Tesla is double-billing some customers for their cars, report says – CNET

That new Model Y is nice, but would you want to pay for it twice?

Tesla

Tesla is a company that does things its own way. It doesn’t have a traditional franchised dealer network, for example, and you can even pay for your car in Bitcoin. Unfortunately, according to a report published by CNBC on Monday, Tesla’s doing things differently can sometimes lead to big problems, and that’s been the case for several Southern California Tesla-buyers.

The trouble specifically stems from Tesla’s move to accept Bitcoin as well as bank wire transfers and automated clearing house or ACH transfers. Several buyers who have opted to pay for their cars outright using Tesla’s new ACH service have found themselves double-billed for their vehicle.

By that, we mean that they were charged once for the balance owed on their brand-new Tesla, and then, without notice or authorization, they were billed that same amount a second time. The worst part is that they claim that Tesla hasn’t made the refund process easy or transparent.

In most cases, buyers affected by this double charge have a couple of options. First, they can call their bank and ask the bank to reverse the charges, but this can take over a month and requires the bank and Tesla to hash things out. According to CNBC’s piece, the preferred method would have the customer interact with Tesla directly and get Tesla to send the money back, but that hasn’t been happening either.

Like Los Angeles area resident Clark Peterson, some customers have been promised refunds over the phone but didn’t receive any kind of written confirmation of that, despite having asked for it explicitly, and as of Monday afternoon, hadn’t received a refund of any kind.

We’d ask Tesla for a comment on this, but since it no longer has a PR department, we are going to record our questions on a VHS tape and leave it in an abandoned cabin for a group of teens to find and share among their peers.

So, what we want to know is what you’d do in this situation? Would you blame the brand for the mistake and no longer do business with it, or would you look at the situation as being separate from your experience with the car you bought? Let us know (respectfully) in the comments.