Tesla radically expands Early Access Program

[arghx7]

Enhanced auto pilot is no longer offered and autopilot is standard on everything except a SR Model 3. Those who paid $6k for FSD recently, or however much it was for Autopilot + enhanced auto pilot (what was it, $5k back then total?), or however much it was for AP + EAP + FSD, got the software first. They got access to it early.

Those who did NOT pay extra, people with base autopilot such as myself or with no autopilot, did not access it early. They did not receive early access to new software.

Therefore, you paid extra and got early access. Nitpicking about EAP vs FSD is just sour grapes. You can submit a bug report for feedback. You got access to software early, and you can submit feedback about it. You got what you paid for.

 

[electronblue]

Enhanced auto pilot is no longer offered and autopilot of standard. Those who paid $6k for FSD, or however much it was for Autopilot + enhanced auto pilot (what was it, $5k back then total?), got the software first. They got access to it early.

I am sorry but it seems you are unfamiliar with what this thread is about.

Back in 2016 EAP+FSD was $8,000 total.

Of that FSD was $3,000. For that money Tesla has delivered nothing, nothing at all yet.

Because in early 2019 Tesla decided a lower the price of this old FSD for upgraders, they decided to make a nice PR gesture and promise old FSD buyers something as compensation, because they paid more and had received no features for paying more: that gesture was promise of invitation to Early Access Program. See #1 post in this thread for the quote and link to Tesla’s announcement, which they subsequently deleted.

The problem is: Tesla never delivered on that announcement, but deleted it quietly. This happened in March/April, 2019.

Then they backpedalled by saying well they’ll give sort of ”wide Early Access” priority to early FSD buyers but in the end that didn’t happen either. They rushed V10 to everyone by end of Q3, at least everyone who paid of EAP/FSD at any point in time, completely forgetting about the compensation offered for the small subset of people who paid for nothing in 2016 (and since).

 

[arghx7]

THEY GAVE YOU ACCESS TO SOFTWARE BEFORE PEOPLE WHO DIDN'T PAY EXTRA MONEY AND YOU ARE COMPLAINING.

they can't give thousands and thousands of people really really immature software.

 

[electronblue]

THEY GAVE YOU ACCESS TO SOFTWARE BEFORE PEOPLE WHO DIDN'T PAY EXTRA MONEY AND YOU ARE COMPLAINING.

What? Tesla did not give me any early access to anything. For the FSD money I paid, I have received nothing. Mind you, Tesla did promise FSD differentiating features in April-July, 2017 back in 2017 but those never came either.

To this date the FSD I bought has brought me 0 features or priority. Nothing, nada. Everything I got I would have gotten with just buying EAP and saving $3,000.

I got V10 too the same day as the quoted guy above who only had EAP (Enhanced Autopilot).

they can't give thousands and thousands of people really really immature software.

Then they should not have announced and promised to us and received all the PR advantage for that promise back in March.

 

[electronblue]

I would have been — and am just fine — without Early Access. My point here is merely to hold Tesla accountable and note their broken promise.

Don’t announce/promise things you can’t keep. And if you do backpedal, for the love of everything that is holy, don’t just delete the blog post quietly.

 

[arghx7]

You paid $8k for software that costs $6k today. Prices of software features go down with time; this is normal.

 

[electronblue]

You paid $8k for software that costs $6k today. Prices of software features go down with time; this is normal.

The point is not the $8,000 though. If anything, it is the $3,000 part for FSD. Had I just bought EAP in 2016 for $5,000 I would have gotten the same features as I did and had the opportunity to upgrade to FSD in 2019 at a lower price... So me and people like me paid more and got absolutely nothing for it.

This discrepancy here is exactly why (at least the public reason) Tesla decided to offer Early Access Program to buyers like me as a compensation for that $3,000 wasted. This and because they had broken every promise of shipping features for that FSD we bought until this date (this is just one more broken promise now).

As for prices, back then Tesla kept saying they would go up, instead of down and that upgrading after purchase would cost more than buying from factory... indeed they repeat that still today sort of but it probably won’t happen quite like that, instead they’ll use price as a demand lever when they need to. Just like they did in early 2019.

But in the end, it is not about the price or the money. It is the ethics part that gets me. I admit that annoys me. Not missing out on the Early Access Program, I don’t care about that, I would not have joined anyway. But I would have wanted people like me to get the promised invite. It is the fact that Tesla keeps making all these announcements and promises and then just quietly not deliver. Not good. All in all, just a very sorry affair and goes to show Tesla’s word can not be trusted.

 

[emmz0r]

This is what Tesla promised:


They deleted the whole blog post of course.

Upgrading to Autopilot and Full Self-Driving Capability

 

[ramonneke]

But in the end, it is not about the price or the money. It is the ethics part that gets me. I admit that annoys me.

Exactly this, not only on the statement that FSD would only become more expensive but also the fact that they heavily reduced the price of the S/X 100D and P100D models. The combination still hurts mentally.

 

[hoeschjp]

You paid $8k for software that costs $6k today. Prices of software features go down with time; this is normal.

It's normal for software prices to drop drastically before delivery? Can you find any other examples of this happening AND the earlier preorders getting stuck with the higher price while receiving exactly the same thing at the same time as those who paid less later?

Remember, FSD still gives you nothing on top of EAP. I basically can't care less about price drops of delivered products BTW.

Tesla sold pre-delivery FSD, marketed as a deal, for $3k. Then they changed the after delivery price from $4k to $5k, added a new disclaimer to the new order forms that the after delivery price can change, and kept suggesting that FSD will get more and more expensive.Then they dropped the after delivery price to $2k, or basically $0 if you didn't have EAP ($5k for both). Tesla promised those early FSD (before March) invites to the early access program, as a small bone to throw for the false marketing and early over-payments. They never did this.

Offering, many months later, everyone with FSD (or even just EAP this round it seems like) a genpop update a few days early is not "an invitation to Tesla’s Early Access Program (EAP)" as promised, or a bone at all for all the extra, early money really.



PS: Myself I paid $5k for FSD (accident / website glitch, long story) on top of $5k for EAP. $10k total. I didn't file a charge-back on FSD (couldn't cancel) only because I was told I'd get a $4k match AND an invite into the Early Access Program (would rather have $2k back than be in EAP, but didn't want to be too difficult or risk blowback). Two direct lies after already feeling mislead a few times. I'll deal with that $3k loss, paying 2.5X the price for nothing, but how it happened was a bit faith breaking. They're a smallish and rapidly changing company and all, but come on...

 

[emmz0r]

You paid $8k for software that costs $6k today. Prices of software features go down with time; this is normal.

No the normal thing is that the price is the same and the software gets a new release.