The scandal began late in the year 2015 on 18th November and was discovered by EPA (The US Environmental Protection Agency). The EPA issued a notice of the violation of the clean air act to the German automobile manufacturer in regards to the unethical trick that they used. The Volkswagen Company had designed a turbocharged direct injection on TDI diesel engines to enable them to pass the emission test and qualify to be used in the first world countries. The injection was programmed to control and hide certain emissions during laboratory emission assessments to meet the US demands. In the real world driving, these cars omitted about forty times NOX and the device was installed in about eleven million cars worldwide including 500,000 vehicles that were used the US.

After extensive investigations, the CEO of the company reported that the six executives who were apprehended were not responsible for the cheating. This was an act done by rogue and scrupulous engineers within the organization. Hans-Dieter Pötsch, the chairman of Volkswagen, admitted to the series of fraud and took the responsibility. In his statement, he revealed that they engaged in these malpractices because they lacked a technical solution to beat the short deadline to make diesel engines that would meet the US emission standards. He was speaking on behalf of the company and gave insight on how the situation was handled in the organization.

Nobody was arrested in regards to the scandal, but the company was fined heavily on various accounts. First, it incurred the cost of repairing over 500, 000 diesel engines from the US and 11, 000, 000 vehicles across the globe. It settled the inconveniences caused to its dealers from all over the world, and this amounted to about $1.5 billion. The fine for cheating was estimated to be $45 billion and was the highest amount ever fined by the US to a stellar company. Both Volkswagen and Audi 3.0 capacity diesel engines were found to be non-compliant with the US standards.

Quality control and inspection checklist serve two significant roles; first is to outline quality standards and that the product meets the requirements that the producer is expected to meet. Secondly, it provides an objective criterion for assessing the product to ensure that the customer’s expectations are duly met. The Volkswagen failed to observe the two vital procedures in their production, and this resulted in the consequences that are mentioned earlier in this post. In an aim to prevent such occurrences in the future, it is crucial that the checklist includes clearly written and printed forms. These forms can contain sufficient information on what and how one plant has manufactured a particular commodity to guide the other plants in doing the same. For instance; if a plant in Germany has invented a new technology, it must inform the sister firms on how to go about it to ensure uniformity in their products. Secondly, the checklist should contain on site tests and checks. These are important in informing other manufacturers and dealers on what tests the given product is expected to pass. This is important because it guides automakers on how to make efficient vehicles that observe the set standards in the world. Thus, meeting both the consumers’ expectations and complying with the environmental regulatory authorities and other respective watch dogs. Conclusively, automakers should ensure consumer safety and uphold all the set regulations so as the industry.