Observations from recent Tesla service (they are far from perfect!)

[Henke]

The free Supercharging goes away upon sale. A friend of mine had the same year car as yours and sold it to a friend of his telling him about free Supercharging. Much to both my friend and the guy he sold the car to surprise, free Supercharging for that specific year car is non-transferable. Yet another Tesla screw over. The moving target that is Tesla is pure bullshit.

I don't think that non-transferable free Supercharging is a screw up. The companies give incentives to people to buy their cars. Those incentives are not longer applicable to second owner.
BMW also made their free 3-year service non-transferable.
Btw, it is unclear if the free 3 year charging that comes with the Taycan is transferable either.

Yeah, I would agree. Porsche only offers 3 years of EA charging and so for Tesla to have offered unlimited for ownership of the car isn't a bad deal. More so because when I bought the car, I was promised only 1000 miles per year and they later upgraded it to unlimited.

I don't disagree that some of Tesla's practices have been shady & dishonest, it's a factor of how the company is run almost like Elon's dictatorship and he makes decisions on a whim.

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[XLR82XS]

Same experience for me when I had mine. Also, I had quality issues after only couple months/few thousand miles and getting it repaired was extremely difficult with their flawed service system and procedure including employees that don't care and are not courteous. Fan boys don't care.... but overall it's BS.

There will be thousands of Model 3's around in the next decade that will be falling apart due to neglect post-warranty coverage.

 

[Henke]

Same experience for me when I had mine. Also, I had quality issues after only couple months/few thousand miles and getting it repaired was extremely difficult with their flawed service system and procedure including employees that don't care and are not courteous. Fan boys don't care.... but overall it's BS.

There will be thousands of Model 3's around in the next decade that will be falling apart due to neglect post-warranty coverage.

Yes their customer service is akin to a low quality brand nowadays. Way different to when I first bought the car when they offered the direct line numbers of the service personnel. Now they almost treat you like you should be happy to own the car and it’s your privilege. I suspect if this continues, in the long run the fanboy perception will not be enough.

 

[Torv]

I don't think that non-transferable free Supercharging is a screw up. The companies give incentives to people to buy their cars. Those incentives are no longer applicable to second owner.
BMW also made their free 3-year service non-transferable.
Btw, it is unclear if the free 3 year charging that comes with the Taycan is transferable either.

The screw up is that they changed the policy mid-stream after you’ve bought the car. In my friend’s case they flat out told him when he bought the car that the Supercharging went with the car. Then Tesla in January 2017 told their customers that any car delivered after March would not have Supercharging for the life of the car. My buddy missed out by two weeks because of Elon’s fickle nature.

 

[Henke]

The screw up is that they changed the policy mid-stream after you’ve bought the car. In my friend’s case they flat out told him when he bought the car that the Supercharging went with the car. Then Tesla in January 2017 told their customers that any car delivered after March would not have Supercharging for the life of the car. My buddy missed out by two weeks because of Elon’s fickle nature.

Yeah that's not cool at all and if it is in writing, would be open to a lawsuit surely as it devalues the car. I was lucky as it was the other way around with me - was told 1k and ended up with unlimited (but cannot transfer).

 

[feye]

In my friend’s case they flat out told him when he bought the car that the Supercharging went with the car.

That is what we were told 2016 when we bought ours - the car needs the SC not me!

 

[epirali]

Yes the Tesla service experience….like all things Tesla its only 75% thought out.

The app is an interesting idea. Until as a Tesla Roadster owner you realize the app DOES NOT know about or support your car. No problem I’ll just call my service center. But wait that is no longer an option. The solution: have to call the main line or wait on an online chat and have THEM try to schedule a service for me. Initially I assumed this had to do with database, etc. But after a couple of years it is clear because there are so few and we no longer are deemed valuable this is just the way it is. There are less than 1000 Roasters in the US and these were early adopters who supported the company at a critical time. But they are disposable.

Keep in mind they were also supposed to be supported at the Superchargers (as decreed by Elon) and that also simply disappeared.

Tells you a lot about the company ethics.

 

[Alemany]

Service - this is why after several Teslas, I dropped the brand. Got tired of their service and in particular their condescending attitude. I even told them that if they didn't improve I was dropping the Tesla and getting a Taycan, they said and I quite "who cares". So I did.

Unlimited charging. I got it for free on my first Tesla and I made it a condition of sale for subsequent Teslas. If I dont get full unlimited charging I dont buy. They always gave it to me. Everything is negotiable.

 

[kort]

Service - this is why after several Teslas, I dropped the brand. Got tired of their service and in particular their condescending attitude. I even told them that if they didn't improve I was dropping the Tesla and getting a Taycan, they said and I quite "who cares". So I did.

Unlimited charging. I got it for free on my first Tesla and I made it a condition of sale for subsequent Teslas. If I dont get full unlimited charging I dont buy. They always gave it to me. Everything is negotiable.

I too did what you did with tesla, always had free charging for as long as I owned the car but I think that they throttled my speeds, I could rarely get over 72kw.
their service wasn't bad, I only needed minor work like replacing the 12v and they sent someone to the house. the bugaboo is that it is impossible to get someone on the phone. the dance was to set a service appointment via the app sometime in the distant future, they'd note it was minor and set a home service call up in a few days.
like I said it is impossible to get someone on the phone.
the other unspoken big issue with tesla is when you need body work done. any sort of repair beyond a minor ding must go through one of their authorized body shops which is ok but the problem is that tesla does not keep a stock of parts on hand so your waits for certain parts can be months. I was without my car for almost 6 months awaiting the proper parts and of course once they arrive they aren't always the correct parts necessitating more delays.
in addition I felt as if tesla screwed me over with their model S with the 90kw battery that suffered severe range losses and they sent an update which took even more range until they corrected it. when I bought my model 3 they screwed the early buyers out of a 5k price drop.
so like you I plan on not going back to tesla anytime soon. but their tech is so much better.

 

[kort]

Yes the Tesla service experience….like all things Tesla its only 75% thought out.

The app is an interesting idea. Until as a Tesla Roadster owner you realize the app DOES NOT know about or support your car. No problem I’ll just call my service center. But wait that is no longer an option. The solution: have to call the main line or wait on an online chat and have THEM try to schedule a service for me. Initially I assumed this had to do with database, etc. But after a couple of years it is clear because there are so few and we no longer are deemed valuable this is just the way it is. There are less than 1000 Roasters in the US and these were early adopters who supported the company at a critical time. But they are disposable.

Keep in mind they were also supposed to be supported at the Superchargers (as decreed by Elon) and that also simply disappeared.

Tells you a lot about the company ethics.

the big problem with tesla, and it was touched on in a WSJ article this past weekend is the cash crunch he was suffering from just before the model 3s were to be delivered. he cut the delivery and customer service staffing to bare minimum levels, he went through managers if they weren't sycophants and as the volume of teslas out there went from under 100k cars to many hundreds of thousands of cars he didn't increase service capabilities so the service side collapsed under the pressure. then in order to get the delivery numbers up to impress wall st. he was sending out defective cars and expecting the already overwhelmed service centers to make the "minor" fixes.
not every buyer makes a meticulous inspection of the car, especially on home delivery and many flawed cars made it out without the needed fixes. and the ones who did reject delivery were told either take this car or wait months or were threatened with being blacklisted.
tesla is not the ethical company some of their more dedicated fan bois think that they are.

 

[XLR82XS]

Service - this is why after several Teslas, I dropped the brand. Got tired of their service and in particular their condescending attitude. I even told them that if they didn't improve I was dropping the Tesla and getting a Taycan, they said and I quite "who cares". So I did.

No matter what happens with that company the ownership/brand experience and enthusiast groups will never be what Porsche is and is about.

 

[Torv]

Service - this is why after several Teslas, I dropped the brand. Got tired of their service and in particular their condescending attitude. I even told them that if they didn't improve I was dropping the Tesla and getting a Taycan, they said and I quite "who cares". So I did.

Unlimited charging. I got it for free on my first Tesla and I made it a condition of sale for subsequent Teslas. If I dont get full unlimited charging I dont buy. They always gave it to me. Everything is negotiable.

Yep. Me too. I totally tired of their poor communication, their incessant nickel and diming me and the poor overall quality of service.

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