The Land Transport Authority (LTA) has taken parallel importer I-Auto to court for falsifying a car's year of manufacture. The car - a second hand Rolls-Royce Phantom Extended Wheelbase - was originally manufactured in February 2008 according to Roll-Royce Motor Cars Singapore but is indicated as April 2011 according to official import and registration documents.
The second hand luxury limousine was imported from Cyprus for 31-year old Indonesian businessman Nico Po. The issue was raised when the businessman took his uber luxury ride to Rolls-Royce Singapore to obtain a warranty - only to realise an inconsistency in manufactured dates.
Besides the warranty issue, Mr Nico is also not eligible for the scrap rebate amount of roughly $290,000. According to local rules parallel imported cars are only eligible for rebates if the car is no older than three years from date of registration when it arrives here.
The original manufactured date of February 2008 for the above mentioned Rolls-Royce thus disqualifies it.
This is not the first time LTA has taken companies in the auto trade industry - most tending to be parallel importers - to court over wrongly declared details.