Airbag Replacement: Be Careful

If you've seen the airbag light pop up on your dashboard, you know it's bad news. The airbag light is designed to come on after a certain amount of time. That's right, airbags have expiration dates, and your car knows when those dates are. Even if you don't care whether your airbag will function properly in a crash situation, most states do. Your car won't pass inspection with that airbag light on. Bummer! Another light to keep you off the road and take money out of your pocket. It gets worse. Apparently some crooked repair shops are charging customers for air bag servicing, but not doing the work. This is easy with an airbag because visually you don't see any change when the system is serviced. In addition, many cars don't have airbags at all because they weren't replaced after being deployed in an accident.