Rental Cars Not Recalled Cannot Be Rented

[Asia Economy Reporter Inho Yoo] The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced on the 6th that the revised 'Passenger Transport Service Act' aimed at ensuring the safety of rental vehicles and preventing accidents will be enforced from the 8th of this month.

According to Article 31 of the 'Automobile Management Act,' when a defect in a rental vehicle is disclosed, the car rental business operator is prohibited from renting out vehicles that have not undergone corrective action (recall).

If the vehicle is already rented out at the time the defect is disclosed, the rental business operator must notify the lessee of the defect within 30 days via mail or text message using a mobile phone.

Rental business operators who possess rental vehicles with disclosed defects prior to the 8th must receive corrective action within three months after the law's enforcement, by January 8 of next year, or if the vehicle is currently rented, promptly notify the lessee of the defect.

Car rental business operators who rent out defective vehicles anew or fail to notify lessees of defects will be subject to a fine of up to 10 million won.

To facilitate prompt recall notifications and defect corrections for rental vehicles during the initial phase of the system's implementation, the Ministry arranged for the Korea Automobile Testing & Research Institute (KATRI) under the Korea Transportation Safety Authority to notify the Korea Rent-a-Car Business Association Federation of defect details with the consent of the rental business operator.

Yoon Jin-hwan, Director of Automobile Management at the Ministry, stated, “As the era shifts from vehicle ownership to sharing, the newly implemented safety measures for rental vehicles are expected to contribute to road traffic safety,” and added, “We will continue to strive to improve the recall system for automobile safety.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.