The United States has one of the most effective automobile investigation and recall programs in the world. Because of the hard work of the Office of Vehicle Safety Compliance (OVSC) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) team, every day millions of drivers can feel safer on our roadways. The NHTSA reports show that manufacturers filed over 650 safety recalls, affecting over 17.8 million vehicles, child seats and vehicle equipment, during 2012. The NHTSA played a large role by influencing the recall of more than 9 million vehicles and 60,000 items of vehicle equipment, including tires and child safety seats. Below is the top five automobile manufacturers experiencing the highest number of vehicles recalled in 2012.

• Toyota Motor Corp. led all automakers with 5.3 million vehicles recalled and 12 recall campaigns.
• Honda Motor Co. was second with 3.4 million vehicles and 16 campaigns.
• General Motors Co. had 17 recall campaigns resulting in nearly 1.5 million vehicles recalled.
• Ford Motor Co. had 24 recall campaigns totaling about 1.4 million vehicles.
• Chrysler Group LLC had 13 recall campaigns totaling about 1.3 million vehicles.

Consumer complaints play a large roll in recalls being issued by the NHTSA. In fact, recalls are regularly the result of a government investigation into consumer complaints, but complaints from vehicle owners are falling. In 2012, NHTSA received 41,912 complaints, compared to 49,417 in 2011, and 65,765 in 2010. According to the (NHTSA) recall statistics, the number of vehicle recalled increased 4.5% since 2011 even though the number of recall campaigns was less.