I frequently visit a supercharger in East Brunswick, NJ. It's a standard configuration, with a power rating of 120 kW (according to the Tesla website). The last month or two, charging here has been painfully slow - even when using it with one or two other Teslas charging, the steady rate has been as low as 24kW, 81 mph. I have spoken to others charging at that same station at the same time, and their speeds are similar. I had called to report it, but the message assured me that if there was a problem with a supercharging station, Tesla was aware of it and to please hang up. Perhaps naively, I respected that I might be unnecessarily taking up a phone line that someone else with a "real" problem could be using and did not report.
However, after a very unsatisfactory response to an email I sent to technical support about the issue, I finally decided to call support and force the issue. To make a long story short, Tesla was absolutely NOT aware of the issue. In fact, even trying to get the representative to acknowledge the issue was difficult because upon her looking at her board, the supercharger in question did not register any errors. I had to insist that she send a complaint to the engineering department, and took the additional step of visiting the supercharger and plugging in for the specific purpose of calling in and insisting that they monitor my charge to confirm my complaint. Hopefully, they will send someone to investigate and repair.
It surprises me that no one else had forced this issue, and I would like to encourage all of us to be persistent about making sure our supercharger network is functioning at is maximum capacity. We depend on this network. We can't be complacent about non-functioning or underperforming superchargers. Please take the time to report these things when we experience them, even if it's inconvenient to be on hold for 30 minutes to speak to a rep, and have to go through the frustrating process of convincing some rep to take effective action instead of blowing off the complaint by asking 10 questions about my battery temperature or whether my car was charging on the same circuit as another. If we don't do it, no one else will. And we'll be helping each other avoid getting stranded at a non-functional supercharger we were counting on to get us home.
However, after a very unsatisfactory response to an email I sent to technical support about the issue, I finally decided to call support and force the issue. To make a long story short, Tesla was absolutely NOT aware of the issue. In fact, even trying to get the representative to acknowledge the issue was difficult because upon her looking at her board, the supercharger in question did not register any errors. I had to insist that she send a complaint to the engineering department, and took the additional step of visiting the supercharger and plugging in for the specific purpose of calling in and insisting that they monitor my charge to confirm my complaint. Hopefully, they will send someone to investigate and repair.
It surprises me that no one else had forced this issue, and I would like to encourage all of us to be persistent about making sure our supercharger network is functioning at is maximum capacity. We depend on this network. We can't be complacent about non-functioning or underperforming superchargers. Please take the time to report these things when we experience them, even if it's inconvenient to be on hold for 30 minutes to speak to a rep, and have to go through the frustrating process of convincing some rep to take effective action instead of blowing off the complaint by asking 10 questions about my battery temperature or whether my car was charging on the same circuit as another. If we don't do it, no one else will. And we'll be helping each other avoid getting stranded at a non-functional supercharger we were counting on to get us home.
