DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. — General Motors says it did everything it could to reach a DeKalb County woman to warn her that her Buick could catch fire.
"You were in the car when it caught fire?" asked Channel 2 consumer investigator Jim Strickland.
"Yes, I was," responded driver Debra Lemmon. "I was like, 'Oh my God.' I didn't want to catch on fire. It just scared me and I was really shaken."
The car is long gone after the 2013 fire, but Lemmon recently received a letter from GM saying her claim for damages was denied.
"'We can't do nothing for you,' basically that's what it's saying. 'We don't care,'" Lemmon said.
Lemmon said the only word she got of a recall came when a postcard arrived a month after the fire.
GM emailed Strickland a list of two letters and five postcards the company sent trying to reach her.
"Had you ever received anything thing like that?" Strickland asked.
"No, never. Never received a letter from GM itself, only that postcard," she said.
GM's own figures show warnings on more than 138,000 cars were undeliverable.
Edmonds.com reports that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has 500 fire complaints from the recalled cars. Half of them were filed after the recall.
Strickland has not heard from a DeKalb dealer who serviced the car five months after the recall but failed to do the service.
WSBTV
