Why Tesla Will Fail

[Peter Thomas]

Sounds like Tesla needs a way of communicating issues and solutions to technicians. Lenovo has a good web site that allows people to search for common issues that the Lenovo community may have and the community or Lenovo engineer can answer if the community does not have the answer. Perhaps the people who are responsible for this website can set up one for the Tesla community and Tesla repair technicians that is supported by engineers to answer questions that the community, other repair technicians can not solve. If the engineer in charge cannot solve then he escalates it to the engineer who is in charge of the design of the component that is not working. This provides 1) education the technician on how to fix an issue based on threads responding to a particular issue 2) the technician, the Tesla community and the engineer and component engineer can all contribute to solving an issue 3) quality feedback on components can be fed back to the engineer responsible for improving next generation parts and getting early feedback on a quality issue which might later result in a recall 3) Youtube could be utilized for show and tell since everyone in the community, the technicians and engineers would have a smart phone with video capabilities. Pictures are worth a thousand words. All you need to see is Elon with the flame thrower to understand that.

 

[Ken7]

I am in Rochester, NY, and have dealt with Omar. I have had 2 service calls and they always had the parts and the techs were great.
The N.Y. service center has always been responsive. I am hoping that your experience was not typical.Tesla should certainly make it right. I understand why they need a central place to log in the service calls and order the parts, but the technicians may do a better job with an assistant that reports to a regional manager.

I will 2nd that opinion regarding the NY service center. I've had only 2 dealings with them, both positive. The first was a prompt rollout of the mobile service van to properly align one door handle shortly after I picked up my new car. The other just occurred as the result of them reading a post I made about an issue I had with my iPhone X and initiating calls from my MS. I had gotten a call from the SC asking if they could be of assistance. As it turned out, I had resolved the issue the night before.

One thing is for sure, coming in with an attitude, demeaning people and treating them in a manner you wouldn't want to be treated, will not enhance your service experience. This is certainly not to say bad service experiences don't occur, they do, but you can certainly maximize the odds that your experience will be a positive one.

 

[Yonaks]

I have had nothing but excellent service from TESLA . I've never had a company willing to come to my location & work on my TESLA under warranty & the repairs are done correctly the 1st time .

 

[McRat]

I used to own a Datsun 510 (bullet proof) and now a 2011 Leaf and waiting for the M3. The Leaf has had nothing break for a first year model. Amazing. Maybe their gasoline cars suck, but then all my Nissan rentals have been exceptional. Much better driving experience than any GM product.

Hardbody micro truck (20mpg yet still gutless) blew trans at 8,000 miles, Nissan tried to chump out on the warranty claiming owner abuse and that clutches aren't covered, before they even diagnosed it. Manual trans was assembled wrong (missing a circlip) and it locked up between 2 gears in the middle of an intersection. A letter threatening severe legal action, citing a potentially lethal defect finally got them to release the truck and honor the written warranty. Putting 500lb in bed of truck made truck unstable at speeds over 50mph in corners. That was when new, and decayed with time. Tendency to hydroplane even with new tires and light rain. Window crank broke internally. Electrical problems. Probably some things I'm forgetting.

Maxima, auto trans blew up at <40,000 miles on our dime. Many of the accessories failed long before that. Luckily it got rear ended and totaled in a minor accident shortly after we replaced the trans.

I rented a Nissan SUV (???) the one with the hidden parking brake. It just died in the snow at an intersection and would not restart. Missed an important meeting while waiting for a tow back to the rental yard. Luckily I dressed for the snow over my suit. This is sage advice when driving a Nissan. Bring gallons of water and a satellite telephone if out west, dress for an Everest expedition if driving in snow country. Practice your hitchhiking skills. If you are male, you might want to pack women's clothes and makeup to assist in getting rides. Get in the practice of leaving the keys in the car, as auto theft isn't exactly the worst thing that can happen to a Nissan driver.

No GM has left me stranded, and that's a lot of cars and trucks. 5000 lb in the bed of a GMC 2500? Nothing broke. I was freaking amazed, but I had pulled a 50,000 lb sled in competition with the truck so I knew it was over-built.

So we have exactly opposite experiences. Not only has GM never tried to screw me out of warranty work, they have honored warranty claims that were past the warranty period. GMs handle great, and exceed advertised specs.

 

[bryanw95119]

Honestly this sounds a lot like my company. I work for Darfon, a Taiwanese PV inverter company. We actually make excellent inverters both our microinverters and hybrid inverters. They don't understand why they don't sell much better.
What they don't appreciate or possibly value is a better term is that an inverter by itself is not a product. It is a complete product when it has support, training, marketing and logistics all in place. Those are very expensive and difficult parts of a business to create.

Perhaps we see the same thing with Tesla. A great car but the support, training, marketing and logistics just haven't caught up or doesn't have the priority needed at this time.

 

[darrelld]

This is why Tesla will fail -- not this year, not next year, but in a few years. It's just one story, but unfortunately it's representative.

Mid-december, the latch fails shut on my rear right door. I call up the service center I've been using to tell them that the latch is stuck shut (can't be opened from the inside or outside). They tell me that top management at Tesla (aka idiots) have told them they can't service my area any more and that I have to be directed to the "New York Mobile Service Team".

Now, there's no upstate NY service center. This is because Tesla top management (aka idiots) have *chosen* not to build one. It is legal for them to build one -- there is a limit on the number of stores, but no limit on the number of service centers. They are lying about this to their technicians, incidentally.

So, the service center I've been using refuses to make an appointment and says the NY mobile service team will call me. They refuse to give me the phone number for the NY mobile service team. They say they'll report my problem and order the part to be delivered to the NY mobile service team. I emphasize that it's the *latch*.

The NY mobile service team doesn't call me back after several weeks. I call the service center again and yell at them. This time I manage to get a phone number for the NY mobile service team. I call them. They say "our computer system says we tried to call you". They never tried to call me -- their computer system is lying. They say the parts came in a week ago (but they never bothered to call me....) I tell them *again* (since it's different people) that the problem is that the *latch* is stuck and ask them to make sure they have ordered the parts for the latch. "Omar" assures me that they have the parts for the latch. At this point, about four weeks after I first called, I am finally able to make an appointment. There is then a further delay because my schedule doesn't allow for an appointment in the next week (but would have in the earlier weeks which Tesla wasted).

Come today, the service tech shows up. He doesn't have the parts for the latch, because nobody ever wrote down that they were supposed to get the parts for the latch. Complete waste of time. I yell at the NY mobile service team guy (Omar), who lied to me, who now claims that the order regarding the stuck latch was never entered in his computer. I ask and he won't give me his manager's number. Or the number of the idiot in top management who ordered that we get all our mobile service through this idiot division. He says he'll talk to his manager -- we'll see.

This is par for the course with Tesla service. I have been dealing with this crap for five years, and it gets worse and worse every time. Meanwhile, the software team breaks basic functionality in updates (such as USB music playback).

This is going to kill the company. Not now, but as soon as there are other decent electric cars on the market -- ones where you can go to *independent service shops*.

They've had five years to fix this sort of crap and they've only made it worse. My advice to investors at this point is to hold on now, but dump the stock before 2020 if they don't fix the chronic and ever-worsening service problems.

It's not the bottom-line technicians. They're all fine. It's top management failure. There's no internal communications: information does not get passed from one person to another, and any one person who screws up the information ruins everything. The only way to get good service is to talk directly to the service tech who is going to do the work on your car. The only way to get a software bug fixed is to find the programmer who is responsible for fixing it. And Tesla does their best to *prevent* you from talking to the people you need to talk to.

Sounds like my experience with a Ford Fusion Hybrid Titanium and corporate support from Ford. Purchased the car new and from the day I drove off the lot one of the blind spot sensors never worked reliably. 3 years later going back and forth with Ford corporate to replace my sensor I was informed that Ford policy is to not change any electronic parts without an error code. Finally the local dealer in a effort to resolve my issue replaced my faulty sensor with one from another vehicle on their lot. Ford refused to ship any replacement parts. Once my sensor was replaced with the part from their inventory car the issues disappeared. Traded the Ford a few months later for my Model S and have nothing but good experience with the Dallas Service Center and Mobile Techs.

 

[FlyingCookie]

Nashville is roughly the same, in my experience. I’ll call the store about an issue and specifically ask them to pull logs, and they never call me back. If I call Back, they never even bothered to write down the request. As such, I’ve had a heater that only works about half the time since November, and after replacing parts, still the same issue. I finally lost it last night when I was freezing, again, on a road trip. I basically told the guy on the phone in Fremont that even as much as i love Tesla and what they’re building, this level of service is completely unacceptable.

“Normal” car owners that will be buying the Model 3 won’t put up with this. If they take their car to the Service Center for something, they are going to expect calls when they’re told they’ll get them, and they’re going to expect the problem to be resolved. An average person that uses their car to get to and from work and doesn’t have a second car will ditch Tesla in a heart beat. I’M getting frustrated enough with service that I’m considering selling my car, which I never thought I’d say.

 

[Vsasson]

This is why Tesla will fail -- not this year, not next year, but in a few years. It's just one story, but unfortunately it's representative.

Mid-december, the latch fails shut on my rear right door. I call up the service center I've been using to tell them that the latch is stuck shut (can't be opened from the inside or outside). They tell me that top management at Tesla (aka idiots) have told them they can't service my area any more and that I have to be directed to the "New York Mobile Service Team".

Now, there's no upstate NY service center. This is because Tesla top management (aka idiots) have *chosen* not to build one. It is legal for them to build one -- there is a limit on the number of stores, but no limit on the number of service centers. They are lying about this to their technicians, incidentally.

So, the service center I've been using refuses to make an appointment and says the NY mobile service team will call me. They refuse to give me the phone number for the NY mobile service team. They say they'll report my problem and order the part to be delivered to the NY mobile service team. I emphasize that it's the *latch*.

The NY mobile service team doesn't call me back after several weeks. I call the service center again and yell at them. This time I manage to get a phone number for the NY mobile service team. I call them. They say "our computer system says we tried to call you". They never tried to call me -- their computer system is lying. They say the parts came in a week ago (but they never bothered to call me....) I tell them *again* (since it's different people) that the problem is that the *latch* is stuck and ask them to make sure they have ordered the parts for the latch. "Omar" assures me that they have the parts for the latch. At this point, about four weeks after I first called, I am finally able to make an appointment. There is then a further delay because my schedule doesn't allow for an appointment in the next week (but would have in the earlier weeks which Tesla wasted).

Come today, the service tech shows up. He doesn't have the parts for the latch, because nobody ever wrote down that they were supposed to get the parts for the latch. Complete waste of time. I yell at the NY mobile service team guy (Omar), who lied to me, who now claims that the order regarding the stuck latch was never entered in his computer. I ask and he won't give me his manager's number. Or the number of the idiot in top management who ordered that we get all our mobile service through this idiot division. He says he'll talk to his manager -- we'll see.

This is par for the course with Tesla service. I have been dealing with this crap for five years, and it gets worse and worse every time. Meanwhile, the software team breaks basic functionality in updates (such as USB music playback).

This is going to kill the company. Not now, but as soon as there are other decent electric cars on the market -- ones where you can go to *independent service shops*.

They've had five years to fix this sort of crap and they've only made it worse. My advice to investors at this point is to hold on now, but dump the stock before 2020 if they don't fix the chronic and ever-worsening service problems.

It's not the bottom-line technicians. They're all fine. It's top management failure. There's no internal communications: information does not get passed from one person to another, and any one person who screws up the information ruins everything. The only way to get good service is to talk directly to the service tech who is going to do the work on your car. The only way to get a software bug fixed is to find the programmer who is responsible for fixing it. And Tesla does their best to *prevent* you from talking to the people you need to talk to.

Consumer Reports says the most satisfied owners of any car own a Tesla. So, could your experience be isolated? I have owed a Model S since April 2015, and have had absolutely no problem with Tesla service. As for my car, it's the most reliable I've ever owned, including the four Toyota Prius hybrids I owned before the Model S. Predicting the failure of a company based on your service experience is a leap.

 

[mpt]

Just a data point: People driving i3 are still getting 'Drivetrain malfunction' after it first appeared in the ActiveE program 7 years ago. This hasn't even bruised BMW. My Samsung Washing machine corroded after 7 years due to a metallurgical design error that's still present today and phones of theirs will spontaneously ignite, they're still with us. Research In Motion still sells the Blackberry. My point being that I think it would take more than crappy service to kill off Tesla given their momentum.

 

[NCIC]

This is why Tesla will fail -- not this year, not next year, but in a few years. It's just one story, but unfortunately it's representative.

Fail? Hmmm, nah. But it's good to have a forum in which to air our complaints. It sounds more like a management problem at your local service center. The Dallas service center does a really good job. I've had some disappointments on having to wait for parts, since I live 2 hours from the center. As far as speaking to the actual programmers, that's a ridiculous expectation. The software glitches get handled as they are reported and I'm sure they have a large queue of requests, so those probably get handled based on priority.

We all do hope that Tesla will beef up their service center staff as the owners of the Model 3's will be far less forgiving than the early adopters who bought the Model S. I can't say I rave about my Ford Service Center when I take my F150 in for problems, so hope that Tesla it least exceeds that standard!

 

[MXWing]

Nashville is roughly the same, in my experience. I’ll call the store about an issue and specifically ask them to pull logs, and they never call me back. If I call Back, they never even bothered to write down the request. As such, I’ve had a heater that only works about half the time since November, and after replacing parts, still the same issue. I finally lost it last night when I was freezing, again, on a road trip. I basically told the guy on the phone in Fremont that even as much as i love Tesla and what they’re building, this level of service is completely unacceptable.

“Normal” car owners that will be buying the Model 3 won’t put up with this. If they take their car to the Service Center for something, they are going to expect calls when they’re told they’ll get them, and they’re going to expect the problem to be resolved. An average person that uses their car to get to and from work and doesn’t have a second car will ditch Tesla in a heart beat. I’M getting frustrated enough with service that I’m considering selling my car, which I never thought I’d say.

Why would you call a store and ask about logs? You explain what the problem is, you schedule an appointment, you bring the car in and see what happens next.

If your issue isn't resolved after the first service appointment, you make another one.

That's what "Normal" car owners do.

 

[FlyingCookie]

Why would you call a store and ask about logs? You explain what the problem is, you schedule an appointment, you bring the car in and see what happens next.

If your issue isn't resolved after the first service appointment, you make another one.

That's what "Normal" car owners do.

Because my car is out of warranty and I refuse to pay $125/hr for labor. WHAT I’m calling about is irrelevant. It’s that they say “Yeah, we can do that, we’ll call you back.” and they have never called me back. When I have Taken the car in for other issues (such as the leaking seals around the triangle glass) the problem either “doesn’t exist” or “was fixed” (except that it wasn’t.)

I’m an outlier in that I do my own work. I’m not an outlier in that when I’m told “We’ll call back tomorrow” I expect a call back tomorrow. Tesla is supposed to be better than dealerships, yet after the warranty expires they throw parts at the problem just like a regular car shop does, at the owner’s expense.

 

[Beth]

When I bought my Roadster 4 years ago, they insisted it had to go into the shop so they could do a full service before delivery. They said they were going to change the tires and do a service, including new brakes. While it was there, and they were really doing absolutely nothing to it (I needed new brakes less than 12 months later), my wheels disappeared from my car. Tesla found them on the car of an employee who's car was in the shop when mine was. I had to call the employee myself and arrange to meet at the service center to get my wheels back, they would not do it. I then reported the employee and they did an "internal investigation" and decided it was an accident (?). This certainly seemed unlikely since they had to remove 4 wheels from two cars, put his used tires on my wheels and my new tires on his wheels. But whatever.... Service got much better after that and I used to wait for my car. Now, not only can't I wait, but last time they forgot to order the parts and I had to call several times to get them ordered. I'm not sure this will put them out of business, but is sure is annoying for owners.

 

[MXWing]

Because my car is out of warranty and I refuse to pay $125/hr for labor. WHAT I’m calling about is irrelevant. It’s that they say “Yeah, we can do that, we’ll call you back.” and they have never called me back. When I have Taken the car in for other issues (such as the leaking seals around the triangle glass) the problem either “doesn’t exist” or “was fixed” (except that it wasn’t.)

I’m an outlier in that I do my own work. I’m not an outlier in that when I’m told “We’ll call back tomorrow” I expect a call back tomorrow. Tesla is supposed to be better than dealerships, yet after the warranty expires they throw parts at the problem just like a regular car shop does, at the owner’s expense.

To be honest, I can't fathom why someone at Tesla would promise to download your out of warranty vehicle logs over the air, analyze them and give you a call back. Since we both know that is unreasonable and doesn't make any sense, we shouldn't be expecting resolution on that no matter what we hear on the phone. If I was that person's manager I would be chastising them for setting impossible blue moon promises.

What we CAN do however is expect them to warranty work already performed. If your heater/seals was supposed to be fixed and isn't, you have a paper trail for them to evaluate and honor.

"Throwing parts at the problem" may very well be the best practice/recommended/only way to solve X problem. That's such a vague, all encompassing slam across all dealers, and all manufacturers. Something may need parts, some may not. Some may need small parts, some may need big parts. Your mileage may vary..

You have a warranty. Warranty last for x long and covers y. After that, you are expected to pay z for parts plus labor.

I do not see why Tesla should be held to a higher standard than any other auto manufacturer in that respect.

$125 an hour is pricey but I bet so is the technician working on your car as well. Whether we like it or not, that is part of the cost of ownership. If you are unwilling to pay them, you should not expect anything from them.

As a general pro-tip, one can generally receive discounts if they are very cordial to the people they deal with. It's a potential bonus but not a guaranteed one.

 

[milleron]

As far as speaking to the actual programmers, that's a ridiculous expectation.

See, speaking to a programmer is an unrealistic expectation in the first place, as they cannot speak to you. They are idiot savants who can communicate with computers in apparently magical ways. However, they cannot speak to humans. That's why one gets error messages like "process failed to complete due to mismatch at A9F3094C," "kernel panic. Shutting down," and the ever-present "404 not found."

 

[MXWing]

When I bought my Roadster 4 years ago, they insisted it had to go into the shop so they could do a full service before delivery. They said they were going to change the tires and do a service, including new brakes. While it was there, and they were really doing absolutely nothing to it (I needed new brakes less than 12 months later), my wheels disappeared from my car. Tesla found them on the car of an employee who's car was in the shop when mine was. I had to call the employee myself and arrange to meet at the service center to get my wheels back, they would not do it. I then reported the employee and they did an "internal investigation" and decided it was an accident (?). This certainly seemed unlikely since they had to remove 4 wheels from two cars, put his used tires on my wheels and my new tires on his wheels. But whatever.... Service got much better after that and I used to wait for my car. Now, not only can't I wait, but last time they forgot to order the parts and I had to call several times to get them ordered. I'm not sure this will put them out of business, but is sure is annoying for owners.

That is truly a screwball story but I see no way for Tesla or anyone to defend against that.
A possible way to address that I suppose is standardizing the interview process and hooking someone up to a lie detector while asking:

"If you owned the same car as a customer, and they brought their cars in for service and you found their tires to be in a better condition than yours - would you consider stealing them from the customer?"

After the first call where parts were promised, I would be asking on the next call:

"I seem to have an unfortunate history where needed parts aren't getting delivered. Is there anything in your system I can use to reference the status of this? Could you please put a note in the system to have someone call an email me when there is movement? Lastly, I don't think it will be a problem but if needed, whom can I escalate this to if somehow I have problems receiving the parts?"

 

[hbouw]

I was interested to read your post based on the title.
However, then you used the word: “idiots” in the 2nd paragraph and immediately lost all credibility.

 

[Chopr147]

I have not read all 6 pages but most Tesla owners will agree: Tesla communication sucks! The car is awesome and like all makers will need repairs at times. But man, how many lousy communication issues have we heard on TMC?

 

[mattjs33]

"Throwing parts at the problem" may very well be the best practice/recommended/only way to solve X problem. That's such a vague, all encompassing slam across all dealers, and all manufacturers. Something may need parts, some may not. Some may need small parts, some may need big parts. Your mileage may vary...

Um... no. Throwing parts at the problem is NEVER the best/recommended/only way to solve a problem. ESPECIALLY when the technician working on the vehicle is supposed to have access to factory diagnostic codes, equipment and procedures to root out the cause of the problem.

In reading a lot of these posts it's clear to me that Tesla has a massive deficiency in the parts supply chain. It's almost as if they buy into the whole mantra that their cars will never need service and thus aftersales parts availability is an afterthought. I think their entire aftersales system needs an overhaul by someone from a legacy OEM with prior experience in the field.

 

[Phenom300]

Door handles are filed under one of the reasons why I’ve shied away from buying a used Model S instead of waiting for my Model 3. Self presenting door handles are cool, but it’s the same reason why manual windows last longer than automatic.....

And when it comes to repairs, door handles are expensive to fix from a labor point of view, even if the parts are cheap.

I re-iterate that Tesla needs a “service portal” to log your own service tickets, and that someone in HQ monitors aging tickets, just like with a well run helpdesk. It helps you identify problem spots and resolve them.

Agree 100%! The Portland Oregon service center is awful! They had my car for 5 days and failed to fix brake noise when autopilot brakes or fix the defective autopilot 2!