Dealership told him low mileage was due to single owner — but it was actually odometer fraud

Steve Andrews had been shopping for a used car online for a while when he came across a registered dealership in Burnaby, B.C., advertising a 2012 Subaru that seemed to fit the bill.

He and his partner were on a budget, but needed a car to get around with their growing family — a two-year-old and a one-year-old. 

“They said it was in very good condition, that there were no real problems,” said Andrews. “Everything seemed to be right about it.”

Most importantly, he said, the mileage on the odometer was low — just under 98,000 kilometres. Under 100,000 kilometres is a sweet spot when selling a used car.

But when the car developed mechanical problems shortly after the sale six weeks ago, Andrews brought it to a mechanic who became suspicious about the low mileage and told him to call a Subaru dealership where the car had a recall issue repaired in 2020. 

Andrews discovered that at that time, the car’s odometer was already at 112,000 kilometres. 

“It was pretty shocking,” he said. “I was definitely angry.”

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Andrews brought the car back to the registered dealership, DD Auto, and produced the Subaru recall report showing the odometer had been rolled back. 

The sales agent called the manager, who agreed to refund the $13,000 Andrews paid for the car. He also claimed to have no knowledge of the odometer fraud, saying that the dealership itself had been scammed, but did not elaborate. 

Odometer fraud ‘on the rise,’ officials say

Across Canada, no one is keeping track of how often odometer fraud occurs. Go Public checked with the federal RCMP, several provincial police departments, Transport Canada and several provincial regulators of car dealerships. 

All said statistics were difficult to isolate, because the issue is often part of a larger fraud investigation. 

A spokesperson for the Ontario Motor Vehicle Industry Council (OMVIC), said in a statement that it believes odometer fraud “is on the rise,” citing “many recent investigations” that have involved some form of odometer tampering.

Odometer rollbacks are closely tracked in the U.S., where the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that over 450,000 vehicles are sold each year with false odometer readings and that this type of fraud costs American car buyers more than $1 billion annually.

With recently announced tariffs threatening to drive up the cost of new cars, more drivers may turn to used cars — demand and prices for pre-owned vehicles have already gone up since January, according to a recent report on the Canadian automotive market by AutoTrader.

Easy to change odometer

Odometers on older model cars used to be analog counters on the dashboard, so rolling them back meant manually turning a dial to change the number. 

Today, digital odometers can be re-programmed using a handheld device that plugs into a vehicle’s computing port. You can buy them online for a few hundred dollars.

“A click of a button” can take years off a car’s life and dramatically increase its value, says mechanic Josh Ingle, an odometer expert and owner of Atlanta Speedometer. 

“You don’t have to have any know-how, you just need to know how to select a vehicle on a screen,” he said, noting the devices do have legitimate purposes. For instance, if a damaged control module where mileage is stored needs to be replaced, which is why they’re readily for sale.

‘Things happen’

Go Public called the manager of DD Auto, Charlie Zhao, to ask about Andrews’ case. He said a recent report by CARFAX, a company that sells vehicle history reports that track things like accident data, service issues and title records, didn’t suggest any red flags. 

“I don’t know why you need [to do] this investigation,” said Zhao, who pointed out that the dealership gave Andrews his money back. “Things happen.”

He also claimed that after Andrews informed him of the odometer fraud, the dealership removed the car from its website.

But Go Public saw it still listed for sale almost three weeks later, and when a producer visited the lot posing as a customer, a salesperson suggested the mileage may be low because the owner “didn’t drive it much.” 

Only after further questioning did the salesperson call his manager, who told him that the odometer had in fact been rolled back.

It’s not illegal to knowingly sell a vehicle with an inaccurate odometer, as long as that’s made clear to potential buyers, says Shari Prymak of Car Help Canada, a non-profit that helps people navigate the process of purchasing a new or used car.

“Dealerships are required to disclose certain material facts, [such as] whether a vehicle has been involved in a serious collision, whether it has a rebuilt or salvage title and whether it has a rolled back odometer,” said Prymak.  

He says dealerships are also required to make sure their staff are informed about the vehicles they’re selling.

Zhao said he told staff about the odometer fraud in a morning meeting and that the salesperson who interacted with the Go Public producer may not have been present at the meeting because he works part-time or was possibly sick. 

He also said the car was on consignment from another dealership, Easy Road Auto, based in Richmond, B.C. Zhao said that dealership purchased the car from a private seller who’d posted the vehicle on Facebook, with mileage showing about 98,000 kilometres.

Prymak says it’s still generally the responsibility of the dealership showing the car to figure out where the odometer fraud happened and who is to blame “because ultimately they will be held accountable.”

Odometer fraud is an offence under provincial and federal laws.

After several requests from Go Public, a director at Easy Road Auto eventually provided a vehicle transfer form he said showed the car’s odometer was not tampered with by his dealership.

The document showed the mileage at just under 98,000 kilometres, but it had no date of sale or sale price, and was not signed by the seller.

And when we tracked down the owner of the vehicle, she said when she recently sold the car to Easy Road Auto the odometer was “around 150,000 kilometres.” 

In an email, Easy Road Auto said it takes the issue “very seriously” and has “conducted a thorough internal investigation,” but did not say what that investigation involved.

A spokesperson also said it’s typical for the employee who buys a used vehicle for the dealership to be the only person in contact with the seller. According to the spokesperson, that employee “went back to her home country,” so they couldn’t contact her anymore. 

Despite all the finger pointing, Prymak says the buck stops at the dealership showing the vehicle to the public. 

“Dealerships have a responsibility to understand what they’re selling,” he said. “A professional dealership that knows what to look for will often be able to identify if something is wrong.”

Steve Andrews has filed a complaint with the Vehicle Sales Authority of B.C., but the regulator would not confirm whether it is investigating. A spokesperson said any dealer found to have violated provincial laws could have their licence suspended or revoked.

Beware ‘curbsiders’

While licensed dealerships have to follow provincial regulations, there are no protections for people buying a vehicle in a different scenario — from a private seller.

If people do this, Prymak says it’s up to the buyer to make sure the seller is the actual owner of the vehicle.

“So check the ownership of the vehicle and also ask to see a driver’s licence and make sure that the two match,” he said. “Because if the seller is not the owner of the vehicle, they could potentially be a curbsider — someone selling used cars illegally for a quick profit.”

Often, these are people selling “junk vehicles” that are re-built or that have rolled back odometers “to make a quick buck,” Prymak said. “So there’s a huge risk, buying a used vehicle from a curbsider.”

Last year, OMVIC laid 1,242 charges against 169 alleged curbsiders, up almost 47 per cent from 2023. 

Prymak says doing your own due diligence before buying a used vehicle includes requesting vehicle history reports, inspecting the vehicle thoroughly, and consulting a trusted mechanic. 

Though vehicle history reports from companies like CARFAX can be valuable to have, mechanics and dealerships aren’t required to record their work or a vehicle’s mileage on them. If these reports are sparse or contain large gaps in odometer readings, experts say that’s a red flag that buyers should investigate.

Andrews and his partner ended up buying a 2020 Toyota RAV4 with only 40,000 kilometres from a larger dealership. And they made sure the vehicle had proper documentation showing its full maintenance and mileage history. 

“We’re paying a little bit more,” he said. “But we have peace of mind.”

As for the 2012 Subaru with the odometer issue, it was nowhere to be seen when Go Public recently visited the DD Auto dealership. Zhao, the manager, says it won’t be sold to anyone, and instead will be rented out, likely to a company.