Tesla has authorized its sales staff to offer 10,000 free Supercharging miles to customers who take delivery by the end of the month as it tries to create some urgency for buyers to take delivery.
As we have recently reported, Tesla is having some rare demand issues lately – especially in the United States due to special circumstances.
It has been years since Tesla hit 200,000 deliveries in the United States, which meant the company no longer qualified for the US federal tax credit for electric vehicles. But Tesla buyers are expected to regain access to the incentive, which is valued at up to $7,500, soon.
The catch is, they need to take delivery of their vehicles on or after January 1 to qualify.
This situation is incentivizing buyers to wait until after the new year to purchase a Tesla vehicle in the United States. We reported last month that it also contributed to an increase in cancellations as Tesla is not allowing buyers to delay orders to get them next month.
Earlier this month, we learned that Tesla started offering a $3,750 discount to buyers in the United States in order to combat this issue.
Now we learn that Tesla is throwing another incentive into the mix to encourage buyers to take delivery this month.
Sources familiar with the matter told Electrek that Tesla authorized sales staff to offer 10,000 free Supercharging miles (or km) to buyers taking delivery this month.
Here are the details of the incentive:
- Valid for all models
- Valld for new titled vehicles only
- Free Supercharging miles/km must be used within two years of delivery date
- Free Supercharging is non-transferable
- Stackable with other incentives/adjustments unless stated
Tesla used to often offer free Supercharging miles as an incentive, and we learned that it plans to bring this approach back as part of its new Loyalty Program.
However, 10,000 miles is a better offer than usual. The incentive is worth about $500, depending on your vehicle and market since efficiency varies per vehicle and Supercharger prices vary per market.
Interestingly, the incentive is not only for the US market as buyers confirmed to Electrek that Tesla has made the offer in the UK also.
Electrek’s Take
This is another piece of evidence that Tesla is currently having some demand issues.
Top comment by LR
Do we know that the Teslas will be eligible for the full $7500 subsidy as of Jan 1? Or would they only qualify for half of it?
I would also point that supply of all EVs has gotten much better in the last few weeks - with sizeable inventories of Tesla and VW building up.
In the United States, the main reason is fairly clear: the impending updated federal tax credit. In this case, demand should revert to it’s prior strength next month once the credit is in place.
However, we can’t be blind to Tesla potentially facing other issues. First of all, its production capacity has increased significantly over the last few months, and there’s a possibility that demand hasn’t followed.
The other main concern that is harder to track is that people’s opinion of Tesla has been affected by Elon Musk’s Twitter antics. Is it affecting Tesla to the point that the automaker is having to come up with new incentives to create demand? It’s a real possibility.
However, in the United States, I think the tax credit is having a bigger impact right now.
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