Hi all,
Just wanted to relay my experience with repairs on my MS (D70 late 2016 version: new nose but still autopilot 1.0)
In late February I parked my MS at the top of a sloping driveway at my daughter's house. The drive had a light cover of leaves and pine needles that had frozen and then covered by a thin layer of snow (don't get a lot of snow in Seattle). About a half hour later my son-in-law came into the room and said that the car had slid down the driveway and banged into the concrete corner edge of the stairway. Horrors! Well, the front bumper was slightly cracked on the left side and the support under the light had popped out about 1/2 inch. I have no idea how fast the car must have been going, but probably less than 5 mph. The drive isn't all that steep and it was a surprise to all of us that the car had slid at all.
I called our insurance company the same day (Thursday PM) and the claims adjuster was out Monday morning. He said the initial estimate would be around $3,500 to fix. After some calling around, including calls to Tesla, it was clear that there were four body shops in the greater Seattle area that were certified to do repairs on Telsas. After reviewing all four I went with the one recommended by my claims adjuster. The body shop said their policy was to wait until they did the tear down of the bumper to see what damage was underneath before ordering parts and that the claims adjuster would have to return to okay the final submission. Fair enough, although the insurance company wasn't keen on paying for a rental care while the car sat around the body shop, waiting for spare parts. They did so nevertheless.
Fast forward two months from the incident and I'm still waiting for my MS... The first month was lost to the insurance company not having enough staff. My claims adjuster went on training and wasn't able to approve the parts submission from the shop for 2 more weeks. Then the shop said they then submitted the parts request to Tesla on a Monday, but Tesla Fremont said they logged in the request the following Friday...who knows what happened. I called Tesla 5 days after they had logged in the request and the parts guy said it should only have been 3-5 days to order the parts, but nothing had been done yet. He said he'd investigate.
This was exactly one month ago. I've called Tesla weekly and each time I've gotten somebody different. To be fair, they've been able to look up what the previous person took as notes. Apparently, even though the car was not moving very fast, enough damage was done to the delicate front end to need some 20+ new parts. The list of outstanding parts has dwindled down to one, so I'm hoping the parts order will be sent "soon".
Meanwhile, the body shop says they've got a backup of more than 20 Teslas, all awaiting spare parts. They also said that other high-end cars like BMW and Mercedes, parts usually arrived in 2-3 days max.This was true for the other Tesla-certified body shops I spoke to as well. Moreover, the initial estimate of $3,500 is now estimated to be over $10,000 !
Seriously?? I understand that the Tesla has a front-end that is designed to crumple in the case of an accident to better absorb the impact. But come on! $10,000 (10% of the cost of the car) for something not more than a slightly cracked front fender seems excessive to me. Yes, insurance will pay initially, but I imagine they will extract this cost in the form of increased premiums at some point. Maybe you can't have it both ways, but I'd hope future design engineers might consider increasing the resilience of the front end just a smidge.
Just to be clear. I love my MS and dearly miss driving it. But the company should put some of that famous creative energy into creating a more functional parts supply chain. This could really become a problem for the company with the influx of new Teslas on the road.
Just wanted to relay my experience with repairs on my MS (D70 late 2016 version: new nose but still autopilot 1.0)
In late February I parked my MS at the top of a sloping driveway at my daughter's house. The drive had a light cover of leaves and pine needles that had frozen and then covered by a thin layer of snow (don't get a lot of snow in Seattle). About a half hour later my son-in-law came into the room and said that the car had slid down the driveway and banged into the concrete corner edge of the stairway. Horrors! Well, the front bumper was slightly cracked on the left side and the support under the light had popped out about 1/2 inch. I have no idea how fast the car must have been going, but probably less than 5 mph. The drive isn't all that steep and it was a surprise to all of us that the car had slid at all.
I called our insurance company the same day (Thursday PM) and the claims adjuster was out Monday morning. He said the initial estimate would be around $3,500 to fix. After some calling around, including calls to Tesla, it was clear that there were four body shops in the greater Seattle area that were certified to do repairs on Telsas. After reviewing all four I went with the one recommended by my claims adjuster. The body shop said their policy was to wait until they did the tear down of the bumper to see what damage was underneath before ordering parts and that the claims adjuster would have to return to okay the final submission. Fair enough, although the insurance company wasn't keen on paying for a rental care while the car sat around the body shop, waiting for spare parts. They did so nevertheless.
Fast forward two months from the incident and I'm still waiting for my MS... The first month was lost to the insurance company not having enough staff. My claims adjuster went on training and wasn't able to approve the parts submission from the shop for 2 more weeks. Then the shop said they then submitted the parts request to Tesla on a Monday, but Tesla Fremont said they logged in the request the following Friday...who knows what happened. I called Tesla 5 days after they had logged in the request and the parts guy said it should only have been 3-5 days to order the parts, but nothing had been done yet. He said he'd investigate.
This was exactly one month ago. I've called Tesla weekly and each time I've gotten somebody different. To be fair, they've been able to look up what the previous person took as notes. Apparently, even though the car was not moving very fast, enough damage was done to the delicate front end to need some 20+ new parts. The list of outstanding parts has dwindled down to one, so I'm hoping the parts order will be sent "soon".
Meanwhile, the body shop says they've got a backup of more than 20 Teslas, all awaiting spare parts. They also said that other high-end cars like BMW and Mercedes, parts usually arrived in 2-3 days max.This was true for the other Tesla-certified body shops I spoke to as well. Moreover, the initial estimate of $3,500 is now estimated to be over $10,000 !
Seriously?? I understand that the Tesla has a front-end that is designed to crumple in the case of an accident to better absorb the impact. But come on! $10,000 (10% of the cost of the car) for something not more than a slightly cracked front fender seems excessive to me. Yes, insurance will pay initially, but I imagine they will extract this cost in the form of increased premiums at some point. Maybe you can't have it both ways, but I'd hope future design engineers might consider increasing the resilience of the front end just a smidge.
Just to be clear. I love my MS and dearly miss driving it. But the company should put some of that famous creative energy into creating a more functional parts supply chain. This could really become a problem for the company with the influx of new Teslas on the road.
