Repair Ripoffs
His manner is mild, but when it comes to fighting auto fraud, Warren Samm is a dragon slayer.
"It's very exciting at times, especially when we catch the people who are doing the fraud out there," he said.
He's a chief investigator with the California Bureau of Automotive Repair, a stealthy agency, operating out of seven secret locations. Its mission: to uncover unscrupulous auto shops and put them out of business.
And in auto-dependent California, where there's at least one accident every 30 seconds, repair scams are a multi-million dollar business. The bureau gets 30,000 auto-repair complaints a year, reports CBS News Correspondent Bill Whitaker.
"We did a study and that study determined that 40 percent of body repairs were fraudulent," said Samm.
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"We really expect them to do the work they were paid for. If they didn't, well they're in a lot of trouble," said Samm.
California's largest auto shop association denies fraud is rampant. It says the state is smearing the whole industry because of a few dirty mechanics. To find out how widespread repair fraud actually is, California just launched a two-year study.
As part of the study, consumers who think they've been ripped off can get a free, at-home check up from inspectors like Samm.
The bureau's investigations lead to about 400 cases of consumer fraud and violations a year. California was the first state to rev up such an operation, but others are following its lead.
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