Missed a car payment? Self-driving cars could repossess themselves

Missed a car payment or two? Ford is patenting a system that could allow self-driving cars to repossess themselves.

The patent application submitted in the US is titled “Systems and Methods to Repossess a Vehicle” and describes using vehicles' built-in data connections to remotely disable a car’s functions to serve as warnings if the owner has missed instalments.

Made possible by the same technology that enables over-the-air software updates, the car would gradually deactivate features like cruise control, automated window controls, automated seat controls and some components of the infotainment system, escalating to functions like the aircon, remote key fob and automated door locking/unlocking.

If that doesn’t convince you to make payment, the car would play an “incessant and unpleasant sound” whenever the owner is inside the vehicle. If that doesn’t work the vehicle could lock the owner out. In future, in the age of fully autonomous cars, the vehicle could drive itself to a repossession agency as a final measure.

The patent application also describes a “predesignated location” that could include the scrapyard. If the bank finds the vehicle to be non financially viable for repossession, “the repossession system computer may co-operate with the vehicle computer to autonomously move the vehicle from the premises of the owner to a junkyard”.

For now it is just a patent application and Ford has not announced when the technology might be introduced into its cars.

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