One potential downside of Tesla’s new, reinvigorated charging strategy is that its own customers will have to share custody of the Supercharger with other EV drivers. Some early adopters are already feeling corporate pressure to use the network less.
For years, the electric automaker offered unlimited free charging to people purchasing Model S sedans and Model this advantage.
In offers emailed to customers, the company offered to trade the free juice perk for $3,000 off a new car and three years of Supercharge, then increased the discount to $5,000. Until the end of this month, Tesla is offering six years of unlimited charging to anyone who wants to trade in their old S or X with indefinite years of unlimited charging.
No deal, says Kagai Kinyua, a Model S owner who lives between Maryland and Georgia. He does not charge at home because he was not authorized to install a personal charging station in the parking lot of his building. Kinyua therefore does most of its charging at local Tesla fast charging stations. He estimates that this benefit saves him almost $3,000 per year.
Tesla’s attempts to get customers to forego free charging for life are leaving drivers perplexed as to the company’s motivations or strategy. “I guess they realize that old owners stick to their old cars,” Kinyua says.
Or maybe Tesla fell into a trap that caught other tech companies that offered an advantage to attract early adopters, like unlimited phone minutes or cloud storage, only to realize that it was too good to give away for free. Musk said as much in 2018, stating that unlimited free supercharging was “not really sustainable in volume production and does not encourage optimal behavior.” He concluded: “We probably should have ended this sooner. »
Tesla’s latest moves to boost the power of its charging network suggest another motive for ending free, unlimited charging: The automaker is trying to eliminate charging stations to make room for hordes of paying customers . Tesla, which reportedly disbanded its press team in 2021, did not respond to a request for comment.
Vicente Perez, owner of a 2014 Model S, says he only uses the Supercharger network during road trips or if he runs out of battery while away from his home in Los Angeles. But he won’t easily give up his free unlimited Supercharging, nor the car to which this benefit is linked. “We still plan to keep it until the wheels fall off,” he says.
