This is probably news to those of you South of the Canadian/US border but there has just been a class action lawsuit launched against 4 of the automotive companies, namely GM, Honda, Chrysler and Nissan with the possible future additions of Toyota and Ford for overpricing cars in Canada.
See the following website for more information:-

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNew...hub=TopStories

For the heck of it I have just priced a 2008 TCH from the Toyota Canadian and US websites. There is almost a $9,000 premium based on MSRP to buy a loaded Canadian TCH with Nav., over the equivalent US car, this is before taxes but includes the delivery charge. Since the Canadian and US dollar are now approximately equal in value there is no currency exchange rate to confuse the issue.

The class-action lawyers, Juroviesky & Ricci LLP, are planning to extend the lawsuit to include Toyota and Ford according to the above article when they get enough plaintiffs. I have searched around but have not yet found out how to sign up! Does anybody out there have any more information on this?

 

So would it be worth it to Canadians to cross the border to buy a fully loaded vehicle? I don't know what the taxes and/or fees would be...

 

What a sobering article!! Our Canadian cousins are really getting the shaft. I assumed that as the dollars of our two countries equalized prices on major items would also come into parity. It looks like the Canadian government needs to step in and demand that goods coming into Canada cost on a par with goods going into the U.S. plus/minus differences in shipping costs. U.S. Dollar parity gives power to Canada! Take advantage of it.

 

Not really!

The manufacturers as far as I understand it have two big sticks to discourage this:

1. They instruct their US dealers not to sell to Canadian customers which means they could lose their licence if they do.

2. They do not honour the vehicle warranty in Canada.

 

I saw the item in the paper today, and was also wondering: "where do I sign up?" I don't remember the exact difference betwee the US and CDN price, but it was certainly more than 8000 more here, when I bought mine in June.

 

Found it! http://www.jruslaw.com/classactions/carprice.shtml for info on how to participate.

 

Actually, what's really going on is the U.S. dollar has dropped compared to the rest of the world's currencies. I suspect it will be an easy suit to defend, as they will simply say that U.S. cars are underpriced compared to Canada, not Canadian cars are overpriced.

I do think there will be a correction to the dollar rise (from the Canadian point of view) or drop (from the American point of view) and U.S. prices will rise as stock depletes. Now's probably the time if you want to buy a car across the border. It certainly is tempting.

Later!

Dang

 

Thanks!

I have sent an e-mail to them to find out if Toyota owners can participate, will keep you posted.

 

Depends on the vehicle. There's a 6.1% duty on imported vehicles if they are not made in North America. There's also a $200ish RIV fee and of course GST and/or PST/HST.

 

From my calculations it appears that the $9,000 price difference would be correct if the Canadian dollar was worth about US$0.78. When I purchased my TCH last November the Canadian dollar was worth US $0.87 so I should have paid only an extra C$4,600 not C$9,000. Buyers today should see almost no difference Canada versus US prices.

For those interested you can check out the exchange rate at the time you purchased on the following website:-

http://www.xe.com/ict/