News

VEHICLE MANUFACTURE ISSUES DUE TO JAPANESE EARTHQUAKE & TSUNAMI

Following the recent earthquake in Japan a number of manufacturers are reporting delays in vehicle production. The impact is also being felt by non Japanese marques as most vehicle manufacturers use Japanese parts suppliers. The impact is also being felt for service and repair organisations.

Detailed below is the latest information that we have available. However as the position is changing on a daily basis, our recommendation would be to check with your supplying dealer for the latest information.

Some manufacturers are looking for alternative suppliers for their parts. However the re-engineering required plus the complexity of patents with some suppliers means that this is costly and may take some time.

PSA/Peugeot-Citroen - Supplies from Japan to the French factories are currently stable. However, some disruption is expected due to parts availability.

Nissan Motor Co - Nissan have suffered a production loss of 55,000 cars due to the disaster and are struggling to secure enough supply parts. Two domestic plants will operate at limited capacity throughout the Easter holidays in order to make up for these losses.

Toyota - Toyota announced that it will stop production in its assembly plants in Turkey, France, the UK and Poland for several days in late April and early May due to parts shortages from Japan. These measures will affect the Toyota models Auris, Avensis, Verso and Yaris. It is alos expected that delivery times of the Prius will be extended.

Honda - Honda has tried to compensate the devastation of its R&D centre in the northern part of Japan by setting up satellite centres at its factories in order to resume research. The main assembly plant in the UK continues production at 50% capacity until the end of May. This will impact the Honda Civic, Jazz and CRV.

General Motors - General Motors overcome its shortage of parts, which forced it to stop production at German and Spanish assembly plants in March. The impacted parts are now being sourced by a supplier in North America.

VW, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, Audi & BMW - So far the leading German car manufacturers have not encountered any major production problems due to supply chain interruptions or shortages. The only impacted model is the T5 Transporter which does not use some Japanese supplied parts.

Automotive Supply Industry

Bosch - Bosch has 36 plants in Japan, which sustained only minor damage. However supply may be impacted due to manufacturer capacity issues.

Merck - Merck produces a special type of shiny pigment (Xirallic), used in automobile plants. The production plant was damaged by the disasters. The company is the only producer of this pigment, so some manufacturers are currently not able to offer certain colours.

2011 BUDGET AMENDS TO AMAPs RATES

From 6th April, 2011, the AMAPs rates will rise to 45p per mile for the first 10,000 miles and 25p per mile thereafter. In addition to claiming AMAPs rates, an allowance for passenger payments currently in place for business employees, at 5p per passenger mile, will be extended to volunteers.