The owner of an electric car has filed a lawsuit against the manufacturer, claiming that the software deliberately inflates mileage readings. In his opinion, this allows the company to exhaust warranty obligations faster and avoid costs for free repairs.
The lawsuit was filed by Nir Hinton, a California resident. In December 2022, he purchased a used Model Y with a mileage of just under 37,000 miles. After the purchase, the owner noticed anomalies: on certain days, the odometer recorded over 70 miles, while the actual distance of trips did not exceed 20 miles. Hinton is convinced that these discrepancies are not a random technical error but are caused by a special algorithm that takes into account driving style and energy consumption.
As a result, the warranty limit of 50,000 miles, which covers certain types of repairs, was exhausted much earlier than expected. Because of this, Hinton had to pay for suspension repairs out of pocket, which cost him over $10,000.
In the lawsuit, the owner accuses Tesla of deliberately distorting odometer data and demands compensation not only for himself but also for all Tesla owners in California who may have found themselves in a similar situation. Preliminary estimates suggest that this involves over a million vehicles.
Tesla denies the allegations and has filed a counterclaim in federal court in Los Angeles. The company claims that mileage readings are accurate, and the deviations are explained by technical features of the vehicle's operation, not by deliberate actions.
It is worth noting that this is not the first such conflict involving Tesla — Elon Musk's company has previously received complaints about the opacity of its warranty policy and the lack of traditional service maintenance.
