Volkswagen France Has Been Lying About Their Sales Figures For Years
VW France head Jacques Rivoal has reportedly quit over… “strategic differences.”
If there's one automaker that could take a break from being accused of dishonesty, it would probably be Volkswagen.
More controversy for VW has surfaced regarding its sales figures in France. Reuters reports that Volkswagen France has been lying about and inflating the number of cars it has sold to their big bosses in Germany since at least 2010, citing a Volkswagen internal audit made public by German news magazine Der Spiegel.
Apparently, auditors discovered recorded deliveries "several months or even years" ahead of when the cars were actually registered by their owners (a process that should only last weeks) and a number of "delivered" cars that were missing entire purchase contracts. All in all, discrepancies were found on 800,000 vehicles encompassing cars from across VAG's wide product mix including Audis, Skodas, and Seats.
On the upside, perhaps the $26 billion VW France made on dirty diesels was overstated as well, which should cut down on those hefty fines. Two losses make a win?
When Reuters hit up VW corporate to discuss the issue last week, they declined to comment. Volkswagen France's head of operations Jacques Rivoal could not be reached.
When Volkswagen CEO Matthias Mueller received the internal audit report in late April, Rivoal quit, citing "strategic differences." I don't know about you, but I have a feeling he wasn't being completely honest about that one, either.
