Post your delivery help experiences

[Electroman]

So I went to Dallas Service Center which also doubles as a delivery center sometime around noon last Saturday.To start with i was not even sure if my offer to help is even welcome there and would they consider my presence as help or a nuisance. So I tried calling them ahead but it only goes to the central number and they wouldn't put me onto anyone in that store. So I decided to take a chance to see for myself. If I am not needed, I will just ogle at various colors and a white interior, and head back. That was my plan.

I went there around noon and that place was buzzing. I asked a rep that as a owner I am available to answer any questions on Model 3 specifically around Autopilot. The Tesla employee was delighted. He immediately went over and put me onto an a family who have been waiting patiently. My original intent was just to explain how to effectively use Autopilot. But the customer asked me to explain all the basics of UI, charging and anything else that I would like to. Since the only demo display car was already occupied by another family - which incidentally was also an owner talking to them - we walked over to my car. The guy had a ton of questions, although he apparently has seen a ton of videos himself and knew a lot. We spent over 30 minutes going over most of the stuff, before he was pulled over to his car which was ready for delivery.

I then talked to 3 other customers waiting for delivery. All terribly excited. Some more knowledgeable having read and watched videos from the internet, while one person knew nothing, and none of them had any practical experience with an EV before. 2 out of the 4 had NOT even test driven Model 3 or any other Tesla.

All in all a great fun experience talking to customers and explaining a lot about their Model 3 and experience of owning an EV.

Few things:

- the Tesla guy said they were delivering over 100 cars that day. Judging from the cars on the lot I am guessing 70% M3, 20%S and 10%X. But during the 3 hours I was there, the delivery process seemed slow and I am not sure how could they deliver 100 cars. Do they even have space to park 100 cars?. But I didn't look everywhere though. May be 50? But then I don't know.

- Some of them were waiting for hours and they were more than a bit frustrated not knowing when they can get going. There was a lady who was alone and kept muttering, this is unacceptable. She does not even know why her car is not ready, and why she has been asked to wait.

- 2 of the 4 I met bought FSD. The way they explained FSD to me, I was cringing. I bit my tongue and didn't say anything. They all got really caught up with the Muskish hype around FSD. I felt sorry for them.

- I went the next day (Sunday). Again I couldn't reach anyone in that store. So decided to drive and check. And the scene on Sunday was exactly the opposite. Hardly anyone there. One or two Tesla employees were busy with some paper work, and the whole place was quiet with just two customers picking up their cars at that time. So I left after a few minutes. That made me wonder, why schedule so many on Saturday when some of them could have picked their cars the next day.

If required I will do this again. Its fun. I love it.

 

[JPP]

Side note--I was at Fremont today Monday 9/24 at 8:30 am to pick up my MCR P3D+ (....my sig line not updated). Spoke to a manager type checking folks in and acting as traffic cop (...actually it was fairly quiet and orderly at that time). She spoke glowingly of the Tesla advocates who showed up over the weekend, and looked forward to their help next weekend. They did not ask for help during the weekdays (...not sure why). Keep up the good work and mission.

 

[SMAlset]

While a lot of Model 3 owners are already Tesla owners, we have a lot of new owners to Tesla with many not even having test driven or sat in the car before.

If you are not especially tech savvy or you have been driving an older car without GPS maps, cellphone connection, voice navigation, setting profiles, charging and now throw in autopilot etc, suddenly sitting in your brand new, rather expensive car for the first time and needing to drive home from the Delivery Center probably can make some a bit nervous. Getting someone set up with the basics of what they will need to drive home and feel comfortable doing so is such a great thing to help out with.

I applaud everyone who can volunteer in this fashion. We all probably do this to some extent when you chat with newbies at the Supercharger and exchange tips. I met a new Model 3 owner just Monday who said he had just picked his car up an hour ago from the Fremont Delivery Center and was driving home to central California but needed more of a charge than it was delivered with. He had gone in and out of the car a few times and appeared to be checking the charging port. Saw he had the temporary Registration on the window and so asked him if needed any help charging....BTW always good idea to check out your charging ability as soon as possible. He knew about the pairing of stalls but wasn't aware of the charging completed 5 minute grace period before fines began. Probably a good thing to mention TMC as well.

 

[LM-5]

While a lot of Model 3 owners are already Tesla owners, we have a lot of new owners to Tesla with many not even having test driven or sat in the car before.

If you are not especially tech savvy or you have been driving an older car without GPS maps, cellphone connection, voice navigation, setting profiles, charging and now throw in autopilot etc, suddenly sitting in your brand new, rather expensive car for the first time and needing to drive home from the Delivery Center probably can make some a bit nervous. Getting someone set up with the basics of what they will need to drive home and feel comfortable doing so is such a great thing to help out with.

I applaud everyone who can volunteer in this fashion. We all probably do this to some extent when you chat with newbies at the Supercharger and exchange tips. I met a new Model 3 owner just Monday who said he had just picked his car up an hour ago from the Fremont Delivery Center and was driving home to central California but needed more of a charge than it was delivered with. He had gone in and out of the car a few times and appeared to be checking the charging port. Saw he had the temporary Registration on the window and so asked him if needed any help charging....BTW always good idea to check out your charging ability as soon as possible. He knew about the pairing of stalls but wasn't aware of the charging completed 5 minute grace period before fines began. Probably a good thing to mention TMC as well.

It is pretty bizarre to think that some people are basically learning how to operate a vehicle all over again. A lot of us take for granted how crazy all of this can be to a complete novice. It’s really cool that the community is coming together to help.

 

[Feathermerchan]

Went to Dallas (Cedar Springs) ~9:30am for my 3:45PM delivery. Got to talk to several customers and one employee about model 3's. It got really busy in the afternoon and I finally got my car around 6PM.
The N Tex Tesla Owners club is asking for member volunteers to schedule themselves for Saturday (today).
There was some information about how to approach this. The only thing I would say is that this should not be about (promoting) your club but about helping people.

 

[Tony8489]

I read this thread yesterday and so my wife and I went to the Burbank Service Center 3 miles from home about 3:45PM yesterday. The place was jam packed with cars but not that overrun with customers. They gave us the red badges to wear but there were any immediate customers at the orientation phase. I did direct one guy to some Tesla employees as the one at the delivery desk was tied up. There were also some people looking over a Model 3 at one of the Superchargers. One of them questioned me about pricing and available configurations of Model 3, which I was able to answer in some detail from what I read here.

We noticed right away that nearly all the cars in the lot were Models S and X. I inquired, and one of the delivery people told me that all of of this weekends deliveries at Burbank Service Center would be S and X. This will make our orientation job easier as we have 2.5 years experience with our Model S but only about 5 minutes in a showroom fiddling with screen of a Model 3. We were told that all of the Model 3 deliveries out of Burbank this weekend will be home deliveries. My guess is that's because so many Model 3's are being stored in the big lot near Burbank Airport.

We then helped two new owners with orientation. One was an interesting case of a Model X demo with ~500 miles. It had 3 scratches on the left front corner, which probably occurred that same day from another car parking carelessly next to it. The new owners were first upset that an employee had said, "What do you expect, it's a demo car." I was not present at that time, and the employees that were around when I was there were working hard to resolve the situation. The owners were skeptical of touch-up or repainting, but the situation was resolved to everyone's satisfaction by arranging to swap out the front bumper with another demo Model X. My wife and I proceeded with the orientation and answering questions while the employees researched the bumper situation. The new owner family lived 25 miles away so they were provided a loaner Model S to take home. Within a few hours Tesla planned to home deliver the Model X with the new front bumper.

We are soon headed back there to help out this afternoon. Burbank still wants volunteer help even though it's only Models S and X. Yesterday they said they were scheduled to deliver a car every 12 minutes today.

 

[Tony8489]

I was at Burbank SC from 12:30 - 6:00. It was much busier today, but oddly I only did one in-car orientation. Another guy with 2-week old Model X came in with questions and they sent me to answer them. His car would take off like a rocket if he tried TACC, so I went into his settings, found default had somehow been set to speed limit + 30mph and changed it to speed limit + 5mph. I also demonstrated autopark and summon for him.

The logjam was not on showing people their cars after paperwork was done. Upon arrival for their appointments, some new buyers had a wait to see a delivery specialist and in some cases paperwork was out of order and in a couple of cases of cars had to be located. 3 of us volunteers were there and could engage the buyers on more general questions regarding home charging, travel with superchargers, TACC/autopilot etc. The delivery people thanked us and found us helpful even though we engaging the customers at a different stage than anticipated. There were 3 of us volunteers, all with the same experience mostly taking to customers up front rather than later on.

The new customers were nearly all S75D or X75D. I had the distinct impression when I was ordering 3 years ago that most of us were buying the maximum range cars. Perhaps in California EV's are not that exotic anymore and there is much greater density of the supercharger network. Now the buyers who are not as much road warriors as us realize they can get by fine and save a few $$ with a smaller battery.

There were a couple of Model 3 deliveries. One said he was e-mailed a choice of home delivery but chose to come to the service center as he lived not that far away.

 

[RedModel3]

I just spent Friday and Saturday afternoons at the Nashville-area store. It was quite the party atmosphere, and on Saturday they were expecting to deliver 40 cars. There were about 6 or seven of us owner-volunteers. I had an absolute blast showing people all the ins and outs, and answering questions. I hope to be able to do this again.

 

[sperkin]

I wanted to try something new so took delivery at Marina Del Rey instead of Costa Mesa this time.

MDR - much bigger and can pick up car outside in Sun light. Check in was fast, easy, and friendly. Got a die cast car in my center console. Only con is they have a coffee bar but it wasn't open and they didn't even have a self service coffee machine.

CM - check in was fast but nobody cared afterwards. Waited over an hour and people only came after I started to look and take pictures of their Google doc on their Macs. Service guy was busy and just wanted us to sign and GTFO. They didn't have my die cast car and had to take it from an adjacent car. Only Pro was they had a self service coffee machine.

 

[Bet TSLA]

I was at the Fremont Delivery Center all day today (10am-00:30). Was also there yesterday, Wednesday, and one day last weekend. Both days this weekend were a total zoo. They delivered hundreds of cars today but I was way too busy talking to people to get any kind of real count. It was a fun day. Tiring though.

Many employees were there when I got there and still there when I left (so putting in a >14.5 hour day). The place was still full of people picking up their cars when I left after midnight. I'm fairly sure those cars will count for Q4, not Q3. There were many Tesla employees buying Model 3s.

 

[Rockster]

I spent four hours at the Dallas Service/Delivery center on Saturday as part of the North Texas Tesla Owners Group. I spoke with a number of folks who were waiting to receive their car and did a full, 30 minute, orientation with a couple of new owners once they received their car. The Tesla staff members were working tirelessly and seemed to appreciate out help (and I read that they delivered 165 vehicles on Saturday from the Dallas location!).

It's obvious that the Model 3 ownership base has turned a corner and most new recipients are people for whom this is their first Tesla and, in most cases, their first electric vehicle, as well. There's no shortage of opportunities for we enthusiasts to welcome new EV owners as they make the transition from ICE to EV. Things we take for granted, like understanding when to keep the car plugged in, optimal state of charge, planning road trips, and the like, are unfamiliar to the new crop of Model 3 purchasers and everyone I spoke to on Saturday was every excited about switching to an EV, was slightly apprehensive about the paradigm shift, and very happy to receive guidance and input from fellow Model 3 owners.

 

[wdolson]

Phil Gorski at PDX Tesla organized a volunteer effort in Portland the last couple of weeks. I was able to get a free afternoon on Sunday (Sept 30). They had a few 3s an S and an X in a display bay where people could be walked through the systems. I think the biggest value the volunteers provided was giving demos, though just talking to them for a while probably helped too.

The delays people had to endure to get their cars were pretty long. Giving them some distraction while they waited was valuable. Maybe instead of putting them in the cars, Tesla should put them in the waiting rooms. Though hopefully we helped some people up the learning curve with our demos too.

 

[John Beans]

We had volunteers at the Fremont delivery center until after midnight on the last day of the quarter. Easy to pitch in when you see so many Tesla employees—from other departments like engineering—working so hard.

Also: you can have some interesting conversations when you meet folks that work in the engineering and software teams. One quote: "Andrej is my best bud!"

 

[docdeb27]

Wow. You guys are terrific! Anyone wanna volunteer to assist a 60+ y/o lady with experience at least with navigation, cell bluetooth connections etc but nervous about driving my M3 home for the first time. ANyone On Long Island, Suffolk County??

 

[SMAlset]

Wow. You guys are terrific! Anyone wanna volunteer to assist a 60+ y/o lady with experience at least with navigation, cell bluetooth connections etc but nervous about driving my M3 home for the first time. ANyone On Long Island, Suffolk County??

Would be happy to help if not on the other side of the country. You might try calling your delivery center ahead of time (ok or maybe just stopping by first if close by) to inquire if they will have volunteers working still. I think letting them know that is something you would find helpful and would put you at ease would be valuable to them in case they have volunteers willing to be there but they think with the end of quarter rush over might not be necessary to continue doing.

BTW I think being a bit nervous about driving home an EV for the first time and especially a Tesla with it's different approach to dash, regen braking, etc. is understandable. It doesn't take long to adjust though. Even though we are MS owners, we did take some time driving our new Model 3 around in the adjacent parking lot to our delivery center. Helped to get a good handle on the basics; and getting the profile, seating adjustments, phone all set and seeing how the screen layout is before heading home was comforting. Getting the feel for the regen was a bit different for me. The feel reminded me a bit when I drove stick and would downshift and feel the resistance in slowing down. Kind of funny to say but after having had a car without a backup screen, learning to use it when I'd go into R was not immediately second nature. The Tesla grin takes no time to experience though! Hope you'll be in your car soon.

 

[Electroman]

I always feel nervous driving out for every new car I bought.

 

[Hobari]

Picked up my AWD M3 on September 29 at the Littleton Colorado Delivery Center. I was hyped up with nervous energy and ready to experience some kind of problem. But lo and behold, everything went smoothly - it took a few minutes to go go through all the paperwork, I had a thorough run through of all the features (with a volunteer, that was unusually I admit), and inspected the car and found absolutely no defects. Very well assembled and no paint flaws. As we were leaving, we had a question about mirror adjustments, ran back in, and got some immediate help. No problem with anything. I now sheepishly feel like an idiot for reading too much into all the complaints I've been reading. How many people post that everything was normal and went as planned?

 

[tomas]

I went to Santa Barbara Tesla on Sunday to pick up my P3D... and quickly conscripted myself into service. I'm a "vet" I guess... 6 years with an S, and took delivery of our first 3 in February.

There were a ton of people there in various stages of waiting for delivery/taking delivery. Answered a few questions... commiserated with some people about the wait... probably my most valuable contribution was talking with a couple about charging. They had a long drive home, and were anxious to leave, but "the battery wasn't full yet", and they don't have a NEMA 14/50 outlet at home... just 110. I helped them with the math. We determined that, given the current state of charge (~200 mi), distance to home, and expected "normal" driving once home... they would do just fine leaving immediately and plugging in to 110 outlet for 8-10 hours a night until they could install faster charging.

Then, I was called to take delivery of MY car... and immediately became selfish and stopped helping. Oh well. I'd gladly do it again.

 

[SMAlset]

I went to Santa Barbara Tesla on Sunday to pick up my P3D... and quickly conscripted myself into service. I'm a "vet" I guess... 6 years with an S, and took delivery of our first 3 in February.

There were a ton of people there in various stages of waiting for delivery/taking delivery. Answered a few questions... commiserated with some people about the wait... probably my most valuable contribution was talking with a couple about charging. They had a long drive home, and were anxious to leave, but "the battery wasn't full yet", and they don't have a NEMA 14/50 outlet at home... just 110. I helped them with the math. We determined that, given the current state of charge (~200 mi), distance to home, and expected "normal" driving once home... they would do just fine leaving immediately and plugging in to 110 outlet for 8-10 hours a night until they could install faster charging.

Then, I was called to take delivery of MY car... and immediately became selfish and stopped helping. Oh well. I'd gladly do it again.

Yep, running out of charge is a common issue people have. I bet they were glad you could run the numbers for them and glad to hear your P3D was waiting for you. Did you trade your S in for a Model 3? I remember you weren't that far from the Thomas fire down there last year. Out of curiosity did you end up with smoke damage in your S? Hope you made out okay with the house and all.

 

[wdolson]

I always feel nervous driving out for every new car I bought.

This is probably the worst delivery experience ever:
Tesla Buyer Takes Delivery, Immediately Crashes Model S