It's time to move your clocks forward — and to check if your car is being recalled

It's "Vehicle Safety Recalls Week," an initiative by federal regulators to encourage drivers to check if their car has been recalled during the two days a year when clocks in the U.S. change. (Jon Cherry/Getty Images)

A shoddy part. Faulty design. A mistake on the assembly line discovered too late. All those things can cause potentially dangerous flaws in vehicles. And when automakers discover them, they're required to fix them, for free.

And while manufacturers have to send out letters to notify drivers, it's all too easy to miss the memo. The result? Millions of vehicles are driving around with potentially dangerous problems, which owners could get fixed for free — if they knew about it.