80% of motorists dont know who to go to for car light repairs
Posted by Tom Benjamin
Badly repaired car lights can lead to accidents and poorly serviced vehicles in general are the leading cause of traffic collisions, according to the Institute of the Motor Industry (IMI).
A recent IMI poll revealed that over 80 per cent of motorists do not know how to tell a good vehicle technician from a bad one.
In an attempt to make this more obvious, the Automotive Technician Accreditation (ATA) scheme was created and today (March 22nd) its 20,000th technician was accredited.
"The ATA scheme only started five years ago," explained Sarah Sillars, the executive chair of the IMI.
"To reach 20,000 accredited technicians in such a short amount of time – a rate of ten new members a day – is an incredible achievement," she added.
Last month, Lancashire County Councils road safety group advised motorists that they could save cash by replacing any cracked car light casings before taking their vehicles in for their annual MOTs.
The problem arises from the need in modern cars to go to a garage to change a light bulb. This intrinsically leads to a dangerous situation where a blown bulb (or even two simultaneously – and it has happened to me) means you can’t carry a spare and change it at the roadside. My Renault Megane needs expert tentacles ^H^H^H^H arms to change a bulb – and a vehicle electrician does not necessarily qualify – I had one cause a lot of damage by failing to change the bulb. My regular garage does not take a labour charge on bulb changing – they prefer (correctly) to keep the customer safe.
That is a very good point you make there Dave. We also think it is scandalous that many vehicles are now built in such a way where even the basic maintenance tasks like changing a light bulb are not achievable by the average motorist.