Recall Date: 7/24/2026
NHTSA ID: 26V4781
Mfr. Campaign Number: N/A
Manufacturer: Mercedes-Benz USA, LLC
Affected Components: Door-Lock Microswitches
Potential Number of Units Affected: 310,667
The recall reaches across seven Mercedes-Benz platforms and nearly every body style built on them, from the A-Class up through the GLC. Mercedes lists 29 separate vehicle groups, and unlike most campaigns, it estimates that 100 percent of the population carries the suspect part:
The common thread is the driver door-lock microswitch, supplied by Kiekert AG in Germany, across nine related part numbers. Because of a deviation in the supplier's development process, the switch housing on these vehicles may not meet moisture-robustness requirements. Vehicles outside the recall population use microswitches that pass those requirements, which is how Mercedes drew the line on which VINs are in and which are out.
The failure builds slowly and depends heavily on climate. Moisture permeates the plastic housing, and under sustained heat, humidity, and condensation, it can reach the electrical contacts and corrode them. The more a door is used, the more exposure the switch gets. When the driver door switch fails, the electronic parking brake and the Auto-Park function tied to the driver door opening may not engage on their own. The lock still latches, and the door still works. What is lost is the car's ability to know the door was opened, and with it the automatic safeguards that keep the vehicle from rolling.
Mercedes has attached Do Not Drive and Park Outside advisories to this campaign, so owners should read their notification closely and not treat a corroding switch as a minor electrical quirk. There is usually a tell before anything serious happens. Drivers often notice comfort features behaving oddly, most commonly the radio staying on after they exit and lock the car. That symptom is the switch failing to register that the door opened, and it is worth reporting to a dealer rather than ignoring.
The remedy is a replacement. An authorized Mercedes-Benz dealer replaces the driver door lock with one that meets the moisture-robustness requirement, free of charge. Because some owners may have already paid to address this condition, Mercedes is also offering pre-notice reimbursement under the federal reimbursement rules. Dealers were notified on July 31, 2026, VINs became searchable the same day, and owners will be notified on or before September 18, 2026 on a phased schedule. Owners can confirm whether a specific vehicle is included by entering the VIN at NHTSA.gov/recalls.
This one took years to come into focus. Mercedes received scattered reports of quality failures between 2021 and 2024, things like the radio or lights staying on after a driver exited, but at the time none of it appeared to carry a safety risk, and the company kept monitoring. A report from outside the United States in May 2025 changed that, prompting a detailed technical assessment of the door lock and the switch inside it. From June through December 2025, engineers reviewed diagnostic data, tested components, and worked with the supplier to understand what was happening.
The investigation landed on moisture. Corrosion could form when moisture permeated the switch housing under the right climatic conditions, and through the first half of 2026 Mercedes worked out exactly which conditions, sustained humidity, elevated temperature, and condensation, were needed for it to progress. That climate analysis is why the estimated defect rate reads as high as it does while real-world failures stay comparatively rare. On July 17, 2026, Mercedes concluded it could not rule out a safety risk and decided to recall. To date it is aware of 176 field cases in the US, all tied to comfort functions, reported between March 2021 and June 2026, and no rollaway incidents in the US. The supplier corrected its production process on May 20, 2026.
The takeaway for dealers is scope. This is a 310,667-vehicle recall spread across seven platforms and eight model lines, with a symptom, a radio that will not shut off, that owners are far more likely to dismiss as a glitch than to connect to a rollaway risk. The volume is large, the repair is defined, and the challenge is getting the right owners to book before a nuisance becomes a safety event. For a more in-depth look at this quarter's recall history, check out our Quarterly Recall Report.
A recall this size lives or dies on outreach. The affected models run from 2019 through 2026 and span the best-selling GLB and GLA lines, so a single dealer's market can hold thousands of these VINs. The warning sign owners will actually experience is a radio that stays on, does not read as urgent, which means many will keep driving without ever booking the fix. That gap between a quiet symptom and a serious advisory is exactly where recall campaigns stall.
BizzyCar's Recall Outreach product identifies vehicles in a dealer's market with open recalls and books the service appointment automatically through two-way SMS, so the message reaches owners where they actually respond. That turns a sprawling, seven-platform campaign into scheduled service traffic, brings A-Class, CLA, GLA, GLB, C-Class, CLE, and GLC owners back through the door, and opens the maintenance and declined-service conversations that come with every visit. Book a demo.