NEWSOM VETOES BILL to increase the processing fees when buying a car

From Ryan SabalowCalmness

This story was originally published by CalmattersS Register about their ballots.

Governor Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill that would allow car dealers in California to deal with another $ 175 dollars for the cost of buying a vehicle.

On Monday Newsom announced that it would not sign Senate Bill 791which would raise the fees that dealers could charge for processing a motor vehicle and other documents from $ 85 to 1% of the purchase price limited to $ 260.

In his veto messageNEWSOM said the increase in the fee makes a little sense as the car buyer will pay a dealer “in just minutes entering data”.

“At a time when the Californians are already struggling with the high costs of life,” Newsom wrote, “this bill would increase the document processing fee to three times the current $ 85 cap – far above what would justify inflation correction.”

Brian Maas, President of the California Association of Car Traders, said in an email that the country’s car sellers are “extremely disappointed” by the veto.

Maas said the current $ 85 cap for document processing fee was “far the lowest in the country.” Now the dead increase in the fee, he said, would still be at the “lower quartile of such fees across the country.”

Car dealers say the legislature is constantly adopting new laws that add to their costs. It is said that other types of businesses can reimburse these costs through service fees, but dealers cannot because the $ 85 cap is determined in state legislation.

The dealers were particularly disappointed with the Newsom veto, as this month he signed a measure that adds a number of requirements to car dealers that are intended to prevent buyers from being sucked in while transferring over the price of the vehicle.

More special, this measure, Senate Bill 766It creates a first second policy that allows the buyer for used cars to return a vehicle for full recovery within three days if the purchase price was less than $ 50,000. Dealers can charge a recovery fee.

The new law requires dealers to reveal the full costs in front and prohibits dealers from charge for supplements that have no benefit to the buyer, such as free changes to the oil for electric vehicles, which do not need changes in oil.

The law enters into force October 1, 2026.

Maas said that “the legislature continues to put more weights for dealers. The SB 766 only adds significantly to those responsibilities, which makes the veto of SB 791 even more district.”

The California New Car Merchants Association has donated at least $ 3 million to legislators since 2015, according to Calmatters Database of digital democracyS

How did the fee increase easily?

It may have been surprising that the bill to raise fees at all reached the governor’s desk, given that legislative leaders on both sides had had Promised to reduce costs this yearS

Still, the Senate prevails a larger version of the bill, which was even more expensive. He suggested an increase in the fee to $ 500.

Only one of the 1940s senators of the legislature, democratic senses of the Kalabasas region. Henry SternHe votes no.

After peace of mind reported on the controversial measure Passing the Senate, its author, San Jose Democratic Sen. Dave Cortes Decrease the offered fee in the Assembly first to $ 350 and then eventually to $ 260.

Cortez stated that in an interview the amount on which the legislature was settled would provide the minimum dealers who have to reimburse their expenses to pay employees who could “spend an hour and a half of filling in documents”, state provisions require one sale.

“There are now 113 different documents we have created,” he said. “Each of them was created legislative … We were trying to get a fair remuneration for honest work.”

In the Assembly, the bill passed with only three Democrats – Alex Lee of San Jose, Jacqui Irwin of thousands of oaks and Boerner On the beach Solana – no vote. Seventeen other members of the Assembly did not vote at all, which reported the same as the vote “no”.

AS Calmatters reportsDemocrats almost never vote “no” to the accounts of their colleagues. Instead, they usually do not vote. In Capitol, it is seen as a more institutive way of saying no and less likely to lead to revenge on the part of other legislators and lobbyists.

With so many talk about reducing costs this year, Cortez said he could understand why the governor was not as receptive to his arguments for the justice of car dealers as his colleagues in the legislature.

“Our perception has been lurking all the way, without a doubt,” Cortes said. “And I can understand why the governor would be sensitive to it.”

Rosemary Shahan from Users for car reliability and safety He said she was “excited in pieces” that Newsom vetoed a possible “junk fee” and signed the law protecting the buyers of car from the “lure type and switch that continues” when buying a vehicle.

She said the new three -day cooling period for returning a vehicle would be particularly useful, which would allow buyers to review their documents without pressure. They can also check their vehicles from an independent mechanic to make sure they have not expelled lemon from the batch.

She called Newsom’s actions this year “Huge victories for car buyers in California.”

This article was Originally Published on CalMatters and was reissued under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Noderivatives License.