Autopilot lane keeping still not available over 6 months after delivery

[breser]

You know a lot of people keep saying they wished Tesla wouldn't have done this flashy demo. Well I'm in the other camp. Let me tell you why.

I got my first Model S on September 24th, 2014. A few days before I picked it up cars with the Autopilot hardware started showing up. Nobody knew much. Forum was accusing the person with the car of making things up. By the afternoon I picked up my car it was clear that it was real and that these cars had Speed Assist and Lane Departure Warnings. I was disappointed but didn't really feel I was missing out. These features alone didn't matter much to me.

On October 9th, 2014 Tesla had their D event. They did the flashy Autopilot demo. I realized this was going to be much more than the minor features we'd seen. That this hardware was going to be something they were going to iterate on and would drive a lot of software updates. Now I was upset and frustrated about having missed out on it by roughly 2 days. I posted a lot of whiny posts about that. People on this forum urged me to talk to Tesla about trading. So I sent an email complaining and never got a response at all.

When I saw this I told myself I'd pay up to $5k to have it retrofitted. But obviously retrofitting wasn't possible. So after a week of no response from Tesla I filled out the Value my Trade form on the website. Tesla contacted me. I got a value back and it was $4k less than I paid. After thinking about it for a while I decided to order an 85D with Autopilot.

Part of what made this work for me was that Washington had no sales tax on new Electric Vehicles at the time. So my losses were limited to what the difference between what I'd paid and what I was getting and the tint/paint protection I'd done. So despite only having the car for 2 months I traded it. Because I knew long term I'd be unhappy and would want to trade it. That the Sales Tax exception was expiring in July of 2015 and it was unlikely it would be renewed. So waiting just made me less likely to upgrade.

Had Tesla not done a flashy demo. I would haven't have an Autopilot car at all.

 

[Max*]

I would haven't have an Autopilot car at all.

Technically, you still don't

 

[perkiset]

Just one more for good measure. I want to make sure this gets seen a lot.

This echoes my sentiments exactly. I still absolutely love my Tesla and can't imagine driving anything else.

Spot on, can't get enough of that. Wish there actually was old-school +1 karma on this board, the significance vote would be MOST telling at this point.

And glad to see that non-whiners are coming back and commenting.

 

[darthy001]

Isn't whining about other people whining just as much whining or even simply childish in the way performed here? Seems to me you guys must be lacking a constructive counter-argument so you try to derail the thread by spamming it with endless unneeded quoting, "beer drinking" etc instead....

 

[jeffro01]

While still in informal discussions with Tesla on the matter I'm not going to point out anything specific just yet out of respect to those I've been speaking with. But suffice it to say there is quite a bit that can be done by them that would go a long way with little to no cost to them, and I think it would go a long way towards keeping good faith if they would extend the same to other customers as well, but we'll see.

Honestly, if I were to actually sue that would mean that all other avenues have been exhausted and at that point I wouldn't want anything to do with the company any more. I would certainly be seeking a full purchase price/fees + legal fees buyback at that point. I'm pretty sure it won't come to that.

In any case, I think a lot of people are missing what this has actually done to many people, myself included, who have been strong proponents of Tesla. If you had asked me in say, November, if I would buy a non-Tesla vehicle in the future my answer would have been "Nope" or "most likely not" or something similar. Today? heh. At this point I'm pretty sure my next vehicle is *not* going to be a Tesla. You won't find me singing their praises lately. Just yesterday, like a lot of days, a random stranger asked me something along the lines of, "So, how do you like it?" about the car... and I just wasn't able to spit out my usual "It's awesome" type response. People who thought I was crazy trading a 1 year old P85 towards the P85D have asked me about it as well, after having been given the test-ride tour and overview by a much more enthusiastic 7 month younger self, and have noted that my enthusiasm has gone to the floor in comparison.

Since Tesla's marketing to date has been significantly driven by enthusiasts, and it's obvious I'm not the only one in this situation who feels similarly, I think this is a decent blow to Tesla as a whole and something they're going to have to do something about.... but maybe they think it's easier to just start spending significant funds on marketing instead of making existing customers and enthusiasts happy.

You keep talking about litigation, yet you keep trying to convince us that's not what you want. Which is it? I suspect your using this forum as a public means to extort Tesla. You talk about no longer being a champion of the brand, and enthusiast if you will, so what exactly is the incentive for Tesla to cave to your demands? Oh yeah, I remember, because you'll sue the bastards. It seems that litigation is the only real avenue you have left, so take it. It'll at least require you to stop your endless campaign here as I'm sure your attorney would instruct you to stop posting immediately.

As a shareholder it's customers like you that I fear the most. Tesla isn't perfect, not by a long shot, we all know (especially those that own the car since I don't so my opinion doesn't matter to some) that there are still serious issues to work out with the service center model, warranty repairs, extended warranty deductibles, lack of parts and service manual availability outside of Tesla (and EDIT: Massachusetts), etc... I think Elon and his team are still struggling with how to be a car company and how to do so at such a rapid pace of expansion. Keep in mind that everything Tesla has done to date, they built from the ground up. The service centers, the supercharger network, manufacturing luxury electric cars, all of this is essentially new. Three years is nothing, they're still in the infancy stage of this journey. However, despite all of that they are selling cars as fast as they can make them. That says something right there. Unfortunately as they sell more cars they are going to sell to a wider range of demographics and personalities which is going to cause an intense spotlight to be shown on the things that Tesla hasn't got quite right yet. It's that which makes me most concerned with being long on TSLA. Tesla is fighting an uphill battle against the dealers lobby, state and federal governments, suppliers, and the auto industry as a whole. The last thing it needs are bad customers.

Jeff

 

[Max*]

The last thing it needs are bad customers.

The customer is always right.

P.S. It's Massachusetts, not Maryland.

 

[darthy001]

@jeffro01 of course its an uphill battle, but why add to the problems by having misleading marketing and refusing to change it after numerous complaints?

Here in Norway they are even refusing to follow the norwegian consumer councils demands about advertising in regards to pricing, and Tesla is most likely breaking the local law here regarding how they show the price of the car on the website. I assume the wording on autopilot would get similar treatment if someone made a complaint about it.

These marketing matters arent something that is hard to fix, but Tesla doesnt want to fix it... That would trouble me as an investor....

service centers, software issues, hardware issues, drive unit issues etc is a completely different ballgame that cant be fixed overnight. The marketing actually could!

 

[Andyw2100]

I'm an owner in the not-so-upset camp. I'm disappointed, sure, but not yet as stressed as many of the rest of you. I'd really like to have the feature, I'm quite shocked a few months has turned into 9-10 months at best, probably a year given Elon Standard Time.

That's about where I am on this particular issue as well. (I'm more stressed about others issues. )

I do think it would be smart of Tesla to offer some kind of conciliatory gesture to owners for waiting a year, but I don't have any particularly helpful suggestions.

Exactly! (I've been saying this for a while.)

This is the nightmare scenario for Tesla. I can tell you how that one would end. We'd all get $500 credits toward future repairs and the lawyers would get $180 million in fees.

I think that may well be about accurate too. Which is one of the reasons I think Tesla should do something for us: it will generate good will, and it may serve to help prevent potential legal action.

In any case, I think a lot of people are missing what this has actually done to many people, myself included, who have been strong proponents of Tesla. If you had asked me in say, November, if I would buy a non-Tesla vehicle in the future my answer would have been "Nope" or "most likely not" or something similar. Today? heh. At this point I'm pretty sure my next vehicle is *not* going to be a Tesla. You won't find me singing their praises lately. Just yesterday, like a lot of days, a random stranger asked me something along the lines of, "So, how do you like it?" about the car... and I just wasn't able to spit out my usual "It's awesome" type response. People who thought I was crazy trading a 1 year old P85 towards the P85D have asked me about it as well, after having been given the test-ride tour and overview by a much more enthusiastic 7 month younger self, and have noted that my enthusiasm has gone to the floor in comparison.

Since Tesla's marketing to date has been significantly driven by enthusiasts, and it's obvious I'm not the only one in this situation who feels similarly, I think this is a decent blow to Tesla as a whole and something they're going to have to do something about.... but maybe they think it's easier to just start spending significant funds on marketing instead of making existing customers and enthusiasts happy.

I think this is really significant. wk057 may be at one end of the spectrum with respect to how strongly he feels about this particular issue, and how vocal he is willing to be about it, but I think there are a lot of owners out there who, for whatever reason, have sentiments that are similar to the above. And if theirs are not quite as strong as wk057's, they are probably moving in that direction. This is a problem for Tesla.

You know a lot of people keep saying they wished Tesla wouldn't have done this flashy demo. Well I'm in the other camp. Let me tell you why.

...

Had Tesla not done a flashy demo. I would haven't have an Autopilot car at all.

Sure, but the flashy demo could have included Musk saying things like, "This is what we'll be doing by some time next year", or something along those lines, to make it clear everything being demonstrated and talked about wasn't available yet. The event would have been just as flashy, you'd have your Autopilot car, and we'd have less to complain about.

 

[jeffro01]

The customer is always right.

Man oh man do I despise that statement... IMHO the customer is almost never right...

Jeff

 

[bonnie]

The customer is always right.

Nah, I've fired customers before. Best thing I ever did. Some even came back and apologized.

Don't go down that path - we've had plenty of discussion it it in this forum.

 

[wk057]

You keep talking about litigation, yet you keep trying to convince us that's not what you want. Which is it? I suspect your using this forum as a public means to extort Tesla. You talk about no longer being a champion of the brand, and enthusiast if you will, so what exactly is the incentive for Tesla to cave to your demands? Oh yeah, I remember, because you'll sue the bastards. It seems that litigation is the only real avenue you have left, so take it. It'll at least require you to stop your endless campaign here as I'm sure your attorney would instruct you to stop posting immediately.

Extort? lol. I don't think that word means what you think it means.

Anyway, whether you believe that I don't want to go after Tesla legally or not is your business. I know where I stand, and honestly that's all that matters. I've said quite a few times that Tesla still has time to make this right and I honestly think that they will do that despite having failed thus far. When/if they do I will likely once again be on the road toward regaining the enthusiasm I once had, likely with the caveat of reading quite a bit further into future claims before laying more money down on something of Tesla's.

You continuing to say "sue! sue! sue!" isn't going to change any actions of mine.

Also, unless I'm under some NDA which requires me not to, I see no reason to stop posting on this issue. Clearly Tesla is misleading people with the current and past verbiage they are and have used on this issue, and that needs to be known. I won't let a random shareholder (or anyone) try to silence that. As a shareholder you should be afraid of customers like me. And not just me, but the others who feel the same who are more inclined to be be hasty with regard to legal action.

I think TSLA dropping a full 10+% and wiping out a full quarter's gains in the first 15 minutes of trades this morning after yesterday's conference call says quite a bit, and I'm more than certain some of that has to do with this particular issue.

 

[LetsGoFast]

The 2016 volt is an eco friendly alternative with 53 miles of Electric range. At 35k price point, it has autopilot. It is reasonable to expect tesla at 100k to have autopilot too, no?

When you can actually buy one and it really does autopilot, we should revisit this question. To my way of thinking there is only one manufacturer with technically acceptable lane keeping today and that is the Mercedes system. I actively dislike the fact that it makes you hold the wheel, but it really does work. Systems today in other cars mostly don't work -- they either turn off in far less challenging circumstances than those described by Elon in his tweets and conference calls or they ping-pong like a drunken driver back and forth off the edges of the lane (or often both). Lots of companies have announced autpilot, including Tesla. I'd reserve judgment until you actually see it in action.

Spot on, can't get enough of that. Wish there actually was old-school +1 karma on this board, the significance vote would be MOST telling at this point.

And glad to see that non-whiners are coming back and commenting.

I hope that I qualify as a non-whiner and I do think that I'm still a Tesla advocate, but I find these kind of labels annoying and counterproductive. One could just as easily say the others are whining about people with legitimate complaints. Owners are not required to be advocates for the company. It works great for Tesla when they are, but they aren't being paid to do so. They bought the car with certain understandings and they are entitled to feel however they feel. It would be helpful if both sides could discuss their positions calmly without resorting to calling the others whiners or fanboys or cheerleaders or whatever other unhelpful labels they can think of.

 

[breser]

Sure, but the flashy demo could have included Musk saying things like, "This is what we'll be doing by some time next year", or something along those lines, to make it clear everything being demonstrated and talked about wasn't available yet. The event would have been just as flashy, you'd have your Autopilot car, and we'd have less to complain about.

If and only if Tesla thought it would take this long. If Tesla thought they were close, did the demo and then kept finding issues that delayed them. Or maybe they found that the regulators weren't happy with their implementation and they had to make changes. The truth is we really don't know why it's taking this long. We've had some snippets of insight into some of the problems. But we don't have the big picture.

Hindsight is 20-20.

 

[AC123]

Nah, I've fired customers before. Best thing I ever did. Some even came back and apologized.

Don't go down that path - we've had plenty of discussion it it in this forum.

I think it depends. When you are a beginner you have to be less picky about customers. When you are well established you can be pickier. You cannot treat customers poorly at the start of your career. Tesla is a beginner in the auto industry, and I'd venture to guess that you rejected bad customers when you were well established in your career. So the simile does not apply IMO.

 

[breser]

Technically, you still don't

Then just read that line as "I would never have had Autopilot." Because that's what I meant.

 

[bonnie]

I think it depends. When you are a beginner you have to be less picky about customers. When you are well established you can be pickier. You cannot treat customers poorly at the start of your career. Tesla is a beginner in the auto industry, and I'd venture to guess that you rejected bad customers when you were well established in your career. So the simile does not apply IMO.

Not treating customers well is a vastly different statement than 'the customer is always right'. And no, some of the customers I fired were when I was first starting a consulting business. It stressed me out (income!), but it was the right thing to do. Trust me, the customer is NOT always right and their behavior was going to hurt my fledgling business.

 

[jeffro01]

Extort? lol. I don't think that word means what you think it means.

Anyway, whether you believe that I don't want to go after Tesla legally or not is your business. I know where I stand, and honestly that's all that matters. I've said quite a few times that Tesla still has time to make this right and I honestly think that they will do that despite having failed thus far. When/if they do I will likely once again be on the road toward regaining the enthusiasm I once had, likely with the caveat of reading quite a bit further into future claims before laying more money down on something of Tesla's.

You continuing to say "sue! sue! sue!" isn't going to change any actions of mine.

Also, unless I'm under some NDA which requires me not to, I see no reason to stop posting on this issue. Clearly Tesla is misleading people with the current and past verbiage they are and have used on this issue, and that needs to be known. I won't let a random shareholder (or anyone) try to silence that. As a shareholder you should be afraid of customers like me. And not just me, but the others who feel the same who are more inclined to be be hasty with regard to legal action.

I think TSLA dropping a full 10+% and wiping out a full quarter's gains in the first 15 minutes of trades this morning after yesterday's conference call says quite a bit, and I'm more than certain some of that has to do with this particular issue.

This is extortion at it's finest, only done in a much more clever way, but nevertheless it's still extortion. You start you entire premise by brining up litigation then you try to convince us that's not what you want while constantly talking about it. Talking about how you are working with higher ups at Tesla to make this right, yet you keep talking about litigation. You know what your doing. Trying to argue that you're not is far more disingenuous to this point than Tesla has ever been on any issue. You know full well that market analysts pull from this forum for both positive and negative opinion pieces on Tesla.

As a shareholder, I am afraid of customers like you. Absolutely. Why? Because your unreasonable, irrational, and completely out of bounds on this issue and have pushed it to the point where I'm sure this thread has been read by people who are short on Tesla, not to mention Tesla itself. This does nothing to help anyone, expect maybe yourself if Tesla caves to your demands whatever they may be.

Why is the stock down 10+% this morning? My guess is it's due to the slightly reduced delivery number guidance, and the lack of a Model X design studio (although to a much lesser extent), I doubt the lack of autopilot is going to move the needle that much no matter how much you wish it would.

Jeff

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Not treating customers well is a vastly different statement than 'the customer is always right'. And no, some of the customers I fired were when I was first starting a consulting business. It stressed me out (income!), but it was the right thing to do. Trust me, the customer is NOT always right and their behavior was going to hurt my fledgling business.

Matthew Inman gave some examples of wrong customers as a web designer.

How a Web Design Goes Straight to Hell - The Oatmeal

 

[gizmoboy]

Why is the stock down 10+% this morning? My guess is it's due to the slightly reduced delivery number guidance, and the lack of a Model X design studio (although to a much lesser extent), I doubt the lack of autopilot is going to move the needle that much no matter how much you wish it would.

I agree. I doubt the autopilot situation has much impact on the market numbers at all. But it could be a snowball if the histrionics continue and/or escalate.

 

[wk057]

This is extortion at it's finest, only done in a much more clever way, but nevertheless it's still extortion. You start you entire premise by brining up litigation then you try to convince us that's not what you want while constantly talking about it. Talking about how you are working with higher ups at Tesla to make this right, yet you keep talking about litigation. You know what your doing. Trying to argue that you're not is far more disingenuous to this point than Tesla has ever been on any issue. You know full well that market analysts pull from this forum for both positive and negative opinion pieces on Tesla.

As a shareholder, I am afraid of customers like you. Absolutely. Why? Because your unreasonable, irrational, and completely out of bounds on this issue and have pushed it to the point where I'm sure this thread has been read by people who are short on Tesla, not to mention Tesla itself. This does nothing to help anyone, expect maybe yourself if Tesla caves to your demands whatever they may be.

Why is the stock down 10+% this morning? My guess is it's due to the slightly reduced delivery number guidance, and the lack of a Model X design studio (although to a much lesser extent), I doubt the lack of autopilot is going to move the needle that much no matter how much you wish it would.

Jeff

To extort them I would have to be, as a minimum, unfair to Tesla. In no way have I been unfair to them. On the contrary, as mentioned previously, the people have spoken to are well aware of this thread and my posts in it. I've been very clear on my position on the matter from the start and everyone, including me, would like to avoid legal action. That's not extortion. Something closer to extortion would be me saying something crazy like, buy back my car right now or give me full autopilot right now or else I'm suing, but that's still not even extortion and I've done no such thing even close to that and have no intentions of doing so.

For starters, a prominent topic of my discussions has been regarding the existing wording on the website being unclear and misleading and is something that they should change to be more on par with what people should actually expect from that today vs what it may do in the future. That's extortion? lol.

Get a grip dude, seriously.

Also, re: stock, autopilot and autopilot's deferred revenue was brought up in the shareholder conference call, as well as the letter. Don't think this was overlooked. Is it the whole 10% drop? Not at all, but it's in there.