Tesla: The real out of warranty costs

[tyson]

I've had two trips to the shop in the 13,000 miles since my 2013 S went out of warranty: a rear window regulator failed and the window wouldn't roll up, the 12v battery failed, one of the TPMS sensors failed, and a few lug nuts were getting out of tolerance and my tire shop wanted new ones before they couldn't get the wrench on anymore. About $900 total in repairs over 9 months, vs. $1400/month to buy a similarly equipped 2017 to restart the warranty. I'll gamble on the occasional repair bill a little longer I think until I'm ready to replace it, hopefully once there's some semblance of value in the FSD option.

Meanwhile my wife's Lexus is going in for $3800 in front end steering and suspension work, so it's not like ICE cars can't rack up the bills out of warranty too.

I would be fine with your repair bills out of warranty too... but mine on the other hand would have exceeded $25-30K if not covered by the warranty... the HV battery alone is ~$22k and the cabin heater is ~$3000 just for the part.

 

[Kenriko]

Same experience here. I've spent about $8k on out-of-warranty service work keeping my 2008 Roadster in great shape. Meanwhile my wife has spent about $15k fixing anything that breaks on our 2004 Toyota Sienna. The labor costs on the Roadster are always very modest and the markup on parts seems modest. In contrast, we get fleeced on everything the Toyota dealer does. One time they charged over $2000 to fix a broken cruise control sensor (I would not have paid it but my wife is determined to keep this thing running because she knows I'll never agree to buy another ICE van).

The law of diminishing returns expired long ago. Sell that pile of junk.

 

[510Red]

In the YouTube video ("Tesla: The real cost of being out of warranty"), starting at minute 3:30, he says that the warranty was voided because the driver used the car for commercial purposes. I bought my Tesla as a personal vehicle and I own a truck as a commercial vehicle, but there are some times when I might drive my Tesla for business purposes. If I deduct a number of miles driven on the Tesla on my tax return as miles driven for business, does that mean that the warranty would be voided?

 

[Electricious]

I'm with you on this. I have a 2013 Leaf that I've had for almost 4 years now, and it's needed *nothing*. And I don't just mean "I haven't had any expenses since everything has been covered under warranty", I mean I haven't had to do squat to it other than plug it in and drive. I take it to the dealer for the annual state inspection, they say "yup, everything's fine", and off I go.

As someone who is looking to replace the Leaf with a Model S, I find it rather disturbing that a much more expensive car apparently doesn't have as good of quality control as my economy car (and perhaps the S also has some inherent design flaws, such as with the door handles).

What I find surprising is that some service visits costs as much as ICE service visits when there is no ICE

 

[Electricious]

In the YouTube video ("Tesla: The real cost of being out of warranty"), starting at minute 3:30, he says that the warranty was voided because the driver used the car for commercial purposes. I bought my Tesla as a personal vehicle and I own a truck as a commercial vehicle, but there are some times when I might drive my Tesla for business purposes. If I deduct a number of miles driven on the Tesla on my tax return as miles driven for business, does that mean that the warranty would be voided?

They would then have to void the warranty of most people who can afford a Tesla as I bet many acquire them as business leases!

I think if you are a consultant or whatever and drive a lot for work that is fine but if you are using the car primarily to transport other people for a fee (like a taxi) that's when the commercial clause kicks in.

Even that, I'm not sure as Bjorn, unless I'm mistaken, operates a business transporting things in Norway and as far as I know Tesla honors his warranty.

Good question though and it would be nice to know the answer definitely,

 

[Nick B]

Like electricious said, unless you use your car as a taxi and unless Tesla can prove that it's been mainly driven for commercial use, I don't see any problems in deducting portions in your tax declaration. Here in Canada Tesla doesn't have access to your tax declarations so they couldn't even prove it.

In the YouTube video ("Tesla: The real cost of being out of warranty"), starting at minute 3:30, he says that the warranty was voided because the driver used the car for commercial purposes. I bought my Tesla as a personal vehicle and I own a truck as a commercial vehicle, but there are some times when I might drive my Tesla for business purposes. If I deduct a number of miles driven on the Tesla on my tax return as miles driven for business, does that mean that the warranty would be voided?

 

[b team]

Profitability? That's kind of murky when comparing an open source OS who's primary purpose is to drive users in to Google search and other products where revenues can be realized to an OS that can't be bought or run on anything other than the hardware is was purchased with. How do you determine profit on the OS as compared to the hardware? Certainly Apple is more profitable company as a whole but Google tends to take much more risk in innovation, let's see how Waymo plays out eh .

Even if you attributed Google’s entire profit to Android (which would be plainly absurd), Apple’s profit from the iPhone alone would still swamp it. There is nothing murky about profitability—it is reported in great detail on a quarterly basis, in addition to being the subject of constant independent research.

 

[tyson]

Even if you attributed Google’s entire profit to Android (which would be plainly absurd), Apple’s profit from the iPhone alone would still swamp it. There is nothing murky about profitability—it is reported in great detail on a quarterly basis, in addition to being the subject of constant independent research.

Right, but that's the point... The iPhone is hardware and software. Google doesn't even come close to making or selling as many Android handsets as say Samsung or LG. But again they give the OS away for free so of course Apple makes more money on iOS. Not even an argument.

And my apologies for taking this way off topic.

 

[base698]

Right, but that's the point... The iPhone is hardware and software. Google doesn't even come close to making or selling as many Android handsets as say Samsung or LG. But again they give the OS away for free so of course Apple makes more money on iOS. Not even an argument.

And my apologies for taking this way off topic.

Thanks to a lawyer, we know now that Google has made $31 billion in revenue and $22 billion in profit from its Android operating system. ... "Google does not publicly allocate revenues or profits to Android separate and apart from Google's general business," Google's lawyers wrote in the filing.Jan 21, 2016

Not nothing.... Even more off topic

 

[tyson]

Thanks to a lawyer, we know now that Google has made $31 billion in revenue and $22 billion in profit from its Android operating system. ... "Google does not publicly allocate revenues or profits to Android separate and apart from Google's general business," Google's lawyers wrote in the filing.Jan 21, 2016

Not nothing.... Even more off topic

Nope but there is a reason it's not reported separately, because they don't directly sell it. Again, open source.

Now, how about iOS... How much does Apple make from it. NOT iPhone or any hardware, just iOS?

Now how do we get back on to Tesla and the lack of ability to service our own vehicles?

 

[zambono]

Because if they sell a car with 80K miles there is obviously a lot of wear and tear from the mileage, if someone sits around and drives 5k a year there's almost for years for that part already taxed by mileage to then fail as a product of time.

They should not CPO a car with 80k miles

 

[LCR1]

They should not CPO a car with 80k miles

Why not? If they can make the money, more power to them.

 

[Tiger]

Nice article: https://jalopnik.com/the-guy-who-salvages-ruined-teslas-and-puts-them-back-o-1827937793

Related video:

 

[Evil Twin]

Remember, there are two CPO warranty tiers now...

how so? I haven't been paying attention lately.

 

[Fusion]

how so? I haven't been paying attention lately.

I think he meant two options. Either 2 years 100k or the same 4 years 50k.

 

[imafan]

anyone know if there's annual maintenance checklist beyond 4 years/50k?

 

[KidDoc]

anyone know if there's annual maintenance checklist beyond 4 years/50k?

They just roll it around and repeat it. So instead of 4 years/50k it is 8 years/100k but exactly the same schedule every 4 years.