I was using a Supercharger at a Service Center and got a notification saying they waived an idle fee because it was my first time. The thing is my car was set to charge for 100% and it stopped at 80%, there was no notification it was a high usage period. How do I fight this and get my one time waiver back?
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Idle Fee
- Thread starter Resist
- Start date
RTPEV
Active Member
Hate to say it, but I think that was your free pass. Now you'll be sensitive to things to watch out for going forward. Make sure you have all your notifications set (including stop charging of course!) and pay attention to them.
My car was set to charge to 100% and stopped at 80% by the Supercharger. How is this something I have to watch out for going forward?
I understand all about the 100% charging thing, but that's not the point. I only did that so I'd have more time at the Service Center, that's attached to the Supercharger and knew I'd be gone way before it got to 100%. But again, the Supercharger stopped at 80% for an unknown reason.Probably best not to charge to 100% going forward unless its for a special need (like a long road trip). Besides, those last few percent take a LONG time
If your at a busy supercharger there will almost always be an 80% auto limit even if you don’t see/miss the notification. If you need that 100% after charging is started and it’s going for a minute or two then set to 100%. Otherwise the charger will almost always cap you at 80%.
It can also decide anytime after charging has started to “reset” the cap to 80% if the location goes from not being classified as high traffic to being classified as high traffic. Have had it happen multiple times on my thousands of miles of road trips. You just need to keep an eye on it, I have been saved a few times from idle fees by changing the % in my app while I was in a store.
It can also decide anytime after charging has started to “reset” the cap to 80% if the location goes from not being classified as high traffic to being classified as high traffic. Have had it happen multiple times on my thousands of miles of road trips. You just need to keep an eye on it, I have been saved a few times from idle fees by changing the % in my app while I was in a store.
You don't. It's an act of grace on Tesla's part, not something you've "owned" or were owed as part of your vehicle purchase. It's granted so that people who aren't aware of idle fees are warned before they actually end up getting penalized, not as a one-time "get-out-of-jail-free card" that comes with the car. Whether you were exposed to idle fees for a "legitimate" reason (or not), or whether it was Tesla's fault and not your fault (or not), is all irrelevant. It sucks a bit for you, but the point is that you've now received your warning. You know about idle fees and therefore you no longer qualify for a further waiver.
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Yes, I've seen those 80% notifications before but not at this one. Now I'm learning that apparently Tesla changed the rules and are saying that if a Supercharger Station is at least 50% full then we get reduced charging and can get an idle fee. I love how Tesla doesn't tell people about this stuff and assumes we are checking their web site daily.
RTPEV
Active Member
How long have you had your car? That rule's been in effect for as long as idle fees have been in place.
ATPMSD
Active Member
Your vehicle will recommend the needed charge level to get to the next Supercharger on your route. To reduce congestion at high-use Superchargers, your vehicle’s charge limit may be automatically adjusted to 80%. You can manually increase the charge limit after plugging in by using the vehicle touchscreen or Tesla app.
www.tesla.com
Idle fees
www.tesla.com
Supercharger Support
Learn more about Tesla Superchargers, including best practices, charging rates, payment methods and locating a Supercharger when you're on the road.
www.tesla.com
Idle fees
Supercharger Idle Fee | Tesla Support
When your Tesla vehicle remains connected to a Supercharger after charging is complete, it may incur an idle fee. Learn more about idle fees.
Exelion
Member
The reason you're not getting a whole lotta love from this thread is nothing against you - It's simply because there's not enough Superchargers to go around for everyone to charge for as long as they want. And we all hate lines for charging.
In an ideal world, there would be 50+ charging stalls at every single offramp (wouldn't that be nice?) no idle fees, and absolutely zero wait times, anywhere, anytime. But we're still far away, and sadly, while cars are being produced faster every year, charging stations are not, so I actually think its getting worse, not better.
So, for the benefit of everyone, (including you!!), and to minimize this ever happening, charge to 80% (always), and then get in your car, and continue on to wherever you're going, because you have no idea how full a Supercharger can get. I've seen a 24 stall station fill up from three to 24 cars in less than five minutes.
In an ideal world, there would be 50+ charging stalls at every single offramp (wouldn't that be nice?) no idle fees, and absolutely zero wait times, anywhere, anytime. But we're still far away, and sadly, while cars are being produced faster every year, charging stations are not, so I actually think its getting worse, not better.
So, for the benefit of everyone, (including you!!), and to minimize this ever happening, charge to 80% (always), and then get in your car, and continue on to wherever you're going, because you have no idea how full a Supercharger can get. I've seen a 24 stall station fill up from three to 24 cars in less than five minutes.
Since December 1st of 2018. And yes, I know idle fees have been around since then. My issue isn't with idle fees in general, it's how it was implemented towards me, if you actually read my post.
RTPEV
Active Member
I did actually read your posts, specifically this one that I was responding to:
The rules were never changed (they've been like that since day 1) and there is no need to check the web site daily because this is not something that has changed. You apparently didn't know the rules (which is fine--I bet a lot of people don't), and Tesla gave you a free pass this time. But now that you know the policy, that doesn't necessarily entitle you to another free pass.
If they do change the rules in the future and you legitimately are not aware because the new policy was only off-handedly mentioned in an Elon Musk tweet or something like that, I think you'd have a case for another free pass. But unless that happens, I'm afraid you've used up your free waiver.
The rules were never changed (they've been like that since day 1) and there is no need to check the web site daily because this is not something that has changed. You apparently didn't know the rules (which is fine--I bet a lot of people don't), and Tesla gave you a free pass this time. But now that you know the policy, that doesn't necessarily entitle you to another free pass.
If they do change the rules in the future and you legitimately are not aware because the new policy was only off-handedly mentioned in an Elon Musk tweet or something like that, I think you'd have a case for another free pass. But unless that happens, I'm afraid you've used up your free waiver.
I didn't even know Tesla gives you a waiver on the first time. Good to know.
I have always seen the notification of high traffic chargers and limit to 80%. I always monitor my charge using my app if I am away from my car.
I have always seen the notification of high traffic chargers and limit to 80%. I always monitor my charge using my app if I am away from my car.
Yes, idle fees have been around since day 1, but not this 50% thing. Maybe I'm not explaining my issue correctly. I'm not complaining about the idle fee in general but when Tesla changes the rules governing them, then they should tell us. It always used to be that once you car was charged to the level you selected then you had 5 minutes before idle fees started. Then they added a heavy usage notifications for Superchargers that were experiencing busier than normal traffic. These notifications popped up on our displays. But now if a Supercharging stations is at least 50% full of cars, then they reduce our charge to a max of 80%. This last change never showed up on my car display, never showed up on the Tesla App. The only place you would know about this change was on the Tesla.com site. Am I supposed to check the Tesla site daily for changes?
RTPEV
Active Member
This is how I always remember it working from day 1. Maybe it's me that's not remembering correctly, but I really don't think anything has changed. In fact, if anything, it's actually loosened up a bit. I think when first rolled out, the 80% was fixed and could not be changed, unless the trip planner had already required charging to >80% to get to the next stop, so the workaround was to always navigate to some place far away. But it was quickly changed to allow you to manually override the charge limit. As far as I know, however, that manual intervention was always required.
You aren't listening. Or perhaps the problem is that you shotgunned this question of yours out into so many threads at once, that you are not going out into those other threads to read the responses.
teslamotorsclub.com
You seem to misunderstand what "this 50% thing" is.
I explained that in my comment I linked above in that other thread. Here's what you're mixing up:
50% relates to whether there WILL or WON'T be idle fees. That's it. If it's less than 50%, then no idle fees in effect. If it's at least 50%, then yes, idle fees are in effect. That's it. There has been no change to that, and that has always been published on that site since they introduced the idle fees. And no, you don't need to go check every day, because it hasn't changed.
This is a separate issue of when Tesla started determining that some sites were high usage and moving people's charge limits down. They have never announced any kind of criteria for that, but they do have the notices in the cars when it happens. (The notices are usually reliable, but not perfect.)
This is not true, and I answered it here:
Idle fee at empty Supercharger?
There is absolutely nothing you can do to fight this with Tesla that won’t take orders of magnitude more effort and time than any ~$10 waived idle fee is worth. Don’t waste your time. They don’t care. All I have is time. lol. But it's more about the principle because seems like I should have...
teslamotorsclub.com
They haven't changed the idle fee part of it. That still works the same way.
Not quite. It was more simple than that. If the car stopped charging, then the 5 minute timer would start. That could be for various reasons. If someone stopped charging intentionally, if the power cut off for some reason, etc. That wasn't always specified that it had to reach your limit. Yeah, that caused some heartburn for people, but that's what it was.
Huh? You just said that the notifications of this show on your displays. So it is there. You don't need to go to the Tesla.com site to find that out.
No, that is false. You are mixing up two things. And that's why they wouldn't need to post an announcement update to their idle fees pages--because what you are stating here isn't true, so there is no change to the idle fee policy.
I explained that in my comment I linked above in that other thread. Here's what you're mixing up:
50% relates to whether there WILL or WON'T be idle fees. That's it. If it's less than 50%, then no idle fees in effect. If it's at least 50%, then yes, idle fees are in effect. That's it. There has been no change to that, and that has always been published on that site since they introduced the idle fees. And no, you don't need to go check every day, because it hasn't changed.
This is a separate issue of when Tesla started determining that some sites were high usage and moving people's charge limits down. They have never announced any kind of criteria for that, but they do have the notices in the cars when it happens. (The notices are usually reliable, but not perfect.)
Ah, well, that's because of this, which I forgot to mention here.
Does Tesla charge idle fees for empty superchargers?
Along I-70 in Kansas, the superchargers are often very, very empty. It's unusual to see a 2nd car. If I go to a restaurant and come out 20 minutes late, will Tesla still charge me idle fees?
teslamotorsclub.com
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Ah, well, there is the theoretical "answer", and then there is the practical "how it plays out in real life" answer.
According to Tesla's policies, if it is less than half full, there should be no idle fees. If it is at least half full, then yes, there would be idle fees. This is sensible and should work pretty well.
However...Tesla's detection systems have been awful at some times in the past about detecting the number of cars accurately. There is this 5 page thread from 2018 of people getting charged idle fees when they were the only car there, or when they were far less than half full, but Tesla's systems were inaccurately showing that the site was mostly full and was assessing idle fees. Hopefully, Tesla has fixed these communication issues some in the last few years, so the in-use stall count is more accurate now.
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And here was the original much longer thread I referenced in 2018 about Tesla's crummy detection systems not being able to tell whether sites are empty or not.
Idle fee at empty Supercharger?
Just got back from a road trip in which I became desperate for some shuteye and wound up sleeping at the Supercharger in Midland, TX, from about 3 a.m. to 8 a.m. (Yeah, I know it violates SC decorum but mine was the only vehicle at that SC the entire time.) Anyway, I received an email from...
teslamotorsclub.com
That didn't happen in my case because in those instances, I stayed in the car.Ah, well, that's because of this, which I forgot to mention here.
lamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/idle-fee-at-empty-supercharger.138438/[/URL]Does Tesla charge idle fees for empty superchargers?
Along I-70 in Kansas, the superchargers are often very, very empty. It's unusual to see a 2nd car. If I go to a restaurant and come out 20 minutes late, will Tesla still charge me idle fees?
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