Anyone who owns a car in France will be familiar with the biennial vehicle safety checks, called the ‘contrôle technique’ (CT). Two new checks are being added to France’s mandatory vehicle roadworthiness tests, bringing the total to 136 – but not all cars will be affected.
A ‘contrôle technique’ is the main roadworthiness test for vehicles older than four years which weigh under 3.5 tonnes. Saturday (May 20 2023) saw the implementation of two new checks added to the test. They concern the European ‘eCall’ emergency system installed in cars since April 1st 2018 and the energy consumption of new vehicles since January 1st 2021.
The ‘eCall’ emergency calling system allows for the automatic or manual contacting of emergency services via your car. The system also provides emergency services with additional information about the state of your car, including its location.
Mechanics will check for 13 possible faults with the system, but only one (a total or partial failure of a key part of the system’s hardware) will result in failure with a subsequent partial test recall to verify the repair of the defect – all others will be classed as minor faults.
The energy consumption text is an ecological one. It measures the volume of fuel burnt and electricity consumed in all combustion and hybrid engine vehicles. Mechanics will check the OBFCM (On Board Fuel Consumption Monitoring) device.
- This information will be collected (with the car owner’s approval) and then sent – via CT regulatory group UTAC (Union Technique de l’Automobile, du Motocycle et du Cycle) – to the European Commission.
- Here, it will be compared to predicted emissions data from vehicles to check the overall energy efficiency of car types.
Once the data is forwarded to the UTAC, the centre where you took your CT test has to delete it from their servers.