Elio a no-show to meeting with Louisiana officials about possible state law violations
Jan 9, 2017 06:46 PM
BATON ROUGE, LA (KSLA) - The car company with hopes of building 3-wheeled cars in Shreveport may be in trouble with the Louisiana Motor Vehicle Commission.
The commission summoned Elio Motors leaders to Metairie Monday for a "pre-hearing" conference behind closed doors to answer to possible state law violations, but nobody from the company showed up.
Elio Motors was called to attend 1pm pre-hearing, but nobody was here to represent them, so they moved on to the next pre-hearing. @KSLA pic.twitter.com/gbFKkK1iEU
— Victoria Shirley (@vshirley) January 9, 2017
More than 10 companies were scheduled for pre-hearings at the Louisiana Motor Vehicle Commissions to discuss possible state law violations.
Elio Motors was first on the list. But when the company's name was called, nobody answered.
They were given notice to appear to discuss concerns the commission has with the company in what they call a "pre-hearing" which is a private information gathering conference.
At issue are the "reservations" customers have been allowed to pay money to hold their place in line for the first vehicles to roll off the line when production begins. Those reservations, which Elio has been accepting for years, are "non-binding." That means the reservations didn't necessarily mean a car was promised.
But in August of 2016, Paul Elio sent out an email letting reservationists know that the option for a "binding" reservation was now possible in an attempt to meet the qualifications of a federal loan.
However, the Louisiana Motor Vehicle Commission is concerned that a "binding" reservation is the same thing as a "pre-sale," and Elio Motors is not licensed to sell vehicles in the state.
On top of that, according to the state's franchise law, manufacturers aren't able to sell directly to customers. Instead, they are required to sell through dealers.
If the company is found in violation of state law, it could face fines in the thousands of dollars.
Commission staff members said Monday that they gave plenty of notice to the company, but never heard back at all.
An Elio Motors spokesman told KSLA News 12 that "No one from Elio was made aware of the meeting."
The commission staff says typically when something like this happens, the company forfeits their pre-hearing and instead have to show up to a fully public commission hearing.
Elio's failure to appear comes less than a week after the company quietly confirmed yet another production delay of their 3-wheeled vehicle on their Facebook page, telling fans the time frame is now 2018.
