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Volkswagen Agrees to Pay the DOJ $4.3 Billion Over the Dieselgate Fiasco

Volkswagen’s emissions scandal, commonly known as Dieselgate, will cost the automaker an extra $4.3 billion.
Volkswagen Golf VI 2.0 TDI 1 photo
Photo: Joe Mayer on Facebook
The mentioned sum will come on top of the $19.2 billion that the corporation has set aside to handle the entire settlement deal for its clients and with government authorities.

In other words, the $4.3 billion will be paid to the U.S. Department of Justice to settle civil and criminal charges handed down by the DOJ. The German corporation has exceeded the amount of money it intended to spend on this.

Furthermore, Volkswagen will be monitored by an outside auditor for an extended period to ensure that the company follows through with its reform and compliance efforts. The audit will be set for three years, and the measure is expected to happen in other markets, once the VW Group settles its wrongdoings with local authorities.

While Volkswagen’s deal with the Department of Justice is not cheap at all, it will bring much-needed stability for its investors. The company will know how much it will have to pay authorities because of its cheating scheme, and all that is left for the VW Group is to settle compensation with each client that was affected by Dieselgate.

As you already know, Volkswagen customers in the USA that have a dieselgate-affected vehicle have a choice between selling the car back to the automaker, or having it repaired and keep it.

Regardless of the decision the customers make, Volkswagen will offer each eligible owner a compensatory payment to overcome the effects of its cheating scheme on the transaction between it and the client.

VW is probably years away from the moment when it will fix the majority of the vehicles that were affected by Dieselgate. Some of those cars might never get fixed, while others will be kept by their owners and remain on the road, but without a cheating device to spew harmful NOx into the atmosphere.

The automaker will have to sell the vehicles it buys back, but only after fixing them, which will take some time and cost even more money. It is hard to estimate how much will Dieselgate cost overall, but it is clear that it will be more expensive than just adding up $19.2 and $4.3 billion. At the end of the day, someone has to ask himself if it cheating was worth the trouble.
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About the author: Sebastian Toma
Sebastian Toma profile photo

Sebastian's love for cars began at a young age. Little did he know that a career would emerge from this passion (and that it would not, sadly, involve being a professional racecar driver). In over fourteen years, he got behind the wheel of several hundred vehicles and in the offices of the most important car publications in his homeland.
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