Tesla Model Y complète Shutdown due to 3rd Party EV charger

[nohjames]

Have you tried making a claim with your insurance company? Let the insurance company pay and deal with recovering the cost.

Yes, asking for coverage on the Tesla repair, still waiting for reply from the insurance company.. however it doesn't cover towing less than 50kms away from home, the charger i used was about 10kms away.. i upgraded to have no distance limitations..

 

[nohjames]

I raised the concerns my battery was draining much quicker than before after the blown fuse, and Tesla immediately responded asking me to bring the car in... I'm glad they immediately recognized the problem, but Tesla service centre is a serious trek out from the city.

 

[nohjames]

Have you tried making a claim with your insurance company? Let the insurance company pay and deal with recovering the cost.

Yes, but they don't cover issues with battery and repairs (??!)

 

[Pianewman]

Yes, but they don't cover issues with battery and repairs (??!)

That may depend on where the car is registered/insured.

 

[davewill]

Yes, but they don't cover issues with battery and repairs (??!)

Sounds like tap dancing. I realize that laws are probably different there, but here, if your car was damaged by a malfunctioning parking garage gate crashing down on your hood, they'd handle the claim. You insurance company would fix your car, then pursue your claim against the parking garage operator. There's no difference between that than and the charging station damaging your car. Unfortunately, it may take a lawyer to make anyone take responsibility, and if the repairs only amount to a couple of thousand dollars, it's not worth it.

What I would do, if you absolutely can't get your insurance provider to handle the claim, is push the charging company hard to cover the repairs since they are the responsible party. Pay a mechanic look at the car and state that the charging station caused the problem. Send certified letters with return receipts making your claim. Document every interaction you have with Tesla, the charging company, etc... If and when that fails, take whatever info you've gathered, then take the whole thing to small claims.

I don't know if they have the equivalent of our small claims court in France, but I expect you might. The way it works is that the court takes cases under a certain value limit. You argue your case yourself before a judge. Neither side is supposed to be represented by council, and there's no jury. Generally, both sides just get up, tell their side of the story, presenting whatever evidence they have, and the judge decides the case on the spot.

There will be rules about filing the case, and notifying the defendant, which you want to follow precisely. If you do a good job, you'll probably win.

 

[tga]

As a few of us keep explaining, the automatic proof exists in that the charger went pop and smoke came out of it. That could only be due to a fault in the charger. Tesla doesn't have to show anyone any data because the cause is blindingly obvious for all to see.

If you or anyone else doesn't agree with that, feel free to offer your explanation as to how you think the series of events reported could have happened.

To play devil's advocate: You don't really have evidence to prove the root cause here; you're ignoring the possibility of a BMS fault commanding the charger to "do something bad". While I agree that's unlikely and it's probably the charger's fault, that doesn't 100% absolve Tesla. Plus, Tesla's refusal to share any diagnostic information to back up their claim that it's the chargers fault doesn't really help their case, does it?

What part of my original comment is unclear? I'd be happy to restate it:

• It is likely the third party charger's fault.
• No one in this thread (including you) knows the root cause or has any hard evidence to absolve Tesla in this case.
• Tesla appears to be doing nothing to help the owner in seeking redress from the charging company, nor seems to have any real interest in doing so.

There is a huge difference between "We looked, but there is nothing in the logs about the event, we found no faults in the car, and we have no information about the cause" and "Go away, we're not telling you anything, pleb." It's not clear to me what sort of attitude Tesla is taking with the OP.

 

[nohjames]

Sounds like tap dancing. I realize that laws are probably different there, but here, if your car was damaged by a malfunctioning parking garage gate crashing down on your hood, they'd handle the claim. You insurance company would fix your car, then pursue your claim against the parking garage operator. There's no difference between that than and the charging station damaging your car. Unfortunately, it may take a lawyer to make anyone take responsibility, and if the repairs only amount to a couple of thousand dollars, it's not worth it.

What I would do, if you absolutely can't get your insurance provider to handle the claim, is push the charging company hard to cover the repairs since they are the responsible party. Pay a mechanic look at the car and state that the charging station caused the problem. Send certified letters with return receipts making your claim. Document every interaction you have with Tesla, the charging company, etc... If and when that fails, take whatever info you've gathered, then take the whole thing to small claims.

I don't know if they have the equivalent of our small claims court in France, but I expect you might. The way it works is that the court takes cases under a certain value limit. You argue your case yourself before a judge. Neither side is supposed to be represented by council, and there's no jury. Generally, both sides just get up, tell their side of the story, presenting whatever evidence they have, and the judge decides the case on the spot.

There will be rules about filing the case, and notifying the defendant, which you want to follow precisely. If you do a good job, you'll probably win.

Thanks for you suggestion. The insurance company has provided legal assistance, but they take FOREVER to come back, awaiting their analysis and "expert" advice. Now that the car has a battery drain problem (confirmed by Tesla engineer who remotely accessed, requires me to bring in the vehicle as apparently he can't extract the necessary data remotely), I'm really starting to regret this purchase! I'm reading that in the US, folks are starting to trend back to hybrids and dumping EVs all together. I read that Toyota has dumped their full EV plans for the coming years. One of the main reasons for migrating away from EVs is not the reliability but the cost of maintenance.. appears the cost/numbers favour hybrids.

 

[nohjames]

What part of my original comment is unclear? I'd be happy to restate it:

• It is likely the third party charger's fault.
• No one in this thread (including you) knows the root cause or has any hard evidence to absolve Tesla in this case.
• Tesla appears to be doing nothing to help the owner in seeking redress from the charging company, nor seems to have any real interest in doing so.

There is a huge difference between "We looked, but there is nothing in the logs about the event, we found no faults in the car, and we have no information about the cause" and "Go away, we're not telling you anything, pleb." It's not clear to me what sort of attitude Tesla is taking with the OP.

well, at this stage Tesla France won't provide any data/reports, but simply stating in the invoice, the "outage" was caused by the EV charging station. I gave in and paid as they told me they will be charging me a grounding fee of Euro40/day, and I wasn't going to wait a month for the sloth insurance lawyers to advise on next move.

Also, the 3rd party EV charging company came back today to simply say, they have never seen this happen before and that they are looking into with their engineers, and the results will be coming on July 3rd.. their words as follows:

1. History of the Terminal: the MAT-030052 charging station located at [redacted], has been used daily by many local residents without incident until now. This is the first time we have encountered a case of this kind, which indicates that the problem could be linked to specific circumstances rather than a systematic malfunction of the terminal.

I've got a feeling they will blame Tesla for the outage in their reports....

 

[MP3Mike]

I read that Toyota has dumped their full EV plans for the coming years.

Toyota has never had any "full EV plans". They are full on hybrid. (A combination of gas and hydrogen hybrid plans.)

 

[Sophias_dad]

I'm reading that in the US, folks are starting to trend back to hybrids and dumping EVs all together.

Don't believe everything you read.

IMHO, hybrids are pretty silly now that reasonable-range EVs are around. More weight, more maintenance, WAY more complexity, less cargo, less performance... the list goes on and on. TBH, hybrids were always pretty silly.

 

[nohjames]

So.. this battery drain issue, Tesla cust service on the impersonal app says that the cause can still be rooted on the EV charger station incident, not the replacement of the fuse.. how can that be when the EV charger according to them didn't delivery any electricity? I think Elon has done a great job with instilling in his staff to save at all cost, and come up with anything for customer to pay! This damn vehicle is only 3 months out of the lot, so any experts on here who can explain this battery drain issue?

 

[nohjames]

Toyota has never had any "full EV plans". They are full on hybrid. (A combination of gas and hydrogen hybrid plans.)

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a45942785/toyota-future-ev-battery-plans/

 

[drtimhill]

This was a 3rd party EV charger in France. I will steer clear away from their chargers… but now I’m wondering if Tesla tried to extract more wattage than the output which caused the EV station to explode.. hmmm

This should not cause the station (or anything else) to explode .. chargers have (or at least SHOULD have) over-current detection which protects the charger and the car. Clearly something catastrophic failed in the charger. As others have noted, although its miserable having the car blow its internal fuses, that is a FAR better outcome than having a destroyed battery.