Tesla Inc.‘s TSLA Chinese customers have reportedly sued the company over allegedly failing to deliver FSD or Full Self-Driving features that the customers paid for.
Paid Almost $8,000 For FSD, Plaintiff Says
Tesla is being sued by over seven customers in China over allegedly failing to deliver the feature they paid for, in a district court in China’s capital, Beijing, ChinaEVHome reported on Monday, citing local media reports.
Customers demand that Tesla refund the FSD fee it charged, as well as pay over triple in damages. The case has reportedly been accepted in the court and now awaits trial, the report says.
One of the plaintiffs alleges they purchased the FSD feature in 2020, citing their need for long-distance travel, paying 56,000 RMB (approximately $7,800) for the feature.
“At the time, both the store salesperson and Elon Musk claimed that FSD full self-driving would definitely be achieved and soon available in China, and that the price would increase later. I believed them and bought it,” the plaintiff said.
The plaintiff also says they recently learned from the company that the FSD feature would be rolled out to vehicles with the HW 4.0 Chip and will temporarily not be available to vehicles running the HW 3.0, the report suggests.
Tesla’s Other FSD Lawsuits
The news comes as Tesla is also facing lawsuits over the FSD system in the U.S. Recently, customers in California filed a class action lawsuit against the EV giant for allegedly making misleading claims about the FSD system’s capabilities.
The company also faces a lawsuit filed by investors, who have expressed concerns about the system’s capabilities and safety following incidents of possible traffic violations committed by the Tesla robotaxis in Austin during June’s launch event.
Experts Doubt FSD’s Capability
Doubts about and criticism of the FSD system have also been expressed by experts, with Gerber Kawasaki’s co-founder Ross Gerber saying that Tesla’s camera-only approach and software-heavy focus would make it difficult to achieve Level 4 and Level 5 autonomy.
Uber Technologies Inc. UBER CEO Dara Khosrowshahi also said that achieving self-driving beyond human capabilities could be difficult with a camera-only approach and questioned why Tesla wasn’t in favor of LiDAR.
FSD was also recently in the spotlight for struggling to detect and stop at railway crossings, with owners reporting instances where they had to intervene and apply the brakes because they felt it wouldn’t stop. The instances also prompted a statement from the NHTSA, which says it is in communication with Tesla.
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