Tesla has openly accused Reuters of disseminating a “manufactured” story asserting that “tens of thousands” of customers were compelled to foot the bill for premature suspension failure rather than having it covered by warranty.
The Reuters article, published on December 20 under the title “Tesla blamed drivers for failure of parts it knew were defective,” purports to possess documents, including repair reports from Tesla service centers globally, dated between 2016 and 2022. These documents allegedly demonstrate that the company instructed workers to inform customers that the broken parts on their vehicles were not faulty.
Among the reported incidents is that of Shreyansh Jain, who experienced a front-right suspension collapse in his Tesla Model Y shortly after picking it up in March. Reuters claims Mr. Jain’s repair took nearly 40 hours and cost over US$14,000 (~A$20,500), with Tesla allegedly refusing coverage, attributing the damage to prior suspension issues.
The article also outlines various owners’ challenges with suspension and steering component failures and asserts that Tesla was aware of parts with high failure rates, including the front-aft suspension link and rear upper suspension link.
Tesla had purportedly denied some suspension problems in the US, attributing them to “driver abuse.” The automaker reportedly evaded a recall for suspension issues for over four years until Chinese regulators intervened.
As per the recall notice from China’s State Administration for Market Regulation, the aft-link part failure posed a “risk of accidents.” Tesla reportedly contested the assessment but opted for a voluntary recall in the US to avoid a “heavy burden.”
In response to the Reuters story, Tesla, known for dissolving its PR department in 2020, posted a detailed message on X (formerly Twitter). The company disputed the Reuters claims, stating the story was riddled with “incomplete and demonstrably incorrect information” and asserted that telemetry data indicated Mr. Jain’s Model Y experienced a crash causing the suspension failure rather than a defect.
Tesla criticized the Reuters piece for its “wildly misleading headline” and contended that customer retention remains strong despite the report’s implications. The company accused the article of conflating non-safety-related noise issues with unrelated service actions.
