), or something serious like "engine replaced," or 10,000 mile service performed at 16,000 miles. Smart move? I say no. You guys are throwing the baby out with the bath water.

But the problem is that people consider a Carfax to be the entire inspection process, and one questionable entry causes them to simply disregard a great car. Most of their maintenance entries are painfully vague and incomplete, so people think "this car wasn't serviced". The problem is that most of Carfax's information sources are VOLUNTARY, so very rarely do you get the entire picture. Of course Carfax doesn't want you to realize that.

Here's what I recommend to people - if you are getting ready to pull the trigger, apply the $40 towards a professional mechanic's inspection.

[Dantilla]

I can think of no better example of marketing being more important than the product as Carfax.
I have never used a Carfax report, never will. I will look at the actual car.

I was at an insurance auction a while ago. When a very mangled Tahoe was up, the auctioneer didn't use the words "Clean Carfax", but he sure insinuated that the accident was not reported. The winning bid was twice what I thought it would go for. I'm sure it ended up at a used car lot where the sales dude shoved the Carfax report in the buyer's face so they wouldn't look under the hood.

Gotta agree with onewhippedpuppy here- Carfax is a joke.

[Steve Carlton]

Originally Posted by Dantilla

I have never used a Carfax report, never will. I will look at the actual car.

So, when you buy something that looks pristine and the Carfax shows an accident or something not too savory (that's most likely accurate), you're okay with that? You're not worried about the resale value then when you sell it?

[Dantilla]

Originally Posted by Steve Carlton

You're not worried about the resale value then when you sell it?

Nope.