NHTSA Failed to Meet Recommendations for Training, Staff Oversight

NHTSA has failed to live up to its promise to make safety improvements to the way it handles defect investigation, an audit from the U.S. Office of Inspector General (OIG) reveals. Particularly with regard to training and staff oversight, NHTSA has fallen short of its earlier promise to improve its internal safety procedures.

Specifically, the investigation focuses on NHTSA’s Office of Defect Investigation (ODI).

In 2011, following its handling of Toyota’s unintended acceleration crisis, NHTSA consented with the OIG’s recommendations make process improvements to how it identifies and addresses safety defects. The list of 10 recommended improvements included directives such as coordination with foreign countries, developing a formal training program, and documenting justifications for when it doesn’t meet its deadlines.

In light of General Motors’ 2014 ignition-switch safety recall, the OIG checked in to see how well NHTSA was meeting its expectations. The answer: not great.

“While NHTSA completed actions to close all 10 recommendations from our 2011 review, we identified concerns with how ODI is implementing some of its corrective actions—especially NHTSA’s lack of quality control mechanisms to ensure that its staff consistently applies the new policies and procedures,” reads the audit report.

“In addition, while ODI developed a training program in response to our recommendation, it has not executed the program to ensure its investigators have the needed skills and expertise to carry out ODI’s mission.”

Of the 10 recommendations, NHTSA satisfactorily and consistent applies just 3. Again, here’s the OIG:

“ODI’s staff may not be sufficiently trained to identify and investigate potential vehicle defects or ensure that vehicle manufacturers take prompt and effective action to remediate issues.”

NHTSA apparently got the message, and agreed to shape up by June 30, 2016. For its part, the OIG has already vowed to keep the matter open until a final investigation is conducted.

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