Good Morning,
We got the same denial email, so incredibly disheartening after believing we had all boxes checked. Our situation is slightly different from yours in that our dealer never received the July 12 email to submit eligible inventory. Ours was the only EV our dealer ever sold so they were apparently not on the network email list. I spoke with the MTO office, apparently, our only glimmer of hope to get our file re-opened is if VW Canada or the regional office sent our VIN# into the office and we can prove that MTO made a mistake. I've filed a complaint against the MTO with the Ontario Ombudsman, emailed CBC Marketplace, CBC Go Public, Ellen Roseman at the Toronto Star. I wanted to let you know in case you want to do the same. The claim is being denied on a technicality that is anyone's fault but ours. While the EV rebate application makes mentions of the "ministry approved order list", we thought it was referencing the published list of eligible cars. We never would have proceeded to take possession if the MTO had indicated that all paperwork was not in order, all calls from our dealer to the MTO prior to the Sept. 10 deadline went unanswered. So incredibly frustrating. This is the message I've sent to CBC etc., perhaps if there are enough of us, someone will take notice:
"We are out $14,000 because the Ministry of Transportation has denied our electric vehicle rebate application, apparently our VIN# does not appear on a ministry approved order list. This is a technicality over which we had no control and our dealer tried to prevent by calling the MTO office several times to confirm all paperwork was in order prior to the Sept. 10 deadline. All calls went unanswered. We trusted the government, had faith in the process, believed our dealer, took possession of the vehicle, filed our paperwork on time and now we're out a lot of money.
The problem lies here, a message was sent to dealers on July 11 or 12 from MTO stating that dealers needed to get eligible inventory onto an approved list by July 16. Our dealer never received this communication and as our VIN# does not appear on a list. The EV rebate application we filled out makes mention of the ministry approved order list, my husband and I assumed it was this one:
http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/vehicles/electric/electric-vehicle-rebate.shtml
Eligible Electric Vehicles - mto.gov.on.ca
This is the message we received from the MTO a couple of days ago:
"Thank you for applying to the Electric and Hydrogen Vehicle Incentive Program. After carefully reviewing your application, we regret to inform you that your application is ineligible for an incentive for the following reason:
· Your vehicle was not on the ministry approved order list.
The program was on July 2018; as a result, eligible vehicles ordered on or before July 11, but plated and registered between July 12, and September 10, must be on the ministry approved order list from dealers and manufacturers to be considered for an incentive. If you have concerns with this decision, please reach out to your dealership. If the dealership states that your vehicle was on the ministry approved order list, please have them contact the Ministry at
[email protected] to provide the required information for Ministry review."
We are continuing to try to work out this situation. Our dealer is awaiting confirmation on whether or not there is any proof that our VIN# was sent to the Ministry for approval by VW Canada. In any case, we've requested that the decision to deny our claim be overturned, as our claim is 100% legitimate. The technicality of the VIN# not appearing on an additional list is anyone's fault but ours. There was not adequate information provided by the MTO. Our dealer never received the notice on July 12 to submit eligible vehicles to a list by July 16, likely because ours was the only e-Golf the dealership ever sold and they were not included in the email that went out to the dealer network.
It is not reasonable to deny our claim based on poor communication during a transition period. Had the MTO responded to our dealer and indicated there was a problem, we would never have proceeded to take possession. Either the dealer, manufacturer or government should take responsibility for this, why are we left holding the bag and out $14,000. The government is supposed to help people, this is not right. They have arbitrarily denied our claim. Every other piece of documentation is in order, we took great care to make sure all boxes were checked. The MTO has stated they will only consider appeals before the end of the month.
Could you help us?"
We'll see how it goes.
