Brandon S.
Yelp
I took delivery of my Tesla Model 3 Performance at the San Antonio Gallery/Service Center. The people were extremely nice at the showroom and service, but I had many issues after delivery. They failed to annotate several issues at delivery, the car had several dirty spots in the interior, and several paint imperfections like micro-scratches, a couple chips, and all but one of the windows had giant scratches on them. I took delivery anyway and they fixed most of the issues, with much hassle on my end, in a couple appointments after delivery. I'm a long-time investor in the company, I've worked hard to be able to afford the car. I've wanted a Tesla for a longtime and just recently became able to afford one. Before, I was in the military and didn't make nearly enough to be able to reasonably afford the car. I work very hard for my money, and I understand it's still a new car company: there's going to be some issues, but the part they failed the most was the customer service.
My delivery adviser was slow to respond, clearly overworked, and almost useless throughout the process. It was scary to think this was already the service I should expect before I even took delivery of the car. I needed to make a last-minute change to the car, and my adviser just didn't respond-- I feel like this made it much more difficult to change it once that last minute passed. After CC'ing other people in on the email and calling the service center/gallery they finally responded. They were able to make the change, thankfully. This caused me to have overpaid for the car, by about $5,500. They said they'd refund me the amount later-- but it took 2 months to be refunded, and they didn't even think they owed me anything.
Fast forward again to delivery day, with all of the scratches and issues, the guy that was helping me with delivery was super nice, his name was Antonio. That guy has been a massive help-- even after delivery. During delivery, with all these issues being apparent, another Tesla person came over to "help". She told me I could refuse delivery, but I'd be sent to the back of the line and I'd have to pay the deposit again-- she said it in the way, "You don't want to do this because we'll make it hell for you.". So, again, I took delivery. This already soured my experience with my delivery. I wanted it to go as perfect as possible. I brought their team 4 pizzas because we were so happy, and who doesn't like pizza?
They've made any fix I've needed help with almost a part time job just to get handled. It's not right. I've had to open a BBB report, contact their district manager-- I've tried contacting their store manager, but he just never calls back. I've tried doing it the right way, but they just seem to blow me off. Then, of course, I hear from one of my close coworkers who visited the Tesla gallery here that while talking about the increase in people "at the military base" buying Teslas (i.e. me because I talk about my awesome car all of the time [my fault, I know it's annoying, like when people talk about their babies or cats all of the time]), He asked, asked if they know me, since I bought my car there. Apparently they said, "Yes.. ugh.." like I'm causing them all of the issues-- dude, I work my ass off, I buy one of your $65,000 cars, I take delivery despite the issues, and I believe and am an investor in the company. I love Tesla. It's a surprisingly small town and I'm sure I've been a pain in the ass for Tesla San Antonio. It takes a hell of a lot of nerve to treat someone, anyone, especially a customer, like that. I've showed them nothing but kindness, gratitude, and professionalism. Anytime I've had their mobile service team to our house for one of the many issues with the car, I've given them cookies and sweet tea-- we brought them pizzas for their team. It's not insane to expect issues with the car fixed and the $5,500, they owned me, returned. It's so disappointing anytime someone's trying to be nice and they take advantage of it. I'm not sure what kind of madness is happening in Tesla or in their service center/gallery. It seems like there's all these different arms of Tesla that don't communicate at all, or at best, communicate poorly. I don't deserve this, no one does.
The technology of the car is amazing. I don't regret getting the car, it's insanely awesome and blows me away every single day. They couldn't get it back if they wanted to. Though, I really, really wish Tesla's quality control and customer service would greatly improve. I feel like it will, and when it does, the crap employees will be removed and the ones that need help will get the help they need to complete the mission.
Buy a Tesla, if you can, and if you want. It's an awesome car-- the best car I've ever driven. The company has its issues and will continue to for a while, but hopefully they'll fix them in time for me to buy another car and not have this same experience.
I swear I'm a good consumer and customer, I tried being as fair an