WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. -

One of the dealers cited in a complaint revealed by the Federal Trade Commission last week is going back online to defend himself.

Tracy Myers gave a statement to Auto Remarketing via Facebook about the FTC coming down on Frank Myers AutoMaxx LLC, one of five dealerships mentioned in the commission’s documents pertaining to a crack down on false or exaggerated advertising.

“Please know that I am not angry that the story was released,” Myers emphasized. “I knew it was going to be released last fall.

“I was upset because of the heavy slant towards the FTC with almost all the facts sensationalized,” he continued to Auto Remarketing. “To make matters worse, my local media picked up the story and used their slant. They (the local media) reached out to me and didn’t use my side of the story at all. I wasn’t asking for partiality, I was simply asking for the entire story to be told.”

The FTC charged that the ads — which ran on the dealers’ websites, as well as on sites such as YouTube.com — “deceived consumers into thinking  they would no longer be responsible for paying off the loan balance on their trade-in, even if it exceeded the trade-in’s value.”

“Instead, the dealers rolled the negative equity into the consumer’s new vehicle loan or, in the case of one dealer, required consumers to pay it out of pocket,” FTC officials continued.

Basically, the FTC contends that in these ads, the dealerships promised to pay off a consumer’s trade-in no matter what the consumer owed on that particular unit.

Auto Remarketing’s complete report on the FTC’s announcement, as well as guidance from Hudson Cook partner Tom Hudson on how dealers can avoid legal troubles, can be found here.

Meyers posted a video on YouTube explaining his side of the issue. Meyers’ comments can be viewed below.