2003 CADILLAC CTS — Complaint #867871
Open-data reference.
NHTSA Complaint about EXTERIOR LIGHTING:BACK UP LIGHTS filed July 18, 2011
NHTSA complaint #867871 (ODI reference 10413446) concerns a 2003 CADILLAC CTS and was filed on July 18, 2011. The owner reports the failure occurred on March 15, 2011. The vehicle had 55,000 miles on the odometer at the time of the incident. The report was geocoded to Illinois based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as exterior lighting:back up lights, one of NHTSA's standardized taxonomy codes used to group defect patterns across make, model, and year.
The filer flagged the following severity indicators: crash: no, fire: no, injuries: 0, fatalities: 0. No crash, fire, or fatality was associated with this report, which places it in the early-warning stream rather than the priority-review stream. Because a VIN was supplied, this complaint is tied to a specific vehicle and not just a model-year cohort.
Individual complaints are consumer-submitted and unverified by NHTSA engineers — the agency's role at this stage is to collect, index, and make them searchable. What matters for federal action is the pattern: when many owners of the same CADILLAC CTS cohort independently describe similar exterior lighting:back up lights failures, defect investigators have grounds to open a PE and request manufacturer data. Related filings for the same vehicle and component appear below, and the detail page for the full 2003 CADILLAC CTS shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.
Complaint Description
THE REAR BACK UP LIGHT PANEL HAS A PLASTIC COVER OVER IT. MINE FELL OFF AND I AM HAVING A TERRIBLE TIME REPLACING IT. I CONTACTED CADILLAC, BUT THEY DON'T SELL THAT PIECE ANYMORE. THEY HAVE REDESIGNED A REPLACEMENT THAT WILL NOT FALL OFF BUT IT COSTS OVER $500 AND CADILLAC WON'T COVER IT BECAUSE THEY CLAIM IT HAS NOT BEEN RECALLED. AS I DRIVE UP AND DOWN THE STREETS AND HIGHWAYS IN CHICAGO, I NOTICE MANY 2003-2007 CADILLAC CTS ARE ALSO MISSING THIS PART. HOW CAN THIS PLASTIC PART FALL OFF WITH OUT CAUSE AND YET NOT BE RECALLED? *KB
Complaint Details
| NHTSA Complaint ID | 867871 |
| ODI Number | 10413446 |
| Date Filed | July 18, 2011 |
| Failure Date | March 15, 2011 |
| VIN | 1G6DM57N230 |
Similar EXTERIOR LIGHTING:BACK UP LIGHTS Complaints for 2003 CADILLAC CTS
Source: NHTSA Vehicle Complaints Database. Component taxonomy and severity codes are standardized by NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation.
Read our methodology — how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.