Tesla cuts owner's range by 80 miles with software update, asks for $4.5K to restore it

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I have a customer who's the ~3rd owner of a 2013 Model S 60.

At some point years ago the battery pack was swapped under warranty with a 90 pack. It wasn't software limited. It was effectively made into a 90 by Tesla.

Years went by.

(1/*)

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Car is sold twice since, and now has a new owner (my customer). It says 90, badged 90, has 90-type range.

He has the car for a few months, goes in and does a paid MCU2 upgrade at Tesla after the 3G shutdown.

All goes well. The upgrade is done, car is working fine.

(2/*)

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Later on, while the car is parked in his driveway, Tesla calls him to tell him that they found and fixed a configuration mistake with his car.

They remotely software locked the car to be a 60 again, despite having been a 90 for years.

He now has ~80 miles less range.

(3/*)

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Furious, he demands they restore it back to the way it was, and they refuse. "We can unlock it for $4,500."



This guy bought a car, & years later Tesla reaches in remotely with no warning and literally cuts his usable range by a third!

(I confirmed story w/logs)

(4/*)

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Imagine walking out to your car to find it's now 1/3rd as good as it was 15 minutes ago, and Tesla making it out like this is a good thing! They fixed the problem!

What do you do?

He tried for a while with them with no progress.

(5/*)

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I try to help, but without completely disconnecting the car from Tesla, when I change it back to a 90 their "teleforce" bot reaches in remotely and flips it back to a 60 within moments. There's hacky ways around this, but none are ideal.

Tesla won't help him at all.

(6/*)

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