I stumbled upon an ad in a magazine in late summer of 2008, that said I was entitled to make a claim for the work I had on my old Grand Am.

I filed online, submitting supporting documents that I scanned, using their online system. I was disappointed to learn that under the terms of the settlement, I was only entitled to $100 of the possible $400 I could have received, due to me sitting on getting the work done on my car when it developed the manifold gasket problem. Bear in mind, the fault was the same as someone claiming and receiving the full $400 - I just fell out of the five year, arbitary cutoff by a few months.

Yesterday (2/6/09) I received a standard form notice in the mail titled 'Notice of Deficiency' which states that my claim is deficient due to repairs occurring after 150,000 miles.

This is blatantly false, as the supporting documents showed that the mileage on the car when it was repaired a couple of years ago was around 55,000 miles. I doubt the car is even at 150,000 miles today, eight months after I traded it in at 70,000 miles.

I now have to return the signed letter, restating my claim and submit the sales receipt I had already scanned and sent in.

I suspect this is a scam, to restrict the payouts by inconveniencing the class members so it remains to be seen whether my claim will actually be honored.