The Auto Glass Safety Council’s (AGSC) general counsel, Kim Mann, has issued a statement clarifying Federal Bill H.R. 6688’s impact on automotive glass repair and replacement companies.
“H.R. 6688, otherwise known as the ‘ADAS Functionality and Integrity Act,’ merely requires the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to publish guidelines for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) and ADAS recalibration on vehicles that have been ‘modified or customized.’ It does not require NHTSA to publish regulations, standards or any other type of mandatory requirement. Therefore, it does not require auto glass repair and replacement companies, or other automotive repair companies, to follow any set of regulations,” says Mann.
The bill mentions in Sec. 2(a)(4) that the guidelines must address maintaining functionality of ADAS following “repair, modification or component replacement.” However, it must be noted that the section in which this provision appears deals exclusively with vehicles that have been modified or customized. While it is possible to argue that the repair and replacement mentioned in Sec. 2(a)(4) applies to all motor vehicles, not just to those that have been modified or customized, that reading does not appear consistent with the stated intent of the bill, Mann states.
Sec. 2(a)(5) of H.R. 6688 requires the NHTSA’s guidelines to include “confirmatory test protocols and performance validation metrics that allow owners, service providers, and independent repair facilities to verify operational integrity of ADAS after calibration,” (emphasis added). That does not mean, in Mann’s opinion, that the NHTSA’s guidelines must include a requirement that anyone or any entity must actually use those guidelines to verify operational integrity. It just provides a metric if they choose to do so.
Mann says the bill does not address, nor even purport to address, any shift in liability for any entity, regardless of function.