**GAO-01-225**                      Published: Jan 31, 2001. Publicly Released: Feb 14, 2001.                  

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## Highlights

Although the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has the authority to regulate aftermarket crash parts, the agency has not developed safety standards for them because it has not determined that any aftermarket crash parts contain safety-related defects. NHTSA has more limited authority to regulate the use of recycled air bags. NHTSA could elect to develop safety standards for occupant restraint systems under the used vehicle provision of the Motor Vehicle Safety Act. NHTSA has not developed such standards because it has not identified significant problems with occupant restraint systems that could be addressed by state motor vehicle inspection programs. The limitations of NHTSA's complaint system may hamper NHTSA's ability to detect safety-related trends through broad key-word searches of its complaint database and make it unlikely that NHTSA can identify all unsafe parts. In addition, the ability to recall unsafe aftermarket crash parts is limited because some parts are not stamped with the manufacturer's name and there is no trail leading from the manufacturer to the ultimate user of the part. Two studies on the safety of recycled airbags concluded that they can be a potentially safe, economical alternative to new airbags as long as they are undamaged and properly handled and installed. However, the failure of some flood-damaged airbags to deploy correctly also demonstrates the potential for serious safety consequences.

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## Topics

Transportation

Consumer protectionMotor vehicle repairsMotor vehicle safetyMotor vehicle standardsMotor vehiclesSafety standardsTraffic accidentsDatabasesRail transit safetyDatabase management systems