Stalls blocked by Tesla Owner

[Triplett]

At a nearby SC in Indy, I have noticed several black model S cars sitting in charging stalls not hooked up and charging, effectively blocking other Teslas from charging. Almost every time I drive by there, there is a black model S or more sitting there not charging. Upon further investigation, ALL of those black model S cars are plated in Montana. I have seen different individuals pull up in other ICE cars and drive away in these black model S cars, never the same person. Recently, I talked to another patron that was there charging and he told me the scoop about these black model S's. According to him, there are five of these black model S cars, all plated out of Montana and the guy is renting them out to drive. Apparently he advertises somewhere that people can rent these cars for a few hours, the day or a week and he charges them all free at this SC location and, I am told, is making a killing at it. Apparently, one owner that was charging there asked him about his enterprise and got a barrage of eff you and mind your own effing business, etc. etc. While it is my opinion that nobody should be running his own business renting out model S cars and charging them for free at the SC, my most obvious problem with this is the net effect of blocking several stalls while not plugged in, keeping other Tesla owners from charging their cars at those stalls. I have sent emails to Tesla customer support about this along with the VIN of the offending cars. I don't know if I'm spinning my wheels or not since I've had no response. If he is running a business that is making him money from all these cars and also blocking Tesla owners from charging, do you believe he should still be able to charge his cars freely? I have called on the 800 line also to report this individual, but after waiting longer than 10 minutes and still can't talk to someone, I've given up. Am I going about this correctly? Should I report this activity or just ignore it, and if so, how should I report it?

Report him to Tesla AND your local state tax agency.

When they find out he is running the Montana scam they will crucify him for tax evasion. It's not just one car, it's an entire fleet of tax evasion.

Oh, and although I don't advocate this, sometimes a fool needs to nap on the concrete.

 

[Scuba Steve’s]

I just saw this thread just yesterday (as I rarely read this forum) but I can shed some light.

Blocking the chargers: First of all, I am very aware of the volume of charging at Beech Grove and many times in the evenings the chargers are full. However in the morning the chargers are rarely used. When I say rarely used I mean that out of 30 days in the month you will typically find 0 or maybe 1 or 2 cars plugged in before noon. As many of you, I would be furious to find a car unplugged blocking a charger and even more upset if all of the other chargers were full. I can assure you that no one was ever not able to charge because one of my cars was occupying a space unplugged. This has never happened to Bill or anyone else at Beech Grove I can tell you with assurity. Here is the truth....in the morning we used to park in front of chargers that were not functioning but stopped back in May. We no longer leave unplugged occupying a charging space.

As other posts have said, there have been many chargers at Beech Grove that have not been operational since the beginning of the year. One of the posts asked how does Tesla know when chargers are down....I can tell you that I have been the one to report many of the issues with the chargers at Beech Grove because when I call I ask them if they were aware of the issue and most of the time they say they weren't. Time and time again I see people pull into the charger to find it isn't functional, then they pull into the one next to it and it isn't functional, etc. For a while there were 3 chargers in a row that didn't work so that is a hardship for those who don't know as they would try each one...so we would tell them which ones weren't functional and so yes we blocked the non-functioning chargers from time to time for very short periods of time in the morning. I get it, appearance is everything so you see a car unplugged parked in front of a charger and you want to scream (or worse as others have posted here) because it upsets you.

I can tell you that the photos that were taken all show just my spot and sometimes the spot next to it because I would venture to say that all of the others were probably empty except for the person taking the picture.

Again, this never happened when they charger is more utilized during the evening hours. I can tell you that I have been there during evening hours and actually moved my personal Tesla out of a charger 2 different evenings to let someone charged who pulled in because 2 of the charging stations didn't work the other 6 were being used. Since May as a policy we try not to charge there in the evening since it is heavily used in the evenings compared to the other SCs. There are 4 other chargers that we typically use during evening hours.

I can tell you I have LLCs properly registered in Montana and Indiana and my CPA and attorney both have assured me that what I am doing is proper and legal in both states. I have also spoken to Tesla and all cars are properly registered with Tesla and I comply with all of their policies and regulations.

A couple other things....when Tesla called me and it was reported that I was blocking a charging stall the person who reported me actually said something in the report that Tesla knew not to be true....I think they were trying to make their point by stretching the truth and so they lost some credibility as Tesla knew that part of what they said was false. I did tell Tesla that we were only parking in front of chargers that weren't operational but they/I agreed the appearance of what we were doing was wrong and had to stop...which we did.

The one picture showing a car parked for "weeks" that hadn't moved...completely false. The cars are driven every day. It may be that the car was driven and put back in the same charging spot. Again, that would really upset me as a Tesla fan and owner if a car had been parked for days/weeks unplugged in a charging spot. Completely untrue.

I hope this helps clear up some of what has been reported.

Lastly, I want to say that I love Tesla. I obviously own Teslas and am a shareholder and want to do everything in my power to help them succeed as a company. I love the Tesla community and love talking to people at the chargers across the country. I felt compelled to post this as a reply to set the record straight.

 

[Kenz]

If the car is not plugged in and charging it needs to be moved out so others can charge.
EV chargers are not long term parking spots.
Charge and GO.

 

[Iowa2]

If the car is not plugged in and charging it needs to be moved out so others can charge.
EV chargers are not long term parking spots.
Charge and GO.

So did you READ his post? He states he was parking there to -- I'll call it inform -- that the chargers were not working in those spots. He has been in contact with Tesla and they are aware of what he is doing.

 

[Cheburashka]

I just saw this thread just yesterday (as I rarely read this forum) but I can shed some light.

Blocking the chargers: First of all, I am very aware of the volume of charging at Beech Grove and many times in the evenings the chargers are full. However in the morning the chargers are rarely used. When I say rarely used I mean that out of 30 days in the month you will typically find 0 or maybe 1 or 2 cars plugged in before noon. As many of you, I would be furious to find a car unplugged blocking a charger and even more upset if all of the other chargers were full. I can assure you that no one was ever not able to charge because one of my cars was occupying a space unplugged. This has never happened to Bill or anyone else at Beech Grove I can tell you with assurity. Here is the truth....in the morning we used to park in front of chargers that were not functioning but stopped back in May. We no longer leave unplugged occupying a charging space.

As other posts have said, there have been many chargers at Beech Grove that have not been operational since the beginning of the year. One of the posts asked how does Tesla know when chargers are down....I can tell you that I have been the one to report many of the issues with the chargers at Beech Grove because when I call I ask them if they were aware of the issue and most of the time they say they weren't. Time and time again I see people pull into the charger to find it isn't functional, then they pull into the one next to it and it isn't functional, etc. For a while there were 3 chargers in a row that didn't work so that is a hardship for those who don't know as they would try each one...so we would tell them which ones weren't functional and so yes we blocked the non-functioning chargers from time to time for very short periods of time in the morning. I get it, appearance is everything so you see a car unplugged parked in front of a charger and you want to scream (or worse as others have posted here) because it upsets you.

I can tell you that the photos that were taken all show just my spot and sometimes the spot next to it because I would venture to say that all of the others were probably empty except for the person taking the picture.

Again, this never happened when they charger is more utilized during the evening hours. I can tell you that I have been there during evening hours and actually moved my personal Tesla out of a charger 2 different evenings to let someone charged who pulled in because 2 of the charging stations didn't work the other 6 were being used. Since May as a policy we try not to charge there in the evening since it is heavily used in the evenings compared to the other SCs. There are 4 other chargers that we typically use during evening hours.

I can tell you I have LLCs properly registered in Montana and Indiana and my CPA and attorney both have assured me that what I am doing is proper and legal in both states. I have also spoken to Tesla and all cars are properly registered with Tesla and I comply with all of their policies and regulations.

A couple other things....when Tesla called me and it was reported that I was blocking a charging stall the person who reported me actually said something in the report that Tesla knew not to be true....I think they were trying to make their point by stretching the truth and so they lost some credibility as Tesla knew that part of what they said was false. I did tell Tesla that we were only parking in front of chargers that weren't operational but they/I agreed the appearance of what we were doing was wrong and had to stop...which we did.

The one picture showing a car parked for "weeks" that hadn't moved...completely false. The cars are driven every day. It may be that the car was driven and put back in the same charging spot. Again, that would really upset me as a Tesla fan and owner if a car had been parked for days/weeks unplugged in a charging spot. Completely untrue.

I hope this helps clear up some of what has been reported.

Lastly, I want to say that I love Tesla. I obviously own Teslas and am a shareholder and want to do everything in my power to help them succeed as a company. I love the Tesla community and love talking to people at the chargers across the country. I felt compelled to post this as a reply to set the record straight.

Tesla told you it's ok to use the Superchargers for your own commercial purposes? You got that in writing?

 

[TexasEV]

Tesla told you it's ok to use the Superchargers for your own commercial purposes? You got that in writing?

Tesla did not prohibit commercial use of superchargers until December 2017, for cars sold after that date. Cars sold before then with free supercharging did not have any restrictions on commercial use. Limo services such as Tesloop based their business model on that.

 

[MP3Mike]

For a while there were 3 chargers in a row that didn't work so that is a hardship for those who don't know as they would try each one...so we would tell them which ones weren't functional and so yes we blocked the non-functioning chargers from time to time for very short periods of time in the morning. I get it, appearance is everything so you see a car unplugged parked in front of a charger and you want to scream (or worse as others have posted here) because it upsets you.

Maybe you could get some caution tape to wrap around the stall/cable to let people know when a stall isn't working and it has been reported to Tesla. (I'm sure everyone using that site would appreciate the your effort of doing that to save them time in finding out that the stalls don't work.)

 

[wcorey]

Tesla did not prohibit commercial use of superchargers until December 2017, for cars sold after that date. Cars sold before then with free supercharging did not have any restrictions on commercial use. Limo services such as Tesloop based their business model on that.

Commerical use does not mean as a parking lot. The purpose of Superchargers is to charge Teslas not be bulk storage locations. Their working condition does not grant parking lot status.

 

[Scuba Steve’s]

Maybe you could get some caution tape to wrap around the stall/cable to let people know when a stall isn't working and it has been reported to Tesla. (I'm sure everyone using that site would appreciate the your effort of doing that to save them time in finding out that the stalls don't work.)

That is a great idea. I did mention to Tesla that they should have a simple green/red indicator that could be used to indicate if the charger was operational. The real solution is for Tesla to keep the chargers in good repair, but if there were a way to let people know not to waste time in pulling up to non-functioning chargers that would help.

 

[shinytop]

Having an individual put on signage or tape on a "bad charger" has drawbacks. It allows anybody just wanting to park to pull in, put up tape and go shopping or even leave overnight or park their rental cars there. Tesla having red or green lights on the charger seems the way to go in the future.

 

[bhzmark]

glad I skipped to the last page of this thread.

 

[S-ALSET]

glad I skipped to the last page of this thread.

haha!