We’ve all seen those huge car haulers on the highway, often driving carefully (or not) with their precious cargo valued in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. After all, those cars that come out of the factories on a daily basis need to get to their respective dealerships, often thousands of miles away. Big companies like General Motors contract out to car haulers to make these deliveries. But what happens when automaker-car hauler relations go south?

Well it turns out that cars can be very effective “collateral.” The Detroit News reports that GM has sued Allied Systems Ltd. for effectively holding thousands of Camaros and Silverado pickups hostage over a pay disagreement.

According to the lawsuit, GM is suing to get the 1,700 captive vehicles back immediately, as well as costs and unspecified damages at the automaker attempts to get the car deliveries back on track. Many of these cars have already been ordered and paid for, and GM understandably doesn’t want to piss off its customer base by not delivering the promised vehicles.

So why did Georgia-based Allied Systems decide to hold all these vehicles hostage? Well apparently Allied failed to get cost cutting concessions from its teamsters union, so Allied went to GM and asked for a substantial 15% increase in what they’re charging GM. But the General declined, and so Allied decided to immediately stop deliveries of GM cars. GM is already courting other delivery companies, so we’re thinking Allied may have miscalculated and overstepped their bounds. Hopefully GM can get those Camaros and the other vehicles delivered to their rightful owners soon.