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Refusing/ Declining Delivery

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Overall, my car is a mix of some outstandingly good features, a tiny number of fairly poor features and a fair number of minor niggles and defects, that have mostly been put right by SC visits (three in all). The single most annoying thing is that the vast majority of the things wrong with the car when it was delivered are things that would have been picked up and sorted out prior to delivery with any other manufacturer. I'm not convinced that Tesla is any worse than any other manufacturer when it comes to new car defects, it's just that customers rarely ever get to see these with other manufacturers, as they get fixed during PDI.


This is most accurate. Multiple points in process for Inspection and Feedback have been missed to prioritise the delivery numbers.
 
This was a below the belt comment from the foreman of the SC in West Drayton after failing to fix some of the trim issues - and according to them every repair they did was a "favour" to me and not a flaw in the car. After about 3 months, the SC advisor called me from his personal phone and said that they cannot keep with the volume of issues and the paint shop they are using (Heathrow Coachworks) also are not able to turn things around the first time - they are being instructed to turn people away with the "it's within spec" script. He suggested I get the finance company involved - Black Horse agreed and said I should've come to them in Week 1.

I've only just received the refund from Black Horse on Friday - still undecided between the M3LR again (yes I did love the car and it's commendable in terms of the tech) or ID4/Enyaq/iX3 - since in lockdown the car's not really an urgent need in my case - I can wait - all I can say is going back to ICE is a non-option for me at the moment.
If it were me I’d let the dust settle on MIC cars (which they all are now I think). I can’t see how the quality can go down unless Tesla imported their processes and “spray it in a shed” paint shop.
 
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This was a below the belt comment from the foreman of the SC in West Drayton after failing to fix some of the trim issues - and according to them every repair they did was a "favour" to me and not a flaw in the car. After about 3 months, the SC advisor called me from his personal phone and said that they cannot keep with the volume of issues and the paint shop they are using (Heathrow Coachworks) also are not able to turn things around the first time - they are being instructed to turn people away with the "it's within spec" script. He suggested I get the finance company involved - Black Horse agreed and said I should've come to them in Week 1.

I've only just received the refund from Black Horse on Friday - still undecided between the M3LR again (yes I did love the car and it's commendable in terms of the tech) or ID4/Enyaq/iX3 - since in lockdown the car's not really an urgent need in my case - I can wait - all I can say is going back to ICE is a non-option for me at the moment.
This is not everyone's experience at WD, it takes a while to get an appointment but I've been entirely happy in the 2 visits I've had

1. About 6 weeks after new it went in to have a couple of small marks in the paint I had noted at collection repaired. Probably wasn't much more than a good polish though. There was also something making a weird noise around the passenger side wheel, the service manager took my out for a drive so he could make sure he could also hear what I was talking about. All fixed.

2. About 6 months later they replaced the rear glass as it had failed with the heater, I also had them investigate a rattle which took several days because they refit various things and it was still there. They told me that it had to go back in to the workshop for a third day as it had failed QC inspection. Afterwards I could see just how many test drive they had done when checking it (see below). They also did the treatment to the steering electrics recall.

upload_2021-2-14_20-21-55.png
 
I'm really torn on this whole issue. To be honest, getting the car "as is" and then picking up on any damage etc and getting it repaired is almost preferable to knowing there's a good chance my car has shown up to the dealer and been covered up without my knowledge, making it appear perfect.

That way if a scratch appears in that same area in months/years I can go back and say, hey that damage you repaired, you need to do it again.

As apposed to assuming that something had clipped my car or whatever.
 
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I took delivery of mine in september last year from birmingham sc. On collection day the only issues i spotted was moisture in the offside rear light cluster & a dirty handprint on the rear seat which stood out like a saw thumb on white upholstery.
On closer inspection at home i realised the front passenger door gap at the bottom of the A pillar was excessive. The handprint cleaned off easily with a wet wipe.
I booked a service call for both issues, however only the rear light cluster was replaced, the door adjustment needed another appointment at the bodyshop. Since i have been shielding i requested the bodyshop appointment be deferred until 2021 when I expected to be out of lockdown. Having now had my covid jab I have an appointment for march 1st at the bodyshop.
If my experience is anything like the first sc visit then I'll be delighted with the outcome.
I had the car ceramic coated and PPF fitted to the front half and sills of the car. When i asked about the paintwork the PPF guys said its fine no worse than the jag the range rover & Ferrari they had treated before mine although they acknowledged the paint is rather softer than European made cars.
Im not going to suggest you take any particular action, just realise that if you do reject the car you a likely to be waiting at least 3 months for a replacement which may or may not be any different. As said before the only reason we see these issues is simply because Tesla do not carryout a proper PDI .
One final comment though, once you get out on the open road all the defects & minor issues will be forgotten because the drive will be fantastic & you won't want to return it.
 
I took delivery of mine in september last year from birmingham sc. On collection day the only issues i spotted was moisture in the offside rear light cluster & a dirty handprint on the rear seat which stood out like a saw thumb on white upholstery.
On closer inspection at home i realised the front passenger door gap at the bottom of the A pillar was excessive. The handprint cleaned off easily with a wet wipe.
I booked a service call for both issues, however only the rear light cluster was replaced, the door adjustment needed another appointment at the bodyshop. Since i have been shielding i requested the bodyshop appointment be deferred until 2021 when I expected to be out of lockdown. Having now had my covid jab I have an appointment for march 1st at the bodyshop.
If my experience is anything like the first sc visit then I'll be delighted with the outcome.
I had the car ceramic coated and PPF fitted to the front half and sills of the car. When i asked about the paintwork the PPF guys said its fine no worse than the jag the range rover & Ferrari they had treated before mine although they acknowledged the paint is rather softer than European made cars.
Im not going to suggest you take any particular action, just realise that if you do reject the car you a likely to be waiting at least 3 months for a replacement which may or may not be any different. As said before the only reason we see these issues is simply because Tesla do not carryout a proper PDI .
One final comment though, once you get out on the open road all the defects & minor issues will be forgotten because the drive will be fantastic & you won't want to return it.

This is an awesome reply! Thank you for your thoughts- makes a lot of sense.
 
Going prepared is probably a good idea (and I note that no one has actually pointed out what the process is after you say 'no'), but don't expect to need to reject the car. Being informed of the process you would be signing up for is pretty sensible I'd think, although I can't help you.

Rejection criteria should probably vary depending on lots of factors - how much you expect the car to be a show car, how far you live from an SC that is going to try and fix the problems and how handy you are yourself at just doing stuff to make sure its spot on...

I've just looked back over my email exchanges and TBH I was being pretty harsh to the SC as they tried to to the right things for me. This was all way back in I think the 2nd major quarterly delivery rush, so big stress time and production still ramping up etc. My problems did mean I got to drive an S (lovely) and X (hated it) for a few days each :D. I had (I think) 3 problems:
  1. Wheel alignment was abysmal. SC put it mostly right, but it took a suspension upgrade and independent manual alignment to really sort it.
  2. I thought the brakes needed bleeding, they wanted to run diagnostics and blah blah blah. After trying a different car I concluded my expectations had been set too high by my previous car. (nothing special, Golf GTI equivalent Leon, but it had really aggressive brakes). Bit of bedding in and use and they are 'OK'. Really should have got me the P+, but then I couldn't have my towball :D.
  3. I have a sunken bonnet. They say within tolerance, I say one day, really soon, I'll get around to doing this fix. That I haven't says it all really.
However, in the process of investigating the brakes, they scraped the bumper and tore a small external bit of rubber at the corner of the windscreen. Another visit to fix.

Buuut, its now my perfectly imperfect 3 second 0-60 rocket ship which I wouldn't change for a moment. Luckily I'm only 15 mins from the Edinburgh SC, they got all this straightened out eventually and I've not needed to go back in 18 months (inidial delivery was Manchester, for Reasons). I've done the early adopter thing and now the rest of the family are slowly coming round to the idea of an EV and I have an awesome car in the mean time.

Go through the check list before hand. Have a good idea of what you personally, in your situation, might consider staying a flat out no to, and own that decision if it comes to it. What might a ranger fix, what will need a round trip to an SC and how much hassle will that be for you? Most of the outright rejections I've read were warranted - absolute lemons that even the service delivery people have appologised for at the time, most of the screaming of 'you should have rejected it' is not warranted.

One way to possibly limit it is to think about how many items or potential visits are you willing to make? If you are saying one thing needs fixed, that's fine, but are 5, even minor, problems? What about 2 big problems? And then take the checklist round your current car - if you are going to measure the tesla with a caliper you should probably look at some other cars first to get an idea of what 'normal' is before we start holding them to super perfect.

It sounds like the current cars are in pretty good shape and you won't have any problems tho. Just hope you get one like they delivered to Sandy Munro!
 
Going prepared is probably a good idea (and I note that no one has actually pointed out what the process is after you say 'no'), but don't expect to need to reject the car. Being informed of the process you would be signing up for is pretty sensible I'd think, although I can't help you.

Rejection criteria should probably vary depending on lots of factors - how much you expect the car to be a show car, how far you live from an SC that is going to try and fix the problems and how handy you are yourself at just doing stuff to make sure its spot on...

I've just looked back over my email exchanges and TBH I was being pretty harsh to the SC as they tried to to the right things for me. This was all way back in I think the 2nd major quarterly delivery rush, so big stress time and production still ramping up etc. My problems did mean I got to drive an S (lovely) and X (hated it) for a few days each :D. I had (I think) 3 problems:
  1. Wheel alignment was abysmal. SC put it mostly right, but it took a suspension upgrade and independent manual alignment to really sort it.
  2. I thought the brakes needed bleeding, they wanted to run diagnostics and blah blah blah. After trying a different car I concluded my expectations had been set too high by my previous car. (nothing special, Golf GTI equivalent Leon, but it had really aggressive brakes). Bit of bedding in and use and they are 'OK'. Really should have got me the P+, but then I couldn't have my towball :D.
  3. I have a sunken bonnet. They say within tolerance, I say one day, really soon, I'll get around to doing this fix. That I haven't says it all really.
However, in the process of investigating the brakes, they scraped the bumper and tore a small external bit of rubber at the corner of the windscreen. Another visit to fix.

Buuut, its now my perfectly imperfect 3 second 0-60 rocket ship which I wouldn't change for a moment. Luckily I'm only 15 mins from the Edinburgh SC, they got all this straightened out eventually and I've not needed to go back in 18 months (inidial delivery was Manchester, for Reasons). I've done the early adopter thing and now the rest of the family are slowly coming round to the idea of an EV and I have an awesome car in the mean time.

Go through the check list before hand. Have a good idea of what you personally, in your situation, might consider staying a flat out no to, and own that decision if it comes to it. What might a ranger fix, what will need a round trip to an SC and how much hassle will that be for you? Most of the outright rejections I've read were warranted - absolute lemons that even the service delivery people have appologised for at the time, most of the screaming of 'you should have rejected it' is not warranted.

One way to possibly limit it is to think about how many items or potential visits are you willing to make? If you are saying one thing needs fixed, that's fine, but are 5, even minor, problems? What about 2 big problems? And then take the checklist round your current car - if you are going to measure the tesla with a caliper you should probably look at some other cars first to get an idea of what 'normal' is before we start holding them to super perfect.

It sounds like the current cars are in pretty good shape and you won't have any problems tho. Just hope you get one like they delivered to Sandy Munro!

That sounds like a pretty fair explanation, BUT I gotta ask...how the hell did they manage to damage the windscreen while looking at the BRAKES? lol

I mean sure Tesla likes to do things differently...but thats just nuts.
 
ah, it's a tiny rubber seal up the first inch at the side of the screen, not the screen itsself. Sits between the hard horizontal plastics and the trip at the side of the screen, nothing to do with the glass. I think they took the frunk/leaf tray out to get to the brake's iBooster gubbins in there. I would have never noticed, so good they fessed up.

Thanks for reading what I now realise is a wall of text....
 
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Going prepared is probably a good idea (and I note that no one has actually pointed out what the process is after you say 'no'), but don't expect to need to reject the car. Being informed of the process you would be signing up for is pretty sensible I'd think, although I can't help you.

Rejection criteria should probably vary depending on lots of factors - how much you expect the car to be a show car, how far you live from an SC that is going to try and fix the problems and how handy you are yourself at just doing stuff to make sure its spot on...

I've just looked back over my email exchanges and TBH I was being pretty harsh to the SC as they tried to to the right things for me. This was all way back in I think the 2nd major quarterly delivery rush, so big stress time and production still ramping up etc. My problems did mean I got to drive an S (lovely) and X (hated it) for a few days each :D. I had (I think) 3 problems:
  1. Wheel alignment was abysmal. SC put it mostly right, but it took a suspension upgrade and independent manual alignment to really sort it.
  2. I thought the brakes needed bleeding, they wanted to run diagnostics and blah blah blah. After trying a different car I concluded my expectations had been set too high by my previous car. (nothing special, Golf GTI equivalent Leon, but it had really aggressive brakes). Bit of bedding in and use and they are 'OK'. Really should have got me the P+, but then I couldn't have my towball :D.
  3. I have a sunken bonnet. They say within tolerance, I say one day, really soon, I'll get around to doing this fix. That I haven't says it all really.
However, in the process of investigating the brakes, they scraped the bumper and tore a small external bit of rubber at the corner of the windscreen. Another visit to fix.

Buuut, its now my perfectly imperfect 3 second 0-60 rocket ship which I wouldn't change for a moment. Luckily I'm only 15 mins from the Edinburgh SC, they got all this straightened out eventually and I've not needed to go back in 18 months (inidial delivery was Manchester, for Reasons). I've done the early adopter thing and now the rest of the family are slowly coming round to the idea of an EV and I have an awesome car in the mean time.

Go through the check list before hand. Have a good idea of what you personally, in your situation, might consider staying a flat out no to, and own that decision if it comes to it. What might a ranger fix, what will need a round trip to an SC and how much hassle will that be for you? Most of the outright rejections I've read were warranted - absolute lemons that even the service delivery people have appologised for at the time, most of the screaming of 'you should have rejected it' is not warranted.

One way to possibly limit it is to think about how many items or potential visits are you willing to make? If you are saying one thing needs fixed, that's fine, but are 5, even minor, problems? What about 2 big problems? And then take the checklist round your current car - if you are going to measure the tesla with a caliper you should probably look at some other cars first to get an idea of what 'normal' is before we start holding them to super perfect.

It sounds like the current cars are in pretty good shape and you won't have any problems tho. Just hope you get one like they delivered to Sandy Munro!

Such a great insight! Thank you for taking the time to reply in so much detail. I think what you are suggesting is spot on. Distance to SC, number of likely visits needs to be factored in etc.