Service says $22k for new battery on 2012 Model S

[krishna3812]

I only can guess @krishna3812 is just reacting to (referencing) what you had earlier mentioned:

Yes

 

[TwistedGray]

I only can guess @krishna3812 is just reacting to (referencing) what you had earlier mentioned:

Yes

Then it was a misunderstanding

Tesla doesn't give a quote for $37k showing a $15k core charge. You're not told about a core charge unless you ask about keeping your battery My quote is shown on this page, and you can see another on the bottom of the second page (post#39).

 

[cduzz]

Then it was a misunderstanding

Tesla doesn't give a quote for $37k showing a $15k core charge. You're not told about a core charge unless you ask about keeping your battery My quote is shown on this page, and you can see another on the bottom of the second page (post#39).

Any complex high-dollar part you're repairing/replacing on a car will have a huge core charge.

Some of the batteries tesla's getting back will probably be completely good, filled with platinum hearts and unicorn farts. Worth way more than $15k. Some of them are going to be worse than worthless; they'll have to pay for shipping, open them up, and find the battery pack is filled with rabid corgies.

We seem to be talking about 2 radically different transactions. One, the normal one one on planet earth is:

My damned car is broken; how much is it to fix it? 22k, sheet that's a lot of scratch; what's the warranty?

and the other, on the internet, is:

Hey, I want you to put a new thing in my car, for reasons. Also I want the old thing back so I can try to fix it myself, or sell it to someone else, or put it in my front yard to get my neighbors mad at me. Yes, please just load the old thing in the back of the car when you've finished.

They're radically different transactions. If I were Tesla, I'd charge a crapton for the core just to keep weirdos away, because no matter what you do you'll never make them happy.

 

[ucmndd]

Any complex high-dollar part you're repairing/replacing on a car will have a huge core charge.

Some of the batteries tesla's getting back will probably be completely good, filled with platinum hearts and unicorn farts. Worth way more than $15k. Some of them are going to be worse than worthless; they'll have to pay for shipping, open them up, and find the battery pack is filled with rabid corgies.

We seem to be talking about 2 radically different transactions. One, the normal one one on planet earth is:

My damned car is broken; how much is it to fix it? 22k, sheet that's a lot of scratch; what's the warranty?

and the other, on the internet, is:

Hey, I want you to put a new thing in my car, for reasons. Also I want the old thing back so I can try to fix it myself, or sell it to someone else, or put it in my front yard to get my neighbors mad at me. Yes, please just load the old thing in the back of the car when you've finished.

They're radically different transactions. If I were Tesla, I'd charge a crapton for the core just to keep weirdos away, because no matter what you do you'll never make them happy.

In what other transaction is it normal/expected to surrender something of significant value that you already bought once? Tesla doesn’t insist on keeping my old car if I buy a new one from them, or raise the price on the new car by $15k if I tell them to eff off.

I get that core charges are a thing. When applied rationally and transparently, they are the best possible outcome for both customer and manufacturer. But Tesla is charging full retail for a new pack AND keeping the old one that generally still has significant value. That’s double dipping to the point of a battery replacement costing me $30k+.

If a fair value for a dead battery is somewhere around $10k (that’s a reasonable estimate based on used individual module prices), and the new pack costs $22k, I should get a $10k core credit and pay $12k out of pocket. OR I should have the option to pay $22k and cart the old pack away at my expense. This shouldn’t be difficult to unpack.

 

[thefrog1394]

In what other transaction is it normal/expected to surrender something of significant value that you already bought once? Tesla doesn’t insist on keeping my old car if I buy a new one from them, or raise the price on the new car by $15k if I tell them to eff off.

I get that core charges are a thing. When applied rationally and transparently, they are the best possible outcome for both customer and manufacturer. But Tesla is charging full retail for a new pack AND keeping the old one that generally still has significant value. That’s double dipping to the point of a battery replacement costing me $30k+.

If a fair value for a dead battery is somewhere around $10k (that’s a reasonable estimate based on used individual module prices), and the new pack costs $22k, I should get a $10k core credit and pay $12k out of pocket. OR I should have the option to pay $22k and cart the old pack away at my expense. This shouldn’t be difficult to unpack.

Realistically I can expect (and accept to an extent) a manufacturer like Tesla making the core charge high enough to be a deterrent to doing anything other than returning the core. They need cores coming in to reman and logistically that's a lot easier to support than untrained customers coming back with a truck to cart off an old battery. And from a customer experience perspective, making the battery swap as seamless and affordable as possible and not forcing a user to recycle their own battery for the best savings makes sense. But the cost minus core has to be lower than $22k and closer to market value of (reman pack + labor - dead battery value) to make this reasonable for the customer.

Tesla should take a page out of Apple's book on battery replacement. They clearly aren't trying to turn a substantial profit on out-of-warranty battery swaps for iPhones and MacBooks ($50-70 for iPhones and $130-$200 for MacBooks). I suspect the difference is that Tesla is battery constrained and can't afford to have at-cost battery swaps for 8 year old cars restricting production on their new vehicles. I very much hope as more vehicles come out of warranty they rethink this approach. Total cost of ownership is about to go way up if used values start dropping due to out-of-warranty repair costs as more cars come off of their 8 year powertrain warranty.

Speaking of the Apple analogy, Apple gets a bad rap for long term hardware support sometimes, but the reality is they are the best in the business for long term mobile device support. And it's not a coincidence that this started to happen around the time they found ways to monetize their existing user base (app store fees, iCloud, etc). I actually look forward to Tesla moving towards more subscription-based revenue models as it will align their incentives with those of us who like to keep our vehicles on the road for as long as possible.

 

[ucmndd]

Realistically I can expect (and accept to an extent) a manufacturer like Tesla making the core charge high enough to be a deterrent to doing anything other than returning the core. They need cores coming in to reman and logistically that's a lot easier to support than untrained customers coming back with a truck to cart off an old battery. And from a customer experience perspective, making the battery swap as seamless and affordable as possible and not forcing a user to recycle their own battery for the best savings makes sense. But the cost minus core has to be lower than $22k and closer to market value of (reman pack + labor - dead battery value) to make this reasonable for the customer.

Tesla should take a page out of Apple's book on battery replacement. They clearly aren't trying to turn a substantial profit on out-of-warranty battery swaps for iPhones and MacBooks ($50-70 for iPhones and $130-$200 for MacBooks). I suspect the difference is that Tesla is battery constrained and can't afford to have at-cost battery swaps for 8 year old cars restricting production on their new vehicles. I very much hope as more vehicles come out of warranty they rethink this approach. Total cost of ownership is about to go way up if used values start due to out-of-warranty repair costs as the more cars come off of their 8 year powertrain warranty.

Speaking of the Apple analogy, Apple gets a bad rap for long term hardware support sometimes, but the reality is they are the best in the business for long term mobile device support. And it's not a coincidence that this started to happen around the time they found ways to monetize their existing user base (app store fees, iCloud, etc). I actually look forward to Tesla moving towards more subscription-based revenue models as it will align their incentives with those of us who like to keep our vehicles on the road for as long as possible.

Well said, agreed.

 

[brkaus]

They clearly aren't trying to turn a substantial profit on out-of-warranty battery swaps for iPhones and MacBooks ($50-70 for iPhones and $130-$200 for MacBooks).

That’s probably a substantial profit for Apple.

 

[ucmndd]

That’s probably a substantial profit for Apple.

I don’t think so. On the contrary, at that price I’d say it’s barely worth their time or effort from a financial perspective.

 

[thefrog1394]

Sorry, 140,000 km ; one too many zeros, I was on a roll when I posted, and didn't edit that, good catch!

Re: MCU replacement, Tesla wasn't forced to offer an MCU replacement program, they could have just kept the MCU1 crawling along with an EMMC daughter card replacement for older cars and only did MCU2 for the AP 2.0+ cars, but they didn't, Tesla went further and allowed MCU2 for older AP1 cars too.

I too have kept laptops running over a decade, adding RAM, changing rotating drives for SSD, and after 4 such laptops died for bad battery, overheating, screen and hard disks, I would just repurpose them as media players, basement servers or whatever. No manufacturer has provided after sale help, I just hacked and kept them running on Linux. 99% of people could not do what I did and would just toss them in the scrap heap. There are people that do the same for Tesla's like @wk057, Gruber, Richie.

Re: my Smart ED, it was $36K CAD MSRP, a new Model 3 is $50K CAD, not much different in price. It's not disposable, it's a fantastic "commuting appliance", and I could afford to drive anything, but I choose the smallest car because of it's charm, there is a ruthless-usefulness about it.

The comparison to other tech devices is valid but the lifespan of a car vs a laptop or phone is much different. The average age of a car on the road in the US is 12 years. Average age of a laptop in use in the US is 4 years. So using your decade old laptop is equivalent to those folks out there daily driving a 95 Camry.

The average car on the road today is 3 years older than the oldest Model S. Let that sink in... it really puts things in perspective. How Tesla handles out-of-warranty service and parts availability over the next few years will have a huge impact on brand perception going forward IMO.

 

[Rocky_H]

They clearly aren't trying to turn a substantial profit on out-of-warranty battery swaps for iPhones and MacBooks ($50-70 for iPhones and $130-$200 for MacBooks).

While I like the concept of the rest of your comment, I feel really sorry for you that you have been convinced by Apple to believe those are normal prices for batteries. They are less than half that for phones and laptops that are not from Apple.

 

[Jason Bloomberg]

They are just trying to be honest, because, a 90 is really an 84...

The battery is 90 kWh, so you are mistaken. Besides using "Tesla Math" they'd he more likely to call it a 100.

 

[thefrog1394]

While I like the concept of the rest of your comment, I feel really sorry for you that you have been convinced by Apple to believe those are normal prices for batteries. They are less than half that for phones and laptops that are not from Apple.

Including replacement service? The batteries themselves are of course way cheaper than that, but apple batteries (like their Tesla counterparts) are often glued in and require some work to get to. Particularly on the laptops.

Apparently surface owners can't even get Microsoft to honor a $200 replacement fee...

 

[ucmndd]

While I like the concept of the rest of your comment, I feel really sorry for you that you have been convinced by Apple to believe those are normal prices for batteries. They are less than half that for phones and laptops that are not from Apple.

Samsung authorized battery replacement service for a Galaxy (any model) is $50.

Apple charges $70 for iPhone X or newer, $50 for all other devices.

“Less than half” is getting into Apple-hater-hyperbole territory.

Of course there are ample third party Chinese garbage options for both devices at comparably lower prices.

 

[jpvdheijn]

WOW I used to love this topic due to its informative nature. It looks like it is getting as overcrowded again as:

Wiki - Sudden Loss Of Range With 2019.16.x Software

What was your full range before and what is it now? 255 and new is 252. But it doesn't hold like it did back in the days. I will have to search for the actual KWH and get back on it.

teslamotorsclub.com

It is about replacing the battery not about taking your old battery after replacement. I think at the moment the prices are getting quite fair for what people get as a replacement. At Nissan a leaf battery swap is not cheap either, or think of blowing up your turbo's on an audi RS6 that is in the same ballpark figure. Please get back on topic and keep it informative.

I would also say that make a topic for gruber repairs if you are interested in those.

 

[rns-e]

Speaking of the Apple analogy, Apple gets a bad rap for long term hardware support sometimes, but the reality is they are the best in the business for long term mobile device support.

Let's be honest, Apple had to go through a pretty tough learning curve regarding batteries in older phones - and the teacher was the owners with assistance from the court system.

I agree that Apple sees a value from the old user base in their entire ecosystem, but it's not Nespresso or printers yet, where the HW is basically given away to make sure people use your ecosystem.

I would say that Tesla is starting out on the same journey and while a $22,000 battery is expensive and will technically total any older car, the price is - in the market today - quite fair. And if you have a choice of a refurb'ed battery for $16,000 you even got other options.

We all want it to be as cheap as possible and we can only hope that Tesla will sell at cost for these older cars out of warranty and that the cost will keep going down.

And maybe we will be so lucky that there will be a third party that develop their own replacement battery and sell it cheaper - not as likely as above ...

 

[TwistedGray]

And if you have a choice of a refurb'ed battery for $16,000 you even got other options.

Correct, that option exists already.

 

[cduzz]

While I like the concept of the rest of your comment, I feel really sorry for you that you have been convinced by Apple to believe those are normal prices for batteries. They are less than half that for phones and laptops that are not from Apple.

Those are the price of:
the battery
the replacement of the battery
the handling / disposal of the old battery
the end-to-end supply chain management of the new and old batteries
the rent for the apple-owned facility that houses the replacement of the battery
the insurance for the entire process
the wages, training, tools, and facilities for doing the repair
the customer relations management for the whole repair process


All this takes place in a facility that makes more money per square foot than almost any other retail establishment.


Compare this to the samsung process where I have to go to a nasty strip mall to an "ibreakitufixit" shop, hand my phone over to some random techy dood who expects me to unlock my phone and then he'll take it "in the back" and do the repair work, copy everything off of it, and put in who-knows-what battery into it. Yeah, no thanks.


Back to tesla content:

Are you going to the service department or the parts department for your "new" battery? There's your answer as to what you're buying (service or part). Can you buy a battery from the parts department?

 

[Mase408]

The takeaway from this 18 page thread, get rid of the car before the battery warranty is up.

 

[krishna3812]

Those are the price of:
the battery
the replacement of the battery
the handling / disposal of the old battery
the end-to-end supply chain management of the new and old batteries
the rent for the apple-owned facility that houses the replacement of the battery
the insurance for the entire process
the wages, training, tools, and facilities for doing the repair
the customer relations management for the whole repair process


All this takes place in a facility that makes more money per square foot than almost any other retail establishment.


Compare this to the samsung process where I have to go to a nasty strip mall to an "ibreakitufixit" shop, hand my phone over to some random techy dood who expects me to unlock my phone and then he'll take it "in the back" and do the repair work, copy everything off of it, and put in who-knows-what battery into it. Yeah, no thanks.


Back to tesla content:

Are you going to the service department or the parts department for your "new" battery? There's your answer as to what you're buying (service or part). Can you buy a battery from the parts department?

Didn't know tesla have parts department. Can you please provide link or place for me to visit?

 

[krishna3812]

The takeaway from this 18 page thread, get rid of the car before the battery warranty is up.

Haha. You got it correct I guess. Problem is it expires at 120000 miles for ~50k car(m3lr)...