DETROIT — After reports of sudden unintended acceleration in cars it has already fixed, Toyota has told dealers to provide replacement accelerator pedals to owners unhappy with repairs, a company document showed on Monday, The New York Times reported.
Under the policy, Toyota has told dealers to provide replacement pedals only if customers’ cars had already been repaired, and the owners had asked for them.
“Accelerator pedal replacement is based on specific customer request only,” said the memo, which was addressed to dealers, service managers and parts managers. “Dealers are not to solicit pedal replacement.”
The memo, originally dated February 2010, was reissued on Thursday with the part numbers for the replacement pedals and the procedure dealers should follow.
A spokesman for Toyota, Brian R. Lyons, said the company had agreed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to provide the pedals as part of its recall. The safety agency has received more than 60 complaints of unintended acceleration from owners whose cars had been repaired.
Lyons said Toyota had already fixed 1.3 million vehicles, and that the number of complaints it had received after the repairs was “very low.” But he said, “There have been cases where the pedal feel was not satisfactory to the consumer or the dealer. In those cases, a new pedal has been put in.”
Toyota told dealers to begin installing a small metal bar in those vehicles that was intended to keep condensation from forming inside the pedal assembly, which the company said could cause the pedal to become stuck.
Toyota said the cars from owners who complained about the repair most likely had not been fixed properly, and said the remedy should address the problem when done correctly.
Lyons said the appearance between the repaired and replacement pedals is “almost identical. The change is so subtle.”