OEM Website Audit Schedule

 


November 3, 2004 EPA made a general announcement about the OEM Website Audit Project and the Steering Committee at Industry Week in Las Vegas
November 18, 2004 First Steering Committee conference call 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm Eastern Time
November 24, 2004 - December 22, 2004 Initial round of weekly Steering Committee conference calls
December 30, 2004 Draft Audit Plan
January - September 2005 Monthly Steering Committee conference calls (as needed)
January 2005 Steering Committee reviews Draft Audit Plan
February 2005 Audit Plan finalized
To be determined Technicians review sites
To be determined Draft Report
To be determined Steering Committee, EPA and OEMs review Draft Report
To be determined Comments incorporated and final document prepared
 
Please note that the original schedule for completing the review by technicians, the draft report, and the final report summarizing the results of the OEM website audit process has been delayed to ensure that the audit is in compliance with OMB's Information Collection Request (ICR) requirements. The comment period for the Information Collection Request (ICR) closed on June 27th. OMB received two comment letters in response to the ICR. One general comment was received from a public citizen requesting that the audit results be publicly available. The second comment letter was submitted by the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA). NADA provided a minor correction to the referenced NAICS Code as written in the ICR and noted that the labor rate used in the ICR appears to be low. OMB is still reviewing these comments and EPA does not have any indication as to when final approval will be received to move forward with the audit.
 
In the meantime, EPA has initiated a small pilot project to test the audit questionnaire and to gather some preliminary results. EPA has already chosen 5 technicians from the list of volunteers who are in the process of reviewing the web sites of Chrysler, Ford, GM, Honda, Mercedes, and Toyota over the next 30 days. A summary of the findings of the pilot will be made available once it is complete, and a revised schedule will be posted when more information is available.