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I felt the opposite. Tesla's answer came across the worst to me, and reads to me with the over-specificity of a student making excuses for why their paper isn't
by pflats 7y ago
I felt the opposite. Tesla's answer came across the worst to me, and reads to me with the over-specificity of a student making excuses for why their paper isn't done on time.
> "It was a supplier-related issue".
Passing the buck is really not a great look to start with. It makes the rest of the response seem like a series of excuses.
Tesla chose the supplier. Tesla built and inspected and sold and shipped the car with those parts. This is a Tesla-related issue. The only time Tesla should mention a supplier issue is in response to, "why can't you sell me a car?"
> "[It] did not pose any threat to vehicle safety".
That's good, but this isn't the safety survey.
> "[T]here was a[...] false service alert [... that was fixed] within two weeks of being reported".
I'm not even sure how to react to this one. Bringing my car in to be told "false alarm" is really not reassuring. And two weeks to fix a false alert doesn't help me - I've probably already brought it in for service.
> "This proactive approach to improved reliability is one of the reasons why Tesla is the highest rated car brand among consumers, according to Consumer Reports." (Paraphrased:) Our cars are the safest and best performing, and Model S is #1 in satisfaction.
To me, blaming a supplier for the issues is a terrible way to start, and this is likewise a terrible closing.
"You just fell in the rankings to come in 3rd to last in our reliability survey. Any comments?" "Our cars are the safest and fastest and we have always ranked #1 on your customer satisfaction survey."
Those stats are undeniably good. They also make me think those are the stats the company cares about a lot more than reliability.
- woodandsteel 7y ago>Tesla chose the supplier. Tesla built and inspected and sold and shipped the car with those parts. This is a Tesla-related issue. They are new at mass manufacturing and no doubt learned a lesson from this incident. And that is the whole point of their response, unlike the other American manufacturers they are successfully working away at rapidly improving quality and reliability. And you are angry at them for that.
- pflats 7y agoBut Tesla didn't say "we're new at this and we learned from it". They said it was a "supplier-related issue" that has been "addressed for cars in the field" and "resolved [...] with fundamental design improvements". Nothing in the statement tells me that there won't be another "supplier-related issue" down the line. There should be controls in place for this.
- woodandsteel 7y agoTesla is new at producing cars in large quantities, and it has greatly improved their quality and reliability. There is no way this could have happened unless they were learning from their mistakes, and that includes controls on suppliers. Do you really disagree?
- sunstone 7y agoIf I had to choose, I would choose specifics over platitudes.
- rednerrus 7y agoEspecially specifics backed by OTA fixes.
- Scarblac 7y agoYes, but the others don't say anything. That Tesla does this makes them look bad (e.g. your comment) but it's more information for the customer, and that's a good thing.