10:34 am, October 22, 2014
GARAGES have been caught out illegally removing diesel particulate filters to save customers the hefty cost of replacing them.
The BBC’s regional TV news programme Inside Out identified five garages out of 10 in Staffordshire that were prepared to remove the filter that prevents harmful diesel soot emissions leaving the exhaust.
Any car that has had its DPF removed should fail an MoT. However, one garage featured on the programme managed to dupe MoT testers by replacing the filter with an empty container.
Brandon Cook, a trading standards spokesman, described the removal of the filters as ‘terrible’ and told the BBC: ‘The fact you can get away with it doesn’t make it right.
‘What we have here is some flagrant breaches that need investigating. There’s clear evidence that what they’re doing is illegal.’
He added: ‘These garages need to know they can’t get away with this… this isn’t something they can just do because it’s difficult to detect. Someone needs to make sure these things can’t be tampered with.’
A statement from the Department for Transport said all garages will be notified on October 26 that they risk losing their MoT authorisation if they offer to remove filters.
Replacing a filter can cost a car owner thousands of pounds.
Watch the programme via the BBC iPlayer (Currently available for another 28 days)
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