Tesla appears to have supply chain issues once again this year. But the issue is not with battery packs, it is with the charging port. It appears that Tesla sent out vehicles to service centers with a missing charging port. There are customers who have been waiting to pick up their car for a month after its arrival at the service center. To fix the issues, Tesla is yet to ship the missing part to the service center.
Compared to other automakers, Tesla has been doing well with it came to supply chain issues. It was able to make it through chip shortage, and battery materials supply price increase. However, a new bottleneck seems to have risen recently. It is said that in a year, the battery cells issue would come back again.
The missing charging port issue was reported by various customers. There are various instances where a missing charging port electronic control unit (ECU) was said to have delayed their deliveries. There are customers who received their VIN, yet their cars sit at the service center. Around a dozen of Tesla Model 3 and Model Y vehicles are said to have the same fate. The report is according to the posts on Tesla Motors Club Forum.
No deliveries
One of the buyers described his situation. “My issue now is I have a VIN assigned vehicle that was last charged on 4/19 sitting at a service center exposed to the elements without any type of ETA for the missing part meanwhile Fremont is pushing out cars and has the parts in stock. It seems like they’ve forgotten about our cars and we are just waiting indefinitely for when Tesla decides to send them the parts. I’m actively making the payments on the vehicle, large down payment paid on the 4/28, and nothing to show for it.”
Several other buyers are in a similar situation – albeit maybe not for the payments on a car not delivered, since that’s related to locking the interest rates in this case. Based on the number of reports it looks like a fairly widespread issue, and the fact that Tesla is shipping the cars to service centers with a missing part hints toward it affecting a lot of vehicles and/or having a long timeline for delivering the missing part.
Otherwise, it would be more efficient to fix the issue at the factory. ut at this point, it makes more sense for Tesla to ship the part to the service center. Which would add a significant workload for the service team.
