Rewritten contract - Rebate conflict

M

Mike J

Member
Hey everyone,

My situation is kinda unique and thus couldn't find an existing thread hence the new one (though forgive me if there's an existing one I couldn't locate).

I just bought my new 2019 Clarity last week and I love it though I'm in a bit of a dilemma now and would like to get your input so that I don't mess up the rebate applications.

There was another discount that I'm eligible for which I found out about after I bought the car and went back to the dealer a couple of days after purchase to receive it though they required to rewrite the contract (to get reimbursed from Honda) which now has a different date than the original purchase date.
Now, I'll be applying to the federal & state rebate as well HOV lane decals and not sure as to how I should approach this. Should I apply using the original contract since this has the original purchase date which matches the DMV, or, apply using the new contract though I'm afraid it'll result in a conflict, or, apply using the original and then submit the new contract and along with a letter explaining what happened.

Any input would be appreciated. Thanks!
 
For the Federal Tax Credit, the form asks for the date "placed in service". There isn't even a place to put the purchase date, so not an issue there.

Without knowing what State, hard to reference the rebate & carpool sticker rules.....
 
DucRider said:
For the Federal Tax Credit, the form asks for the date "placed in service". There isn't even a place to put the purchase date, so not an issue there.

Without knowing what State, hard to reference the rebate & carpool sticker rules.....
Click to expand...

Thanks so much for your reply! I'm in California.
 
I agree with @DucRider re the feds. For the state, I would use the date that the DMV already has, and then not contact them about the change unless they raise the issue. No point in poking the bureaucracy.
 
Rewriting the contract to change the purchase date may lead to a nightmare situation, as described in the thread linked below. Unfortunately I don't have any good advice, since I'm not a lawyer and I don't know how to negotiate that legal minefield.

But I do advise you to be an informed buyer, and make sure you understand what the legal implications of retroactively changing the purchase date might be. The very last thing you'd want is for the courts to view your actions as willingly participating in an attempt to defraud the government in order to gain something of value, which seems to be what happened to this unfortunate buyer:

Buyer Nightmare. Just found out bad news!

A common sense suggestion might be to visit the DMV and talk to someone there about the situation, to make sure that what the dealer is doing is permitted. Unfortunately, that might well alert them to the very thing you'd want them to ignore, so I don't know that this would be good advice.
​
 
The CA CVRP rebate requires submitting a copy of the full sales contract as well as the registration (a copy of the temporary one in the windshield works). And they read it carefully -- my contract copy was rejected because I didn't overlap the scans well enough to see every line, so I had to rescan and resubmit it.

It's probably normal for the registration date to be after the contract date (when you sign then pick up the car another day, in my case when the car was transferred from another dealer a day later). I can see it raising red flags if the second contract is submitted with a date *after* the registration date however. On the other hand, not submitting the second contract and signing that the now-invalid first contract is correct could get you in trouble too. I know you're not trying to commit fraud here (like if, say, what's in the second contract didn't qualify you for the rebate), but that might not matter. I think I'd scan both contracts with an explanation that they are for the same car and the only difference is a price adjustment. I haven't done the HOV sticker app yet, so I don't know if it asks for similar info.

Be aware that the CVRP rebate is waitlisted; you want to submit the app ASAP to get on the waitlist, but there's no funding currently for cars purchased after 6/5/19.
 
The Center for Sustainable Energy administers California's Clean Vehicle Rebate Program (as well as most others in the US). While at a meeting about Oregon's Charge Ahead Rebate (additional rebate for low/moderate income residents), CSE stated that there would be a phone number that people could call and they would walk them thru the application process if necessary.
I would contact them:
https://cleanvehiclerebate.org/eng/contact

By phone:
866-984-2532

By email:
[email protected]
 
You have signed two separate bill of sale contracts for the same car. This could work out fine with no problems or it could go quite wrong depending on what the dealer does, which is out of your control at this point. You might consider contacting a lawyer familiar with vehicle law for advice but if that seems like overkill at this point if you have AAA you should ask them for advice as they handle registration and can at least give you some ideas of what might go wrong and what your best options are.
 
The dealer rewrote the contract so that they can get reimbursed from Honda for that discount since it's a corporate discount, they won't change anything with the original registration/dmv paperwork.

2002 said:
You have signed two separate bill of sale contracts for the same car. This could work out fine with no problems or it could go quite wrong depending on what the dealer does, which is out of your control at this point. You might consider contacting a lawyer familiar with vehicle law for advice but if that seems like overkill at this point if you have AAA you should ask them for advice as they handle registration and can at least give you some ideas of what might go wrong and what your best options are.
Click to expand...
 
Mike J said:
The dealer rewrote the contract so that they can get reimbursed from Honda for that discount since it's a corporate discount, they won't change anything with the original registration/dmv paperwork.
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Something isn't quite clicking here. What discount/rebate was the bill of sale rewritten for? I.e. what is different about the second contract compared to the first? Did they refund you the difference with a check?
 
2002 said:
Something isn't quite clicking here. What discount/rebate was the bill of sale rewritten for? I.e. what is different about the second contract compared to the first? Did they refund you the difference with a check?
Click to expand...

Yes, I received the discount as a refund to the down payment I made. So the final price was reduced by that discount made.
 
Mike J said:
Yes, I received the discount as a refund to the down payment I made. So the final price was reduced by that discount made.
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Not that I fully understand the murky world of car dealerships but if the loan amount is the same and they refunded part of your down payment, then I guess they did you a favor by essentially lowering the price of the car after the purchase, since they would get the rebate anyway since it's a dealer rebate not a consumer rebate. Assuming we are talking about the $6,000 Honda incentive which is the only one I know of. If it's the $6,000 rebate the current iteration of that runs from May 1st to July 8th.

So in other words they originally planned to keep all of the rebate for themselves (which is their right) instead of passing some or all of the rebate amount on to you in the form of a lower price. Most people who aware of the $6,000 rebate press the dealer on this point prior to purchase (when the buyer is in the driver's seat) but in your case you brought it to their attention after the sale and based solely on the goodness of their hearts they decided to go ahead and give you some or all of the rebate that they will receive. I'm trying not to be cynical but I just don't see anything in this for the dealer which is why I am so suspicious.
 
2002 said:
Not that I fully understand the murky world of car dealerships but if the loan amount is the same and they refunded part of your down payment, then I guess they did you a favor by essentially lowering the price of the car after the purchase, since they would get the rebate anyway since it's a dealer rebate not a consumer rebate. Assuming we are talking about the $6,000 Honda incentive which is the only one I know of. If it's the $6,000 rebate the current iteration of that runs from May 1st to July 8th.

So in other words they originally planned to keep all of the rebate for themselves (which is their right) instead of passing some or all of the rebate amount on to you in the form of a lower price. Most people who aware of the $6,000 rebate press the dealer on this point prior to purchase (when the buyer is in the driver's seat) but in your case you brought it to their attention after the sale and based solely on the goodness of their hearts they decided to go ahead and give you some or all of the rebate that they will receive. I'm trying not to be cynical but I just don't see anything in this for the dealer which is why I am so suspicious.
Click to expand...

I don't think they have intention of anything murky... My initial concern was with the federal tax incentive (which thankfully should be OK) & CA rebate since the application requires indicating purchase date.
 
Mike J said:
Hey everyone,

My situation is kinda unique and thus couldn't find an existing thread hence the new one (though forgive me if there's an existing one I couldn't locate).

I just bought my new 2019 Clarity last week and I love it though I'm in a bit of a dilemma now and would like to get your input so that I don't mess up the rebate applications.

There was another discount that I'm eligible for which I found out about after I bought the car and went back to the dealer a couple of days after purchase to receive it though they required to rewrite the contract (to get reimbursed from Honda) which now has a different date than the original purchase date.
Now, I'll be applying to the federal & state rebate as well HOV lane decals and not sure as to how I should approach this. Should I apply using the original contract since this has the original purchase date which matches the DMV, or, apply using the new contract though I'm afraid it'll result in a conflict, or, apply using the original and then submit the new contract and along with a letter explaining what happened.

Any input would be appreciated. Thanks!
Click to expand...
The new contract is between you and honda. So the new purchase date does not void the older purchase date imho. Im not a lawyer. But i think that you are not decieving or lying about anything to use the origonal purcha1date as long as you have your origonal paper work. The state will probably not care about the semantics. They do care about you paying dmv fees for the origonal date of service. You could present both contracts if questioned and explain.
 
neal adkins said:
The new contract is between you and honda. So the new purchase date does not void the older purchase date imho. Im not a lawyer. But i think that you are not decieving or lying about anything to use the origonal purcha1date as long as you have your origonal paper work. The state will probably not care about the semantics. They do care about you paying dmv fees for the origonal date of service. You could present both contracts if questioned and explain.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your reply, Neal! Yea, I reached out to them and they said just submit the new date and it shouldn't be a problem... We'll see.
 
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