[TusharK]

The use of GPS trackers on financed vehicles is quite prevalent in some countries. Now, according to a media report, Toyota Financial Services could introduce a similar device in vehicles that are financed through them in India.



N Raja, Managing Director and CEO, Toyota Financial Services, has stated that the GPS system will ensure safety and security of the vehicle. It will enable the finance company to track down vehicles of loan defaulters. Insurance companies would also welcome the move as it will reduce the possibility of theft. This could result in lower insurance premiums as well.

N Raja also stated that the company is looking to tie up with vendors and localise the product so that it can be made available at an affordable price. The device could be installed by the manufacturer making it an inseparable part of the vehicle and tamper-proof.

Source

Link to Team-BHP News

[ABHI_1512]

As if the stringent financial norms for availing loans not enough, that the companies are thinking of GPS devices pre installed in cars is a serious security lapse trigger. The financing companies have enough checks and balances to act against defaulting customers and this idea of introducing GPS devices is another case of over zealousness.

In today’ day and age, when data is what you need to breach into anyone’s personal space, tracking of individual vehicles just for the sake of catching defaulters is indeed taking the things too far. I hope this thought process is nipped in the bud. This constant need of monitoring everything under the sun is taking us nowhere !

[Zen2001]

So just because someone LEGALLY finances his vehicle, Toyota assumes the right to infringe on his traveling/vehicle usage patterns? What is the guarantee that such companies are not collecting other data from the vehicle and using it for their long term vehicle analysis and research, thereby using customers as their free test drivers? Will this cost be passed onto the customers? And how will it be ensured that this GPS tracking device is physically removed from the vehicle once the loan is closed?

[RedTerrano]

I do not understand the concerns of privacy over this.

1. Owner's (financier's) car, owner's decision. What's wrong with anyone wanting to know the whereabouts of their mobile property?
2. So many companies put trackers on their trucks/buses already
3. My wife's work involves quite a lot of commuting. Many a times, that means late night flight arrival. Thanks to trackers in Ola/Uber, I can know her location during her commute home
4. Trackers a not the only way to "breach" privacy. Tonnes of CCTV camera's nowadays.

[ABHI_1512]

Originally Posted by RedTerrano

I do not understand the concerns of privacy over this.

1. Owner's (financier's) car, owner's decision. What's wrong with anyone wanting to know the whereabouts of their mobile property?
2. So many companies put trackers on their trucks/buses already
3. My wife's work involves quite a lot of commuting. Many a times, that means late night flight arrival. Thanks to trackers in Ola/Uber, I can know her location during her commute home
4. Trackers a not the only way to "breach" privacy. Tonnes of CCTV camera's nowadays.

Little corrections:

1. Financiers are not the owner’s. There is a difference between a lease and hire purchase agreement. A car purchase comes under hire purchase and so you are the owner of your car and not the financier’s.

2. Companies put trackers because that’s their asset and they need to monitor them on real time basis.

3. Again same, Ola and Uber are commercial operators involved in transportation and not cars operated by individuals. They are mandated by law to put trackers for safety and security issues.

4. CCTV camera’s are put by the agencies in order to maintain various roles like law and order, traffic management etc. They are at best tools and not necessarily intrusive.

The moot point here is whether it is necessary to put a GPS device on a car to track defaulters and the answer is no, so why the hassle ?

[RedTerrano]

Originally Posted by ABHI_1512

1. Financiers are not the owner’s. There is a difference between a lease and hire purchase agreement. A car purchase comes under hire purchase and so you are the owner of your car and not the financier’s.

I don't understand the legal terminology. For me owner is whose name is on RCTC. AFAIK in case of hypothecated vehicles, the name would be the financiers. Not 100% sure though.

Originally Posted by ABHI_1512

2. Companies put trackers because that’s their asset and they need to monitor them on real time basis.

Exactly my point. Owner would want to monitor asset.

Originally Posted by ABHI_1512

3. Again same, Ola and Uber are commercial operators involved in transportation and not cars operated by individuals. They are mandated by law to put trackers for safety and security issues.

I think you misunderstood my point. Tracking in this scenario is a safety feature. IMO similar to feeling safe by knowing where one's assets are at any given moment.

Originally Posted by ABHI_1512

4. CCTV camera’s are put by the agencies in order to maintain various roles like law and order, traffic management etc. They are at best tools and not necessarily intrusive.

CCTV can identify who was where at what time. Thus pointed it out since privacy concerns were being discussed.

[saisailendra]

Exactly a year ago, similar news regarding Mercedes Benz having tracking senors in their cars sold, had come out. And they too claimed it would be used in extreme cases of defaulters. But clearly, people had concerns and weren't happy about it.

Link to one of the news articles :
Link

Legally not sure if this is allowed in India or not, but it just doesn't make me feel comfortable having a tracker on the vehicle I keep for certain number of days. Period.

Irrespective of the way they use the data, it always leaves a vulnerability with respect to privacy and safety.

[WhiteSierra]

If I am the owner of a car, I'd like to know where my vehicle is. But I don't want someone else to monitor my vehicle or my movements and track me unnecessarily. This is a serious breach of privacy.

Instead of using GPS device to track financed vehicles, Toyota should add GPS device and give access to owners as a standard safety feature so that owners can track their ride. I've seen many instances of vehicles being abused and taken for personal trips by drivers, service center folks who took an Audi for joy ride (Customer's Q7 being misused by Audi Dealership @ Vakola. Caught by GPS Tracker), valet parking people going around for quick spins and many more instances.

But Insurance companies and Bankers will be more than happy with this. They can happily track down lost vehicles and defaulters easily.

[vsun]

Its definitely a breach of privacy. If this idea of installing GPS devices in the financed vehicles becomes a reality, I will never take finance from Toyota for buying a car.

What if some employee of a financial company passes the GPS details of the car to some miscreants, when a parson traveling in his financed car with his family in a remote area ?

It is not acceptable that a finance company tracks wherever the person goes, just because that the person has taken finance form the company.

Does the Toyota Financial Services facing such a big problem from defaulters? I was surprised.

[Zen2001]

Originally Posted by RedTerrano

I do not understand the concerns of privacy over this.

1. Owner's (financier's) car, owner's decision. What's wrong with anyone wanting to know the whereabouts of their mobile property?
2. So many companies put trackers on their trucks/buses already
3. My wife's work involves quite a lot of commuting. Many a times, that means late night flight arrival. Thanks to trackers in Ola/Uber, I can know her location during her commute home
4. Trackers a not the only way to "breach" privacy. Tonnes of CCTV camera's nowadays.

You are confusing privacy of an individual (vehicle) with that of a company/cab service one. Banks only finance, it's your name on the RC and you are the owner. By your logic, as owners, they should also be paying for maintainence and fuel then! CCTV only give a single point of visual evidence without tracking your driving patterns) whereabouts. How many CCTV installations can you find outside city limits and in rural areas anyway? It's one thing monitoring your own car's whereabouts (geofence) when you've given it in someone else's hands as against having that done unknowningly to you by somebody you don't even know, let alone what other purposes such information might be misused for.

[GTO]

This really could be a deal-breaker for me if I wanted to finance through Toyota's division. Our data privacy levels are anyway poor due to our vast online presence, but the last thing I want is someone monitoring my movement or car's location. Today, they are saying its for "asset security", but who can predict tomorrow? No one can guarantee that this data won't be sold.

If I was the CEO of Toyota Financial Services though, I'd have a simple fix to make this popular in India. A 0.5-1% rate discount on the interest rate to customers who agree to the tracking. The 0.5-1% discount should be easy as asset risk is significantly lowered and Indians love a good deal! Not saying I am okay with this, but just an idea from the businessman's POV. When Indians can happily choose to deposit their life-savings / FDs with a risky bank (e.g. Yes Bank) over a safe bank (e.g. SBI) for a 1% better rate, a tracker is but a minor nuisance.

[tilt]

Originally Posted by GTO

This really could be a deal-breaker for me if I wanted to finance through Toyota's division. Our data privacy levels are anyway poor due to our vast online presence, but the last thing I want is someone monitoring my movement or car's location. Today, they are saying its for "asset security", but who can predict tomorrow? No one can guarantee that this data won't be sold.

If I was the CEO of Toyota Financial Services though, I'd have a simple fix to make this popular in India. A 0.5-1% rate discount on the interest rate to customers who agree to the tracking. The 0.5-1% discount should be easy as asset risk is significantly lowered and Indians love a good deal! Not saying I am okay with this, but just an idea from the businessman's POV. When Indians can happily choose to deposit their life-savings / FDs with a risky bank (e.g. Yes Bank) over a safe bank (e.g. SBI) for a 1% better rate, a tracker is but a minor nuisance.

Re. your first paragraph, it is not just about the data being sold and exploited for other purposes, but also the question of whether and how the GPS will be removed after the money has been paid off. There's no mention of that anywhere.

Re. your second paragraph, do not give them ideas - instead of doing what you suggest what they will do is keep the current rates for people agreeing to be tracked and increase rates for people who opt out.

Cheers

[i74js]

This is nothing but another opportunity to increase funding. During the loan appraisal process, the financing company has CIBIL score of applicant. When its a norm that a score or 750+ is good, why do the finance companies want to fund cars to people with poor or no score and then put these devices on the cars to secure their loans?

Is it not just expansion of business at the cost of privacy of vehicle owner? Instead a better / alternate approach should be to give option to people with no score (one should not take chance with people with poor score since they are responsible for it) to have these devices installed as a pre-condition to loan disbursal.

This will be cost effective and will not create a discomfort for people with good CIBIL rating.

[sukarsan]

All these company executives are walking on thin ice. The head of HDFC vehicle loans division was booted out for packaging these GPS devices with loans.(I suppose there was some deal this guy had with the GPS company). Bundling GPS devices with loans has had a lot of bad press and there are auto executives who still think its a good idea? It adds no value whatsoever and only the GPS makers profit out of this.

[adwaith]

Originally Posted by i74js

This is nothing but another opportunity to increase funding. During the loan appraisal process, the financing company has CIBIL score of applicant. When its a norm that a score or 750+ is good, why do the finance companies want to fund cars to people with poor or no score and then put these devices on the cars to secure their loans?

Is it not just expansion of business at the cost of privacy of vehicle owner? Instead a better / alternate approach should be to give option to people with no score (one should not take chance with people with poor score since they are responsible for it) to have these devices installed as a pre-condition to loan disbursal.

This will be cost effective and will not create a discomfort for people with good CIBIL rating.

This solution makes a lot of sense and should be largely feasible.


Coming to the matter of privacy, it is very difficult in the absence of proper laws to determine if the practice is illegal or not. Based on the Puttuswamy Aadhar judgement, this does seem like a violation of privacy on the face of it but, until such time the matter is brought to Court or a statute is brought into force, it will continue to remain in a gray area which Toyota can exploit.

Playing the devil's advocate, I would like to point out that some Financial Services incentivise better CIBIL scores by giving those with higher scores better rates of interest, but if that was working, I doubt a company like Toyota would resort to such a thing.

This is on a tangent, but those who foreclose loans also take a considerable hit on their credit scores, which would mean that those playing off loans before it is due will also be penalised.