How to Find RV Recalls and Service Bulletins
- Just CAMP Wait
- Apr 11
- 3 min read
One of the most overlooked tasks for keeping your RV safe and in good working condition is checking for recalls and service bulletins that effect your year, make, and model. Like all vehicle manufacturers, RV manufacturers make mistakes. When that happens, federal law requires them to report recalls and manufacturer communications to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). More often than not the RV manufacturers are proactive in reporting these issues and the NHTSA makes them easy to access for consumers through their website. You can even sign up for email notifications to make sure you receive any new recalls as soon as they are available. It is important to note that recalls are for more serious immanent "safety" issues and carry more oversight while manufacturer communications are generally in the form of bulletins and often impact things like needed inspections or functional issues that don't pose or are thought to pose an immediate risk to safety.
One of the most concerning things that I've noticed about RV recalls and manufacturer communications is how rarely owners are directly notified and how often dealers fail to check their stock for known issues. I haven't really been able to pinpoint why this is since most new vehicle manufacturers are pretty good about sending out mailers or advertising recalls. Case in point is an issue that I discovered on my current RV. My RV was supposed to come with an inverter prep package, but when the time came to use it I couldn't find the wiring. After some research I found that the manufacturer had issued a service bulletin via a manufacturer communication about this issue. The biggest concern came when I realized the bulletin was posted 7 months prior to my purchase off the dealer lot. That means the dealer was either unaware that a repair was required or chose not to do it during the dealer prep for sale. Luckily this wasn't a serious issue, but without checking the NHTSA website we could have been staying in an RV with a serious issue due to the dealer oversight.
So, let's get into exactly how to check your RV for and issues. The first thing you need to do is go to www.NHTSA.gov and have your year, make, and model or VIN available. Simply input your information into the search bar on the website to search for your RV. If you don't have all the information, you can often find what you're looking for by just inputting the year and make.
Next you can find your model and see what recalls, investigations, complaints, or manufacturer communications have been submitted. If you see a number in the column, it indicates how many are available for that model. Simply click on the number to pull up the information for the reported issues.
If you scroll down the page a little bit, you will see that you can sign up for notifications for your particular RV.
Checking your RV for recalls is something that every owner should be doing. Don't count on the dealer or manufacturer to ensure you have been contacted. Some issues that become recalls can be life threatening and the best thing you can do is to check the NHTSA website on a regular basis or sign up for alerts so you get the information you need to keep on camping.
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