If you are very nitpicky about your car, then right before you drop it off, take as many pictures as you can of the car both inside and out. Wouldn’t hurt to make a video showing the condition you are dropping it off in. Better yet, have someone at the delivery center do a walk around with you and borrow one of those flat car drawings to indicate any prior scratches/dings/curb rash/etc.
This may sound like overkill, but it’s the only way to protect yourself if the car comes back with damage that wasn’t caused by you.
I just recently gave Tesla my car so that they could correct some issues found at delivery including a couple of dings. It was sent to their most trusted certified body shop in the area who performs immaculate work according to them. I got my car back with grease stains on the seats, scuffs on the steering wheel and dash, a chip on my driver’s side door, dried up adhesive on my rear bumper and several other scuffs on the paint. They also installed the dual motor badge without asking if I even wanted it.
Their solution? Have their detail personnel spend half an hour applying touch up paint to the chip, which doesn’t address the issue of there now being a hole on my door where there wasn’t one previously. Whatever buffing they attempted on the other scuffs didn’t do much as it is obvious they are still there. They also scratched up my trunk removing the badge that I never asked for and acted like they had gone above and beyond in their service in even having their detailer work on my car.
It was obvious no one took a look at the car when it came back from the body shop before I arrived. I spotted all these things within a couple minutes of inspecting it.
So sure, you can trust them to do their job and return your car as you handed it off to them, or you can take some precautions.
Tesla makes great cars, but their service and treatment of customers is abysmal, YMMV of course.
