US Federal $7,500 Electric Vehicle Credit Expiry Date By Automaker

[mongo]

So much this...

Who knows??!

Regarding numbers, by my (optimistic?) read, not all cars sold in the US count toward the 200k. Verbiage is 'consumers and retail dealers' so government/ municipal and exports originating in the US may be exempt.

The number of qualified vehicles sold by the reporting entity to consumers or retail dealers during the calendar quarter.

Internal Revenue Bulletin: 2009-48 | Internal Revenue Service

(Which bodes badly for GM car purchasers, the dealer inventory will kick in the phase out before 200k are purchased)

 

[kengchang]

I am just looking at the official Tesla press release; Troy’s M3 spreadsheet; and InsideEVs numbers. These all support the conclusions I came to. Weirdest situation really is (so far) complete lack of big uptick in scheduled deliveries. Tesla reports 11,000 M3 in transit at June 30 along increased production rate. So, would be expecting that they try schedule 20,000 deliveries in July. But, so far activity appears to be flat to June. Troy says maybe we will see uptick soon. Who knows??!?

Seeing a lot people on FB taking delivery everyday

 

[Thomas Edison]

Seeing a lot people on FB taking delivery everyday

Since the first of the month?

 

[kengchang]

Since the first of the month?

Yap, definitely noticing more people posting about pick up

 

[R.S]

I am just looking at the official Tesla press release; Troy’s M3 spreadsheet; and InsideEVs numbers. These all support the conclusions I came to. Weirdest situation really is (so far) complete lack of big uptick in scheduled deliveries. Tesla reports 11,000 M3 in transit at June 30 along increased production rate. So, would be expecting that they try schedule 20,000 deliveries in July. But, so far activity appears to be flat to June. Troy says maybe we will see uptick soon. Who knows??!?

Didn’t they shut down the factory for a week or so? Then there should be no uptick in deliveries.

 

[kutkuzak]

When I was in the Indy service center yesterday (where they do the deliveries as well) the lot had a bunch of model 3s and there was a line of them in the service center being staged as well. They’re definitely moving them at a decent clip.

 

[FlatSix911]

InsideEVs published another article on July 7th... The 6 Automakers Closest To Losing Federal Tax Credit

Tesla – 205,383 (estimated, in-depth analysis/discussion by InsideEVs here)
Taking into consideration the numbers and pace of sales in the past months, Tesla hit 200,000 first, in the second quarter of this year.

General Motors should be second to the 200,000 level, some 3-6 months after Tesla. It’s likely Nissan will be third, with the expected emergence of the new LEAF, though sales of that vehicle have been soft in the U.S. After that, it’s not so clear which automakers will be next.

 

[kengchang]

Also note that they are doing group video/QA session and outdoor delivery now with only 10-15 minutes allocated only.

 

[mongo]

InsideEVs published another article on July 7th... The 6 Automakers Closest To Losing Federal Tax Credit

Tesla – 205,383 (estimated, in-depth analysis/discussion by InsideEVs here)
Taking into consideration the numbers and pace of sales in the past months, Tesla hit 200,000 first, in the second quarter of this year.

General Motors should be second to the 200,000 level, some 3-6 months after Tesla. It’s likely Nissan will be third, with the expected emergence of the new LEAF, though sales of that vehicle have been soft in the U.S. After that, it’s not so clear which automakers will be next.

Broken record still tthink they're wrong.

From article:

Each independent automaker’s eligible plug-in vehicles receive a federal credit (up to $7,500) federal credit – until the 200,000th plug-in is registered inside the US, when a countdown for phaseout of the credit begins.

That is not the criteria.

From the IRS:

.05 Quarterly Reporting of Sales of Qualified Vehicles. A manufacturer (...) that has received an acknowledgment of its certification from the Service must submit to the Service, in accordance with section 6 of this notice, a report of the number of qualified plug-in electric drive motor vehicles sold by the manufacturer (...) to consumers or retail dealers during the calendar quarter. The quarterly report must contain the following:

So (by my reading) GM's (and all other traditional dealer OEMs) totals must include dealer inventory and government/ municipal sales direct from OEM don't count.

Registration date matters to the purchaser during phase out, but not the manufacturer in regards to triggering it. (Which is a penalty on traditional OEMs)

 

[Thomas Edison]

This thread:

 

[scaesare]

Well, worse than a comment at least. And like I said before, if it's really close, I can understand why they would want to wait.

But I personally would prefer a statement, if they are well below, or way above 200k. And I don't want to accuse them of having a bad PR strategy, even though you seem to want me to do so. (I guess it's always easier to argue against a "troll"?)

I just use it as my own reasoning to say it's probably close. I also do think they are probably below 200k, again as I mentioned before slightly above 200k would be a word case, but also the easiest to avoid.

It just seems to be a rather complicated process and not even the guys at Tesla are sure enough to issue a statement, or just tweet something. So I don't see it as a reason that they are definitely below 200k, as @mongo does, but rather that it's incredibly close.

Though after reading about the weirdness of how sales might be added up, incredibly close could be up to 5k cars.

Just because I think you are making a bigger deal than necessary out of something doesn't equate to me calling you a troll. Please doesn't insinuate on my behalf.

You have a preference for a statement. That's fine. In my opinion all that really accomplishes on the positive side at the moment is satisfies your curiosity. There are, however, several potential downsides that have been pointed out.

And as you admit, it's a complicated process... so your repeated calling for a statement from Tesla in this regard along with repeated questioning why they haven't seems to be making more out of this situation than necessary.

 

[ccutrer]

This thread:
View attachment 315502

Just this thread?

 

[gambit48]

I think they blew through the 200K in June. Here is why:
- No evidence of tons of deliveries scheduled for July. If they had been holding back cars, you would have seen lots of deliveries scheduled for early July (and few in late June). But, we aren’t seeeing that at all.

I only have my NorCal delivery center and my parent's SoCal delivery center experience to go by, but I got mine the last week of June. They were going gangbusters. Said they had to do 130+ cars every day. I got 5-10 minutes with the car and then they were off to the next person. My parents got more time yesterday, but they're elderly and they had a huge delivery center and when I called them, they said they didn't have time to talk in the middle of their delivery as they were under time pressure too. Their delivery center was going crazy too. My rep basically said "I'm sure you researched all this stuff online" as kind of an excuse for rushing us.

I just joined a couple of Facebook groups and it looks like a TON of people just got their cars the past two weeks.

To me, that says Tesla was confident they could blast out a ton the last week of June and still hit 200,000 the first week of July. That's in addition to us knowing that Canada got thousands diverted to them earlier in June.

 

[ℬête Noire]

Also note that they are doing group video/QA session and outdoor delivery now with only 10-15 minutes allocated only.

As practiced for at scale at the Toronto International Centre in May-June when they rented a venue for a month and were handing over several dozen/day in a format like that (not clear if Tesla's reported target was 200/day max there or 200/day in the wider Southern Ontario region). The first I heard Tesla trying this approach was back in early April in Culver City. First look at Tesla’s new ‘delivery center’ concept and ‘group delivery’ service

It was always going to be a logistics leap they had to make. Going from their historical levels of roughly 1200 S+X deliveries/week peak at end of Q in the US to approximately 4-5 times that sustained and potentially trying to burst higher at the end of Q. I expect they're going to try move every unit they can by the end of September for their Q3 financial targets.

 

[mongo]

As a follow up to my thought line on the 200k numbers, I dove into the base law:
tl;dr; Government sales look to be exempt from counting, but Tesla could technically have claimed the credit.
Export sales look to be exempt from counting.
It's less than clear, so I could be mistaken.

Spoiler: Legalese

26 U.S. Code § 30D - New qualified plug-in electric drive motor vehicles

(d) New qualified plug-in electric drive motor vehicle For purposes of this section—
(1) In general The term “new qualified plug-in electric drive motor vehicle” means a motor vehicle—
(A) the original use of which commences with the taxpayer,

Where taxpayer is defined as:

(b)Notwithstanding section 7701(a)(14), the term “taxpayer” means any person subject to a tax under the applicable revenue law.

Further, in 30D:

(f) Special Rules
(3) Property used by tax-exempt entity

In the case of a vehicle the use of which is described in paragraph (3) or (4) of section 50(b) and which is not subject to a lease, the person who sold such vehicle to the person or entity using such vehicle shall be treated as the taxpayer that placed such vehicle in service, but only if such person clearly discloses to such person or entity in a document the amount of any credit allowable under subsection (a) with respect to such vehicle (determined without regard to subsection (c)). For purposes of subsection (c), property to which this paragraph applies shall be treated as of a character subject to an allowance for depreciation.

Which reads to me that Tesla could take the tax credit for government sales, or could have not in which case the vehicles would not be qualified.

Paragraph (3) and (4 ) of 50(b) per 26 U.S. Code § 50 - Other special rules

(3) Property used by certain tax-exempt organization

No credit shall be determined under this subpart with respect to any property used by an organization (other than a cooperative described in section 521) which is exempt from the tax imposed by this chapter unless such property is used predominantly in an unrelated trade or business the income of which is subject to tax under section 511. If the property is debt-financed property (as defined in section 514(b)), the amount taken into account for purposes of determining the amount of the credit under this subpart with respect to such property shall be that percentage of the amount (which but for this paragraph would be so taken into account) which is the same percentage as is used under section 514(a), for the year the property is placed in service, in computing the amount of gross income to be taken into account during such taxable year with respect to such property. If any qualified rehabilitated building is used by the tax-exempt organization pursuant to a lease, this paragraph shall not apply for purposes of determining the amount of the rehabilitation credit.
(4) Property used by governmental units or foreign persons or entities
(A) In general No credit shall be determined under this subpart with respect to any property used—
(i) by the United States, any State or political subdivision thereof, any possession of the United States, or any agency or instrumentality of any of the foregoing, or
(ii) by any foreign person or entity (as defined in section 168(h)(2)(C)), but only with respect to property to which section 168(h)(2)(A)(iii) applies (determined after the application of section 168(h)(2)(B)).
(B) Exception for short-term leases

This paragraph and paragraph (3) shall not apply to any property by reason of use under a lease with a term of less than 6 months (determined under section 168(i)(3)).
(C) Exception for qualified rehabilitated buildings leased to governments, etc.

If any qualified rehabilitated building is leased to a governmental unit (or a foreign person or entity) this paragraph shall not apply for purposes of determining the rehabilitation credit with respect to such building.
(D) Special rules for partnerships, etc.

For purposes of this paragraph and paragraph (3), rules similar to the rules of paragraphs (5) and (6) of section 168(h) shall apply.
(E) Cross reference

For special rules for the application of this paragraph and paragraph (3), see section 168(h).

Further, back in 30D:

(4) Property used outside United States not qualified

No credit shall be allowable under subsection (a) with respect to any property referred to in section 50(b)(1)

50(b)(1):

(b) Certain property not eligible No credit shall be determined under this subpart with respect to—
(1) Property used outside United States
(A) In general
Except as provided in subparagraph (B), no credit shall be determined under this subpart with respect to any property which is used predominantly outside the United States.
(B) Exceptions
Subparagraph (A) shall not apply to any property described in section 168(g)(4).

168(g)(4): 26 U.S. Code § 168 - Accelerated cost recovery system

(D) any motor vehicle of a United States person (as defined in section 7701(a)(30)) which is operated to and from the United States;

 

[SZNJ]

I find it a bad show by Tesla to not make an official statement that they hit 200k in June or July. Basically people who received their invite to configure the last week in June do not know if they will have the full $7500 or $3750 as most received a delivery window of Sep -Nov.

 

[ℬête Noire]

I find it a bad show by Tesla to not make an official statement that they hit 200k in June or July. Basically people who received their invite to configure the last week in June do not know if they will have the full $7500 or $3750 as most received a delivery window of Sep -Nov.

As mentioned further up the thread, it appears that the IRS has to certify Tesla's reporting to them before making it "official". The IRS has 30 days from the time of Tesla reporting to the IRS (Tesla has as long as July 31 to report Q2, so there's potential for further delay there depending on how proactive Tesla is on reporting to the IRS).

If Tesla believes they didn't hit 200K but then the IRS ends up disputing that it would be a major "oopsie", and I'd bet huge legal liability, if Tesla made a public statement about not hitting 200K out ahead of receiving official confirmation from the IRS.

Remember, this is going to be the first manufacturer to hit this trigger, so it's hard to predict how it'll all look.

I say this as someone with an D order, and thus very likely $3750 on the line here. Yes, it weighs on my mind to an extent but I'm not sure there's any better solution for Tesla than for me just to "wait and see". To speak out of turn about their belief of not hitting 200K in June could very well put them on the hook for hundreds of millions in liability.

 

[dhanson865]

I find it a bad show by Tesla to not make an official statement that they hit 200k in June or July. Basically people who received their invite to configure the last week in June do not know if they will have the full $7500 or $3750 as most received a delivery window of Sep -Nov.

July isn't over yet. If by some chance Tesla knows they haven't hit 200,000 yet I'd say it isn't bad form to wait until they do.

Now if you modify that and say "I find it a bad show by Tesla to not make an official statement that they hit 200k in June if that is what happened" then I'm there with you. If they haven't announced it by this Friday (the 13th) and it turns out June was the trigger month, I'd be disappointed.

I'd totally be fine with a tweet saying "news on 200,000the delivery coming soon" if they want to reveal it later. If it turns out the answer is complicated and they need more time to figure it out a "We are still working on the forms to turn in" type statement would work as well.

Of course any neutral statement would be spun both ways, so it wouldn't slow down threads like this, still it'd be nice to know that they will communicate it when they can.

 

[mongo]

I'd totally be fine with a tweet saying "news on 200,000the delivery coming soon" if they want to reveal it later.

This may sound flippant, but what difference would that make? We know they will announce soon (for some value of soon).

 

[Shmackers]

Today’s Updated design and configuration website (no reservations—just design and order) is very prominently showing and highlighting $7500 of savings for orders with estimates five months out. This should come close to closing the book on the thought that they hit 200,000 in June.