New cars are great; everyone knows that, but they’re also overpriced and lose massive amounts of their value the moment you drive off the dealership lot. For many people, a new car isn’t just a waste of money but an impractical choice they simply can’t afford. That’s why used vehicles are so terrific – but you never really know what a used car has been through, and you have to hope that strange smell will go away in time (spoiler alert: it won’t).
The middle ground between the two extremes of a new vehicle and one driven into a lake and then resold is the Certified Pre-Owned (CPO) vehicle. You can only find these at licensed dealerships, and they’re designed to give you some peace of mind so you can buy a used car with confidence. Recently, GM revealed some details about an exciting new program to expand the selection of vehicles you’ll find at your Certified Chevy dealer, giving you more great ways than ever before to pay them money.
The Standard Chevy CPO Terms
At the moment, Chevy has pretty straightforward terms––as set by GM––that you know you can rely on when shopping for one of their CPO models. For starters, every CPO Chevy must be less than six model years old and cannot have more than 75,000 miles on it. In addition, it has to have a clean vehicle title and pass a rigorous 172-point vehicle inspection that includes incredible points like “Owner’s Manual/Warranty Booklet Present” and making sure the engine starts––bold, rigorous stuff!
Those select few models that make it through this exhaustive inspection process can be sold as Certified Pre-Owned Chevy models. Every CPO Chevy comes with a pair of warranties: a 6-year/100,000-mile powertrain limited warranty and a 12-month/12,000-mile bumper-to-bumper limited warranty. Don’t get too excited; the powertrain warranty starts when it was sold new, so it might only have one year and 25,000 miles on it. Still, it’s something, and it shows that Chevy can make their CPO program just like every other manufacturer’s.
GM’s Exciting New Program
Recently, GM became aware of a problem that needed a solution––this is rare, as the auto industry typically tries to come up with solutions they can sell to us and then create problems to justify them. The Chevy Bolt EV, with its whole lights-itself-on-fire thing, is problematic for their Chevy CPO program. In response to this, GM has introduced a new version: the Chevy Certified Blazing Vehicle program (not to be confused with the Chevy Blazer, Trailblazer, or Blazer EV––they really like things that blaze). This new CPO model only applies to pre-owned Bolt EV and EUV models. To meet the high standards of this new program, the Bolt EV must:
- Be from the last 10 model years
- Have fewer than 200,000 miles on it
- Have burst into flames no more than 24 times
- Had its battery replaced to satisfy their recall
As long as the vehicle meets these terms, it can be offered as a CPO Blazing model. Best of all, every Certified Blazing Bolt EV comes with a 4-year/10,000-mile battery and motor warranty and a 12-month/12,000-mile floor mat warranty. Both of these warranties start when the Bolt EV first rolls off the factory floor, and they only cover damage or failure as a result of fires started by something other than the battery in the Bolt EV. I reached out to one of my contacts at GM about this new program, and he said everyone there was excited about it and how it would revolutionize what they can cover under their CPO banner.
He told me additional programs are already being worked on, providing numerous layers of CPO coverage in an effort to make every used model certified in some way. When I asked him if this wouldn’t simply dilute the meaning of “Certified” for their vehicles, in much the way Ford and Nissan have done with their numerous certified tiers, he started cackling maniacally and shouted at someone else that it was his turn to swim in their pool of gold coins.
Editor’s Note: We were unable to confirm the existence of a Certified Blazing Vehicle program with representatives from Chevy and GM. At this time, it seems that Bolt EV models should be covered just fine under the current CPO terms as long as they’ve had their batteries replaced. That’s good enough for us and should be good enough for you too. What’s a little fire damage between customers and dealerships? Buy one already! Thank you.
