2000 Rain leaking through the pollen filter

The damage caused by this leak was a $2300 repair because the leak knocked out my transmission control and stopped the car from running. This was after the recent heavy rains in the Northeast - but surely this situation was not unique. The service manager told me he had 10 VW's in for the same problem.

My comprehensive insurance covered all but $500. I have 2 questions:

1) Has this happened to you? And if so, was the repair successful - reinforcing the pollen filter housing and replacing the transmission controls?

2) Because this is clearly a defective design issue - nothing to do with wear and tear - is there any chance VW America will reimburse my deductible $500?

Thanks, all.

hopefully after replacing the TCM and other parts they installed new gasket maker to pollen filter tray so this wont happen again!

Also on the driver side under the relay/ecm box the same

Thanks Jup! I've checked the invoice and the parts list states:

4 body plugs @$1.20
1 filter element @$17.33

Doesn't sound like the parts you're recommending... or are they just being called something else?

Thanks again - I've no idea how widespread this problem is.

I experienced the same problem in my '99 Passat. The sunroof drains were plugged causing the floorboard to get soaked and ruin the transmission control module. This happened during heavy rains brought on by hurricane Frances in 1999. The local VW service dept. repaired it and fortunately hurricane Ivan came through 9 days later to prove that it had NOT been successfully repaired. They finally fixed it on their dime.

the body plugs there talking about are problably the ones under the car. There are gaskets under the pollen filter box and ecm box that wear out causing water in the car.

Thanks for the clarification, Jup. I'll make sure to replace these parts.

Ngonce, If I believe the mechanic, mine was a pollen filter problem, not a sunroof issue.

Babaloo