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State of Iowa Tells Tesla To Cancel Its Scheduled Test Drives
puddingebola writes: Conflict continues between state governments and Tesla. From the article: "Iowa joined a growing list of states tussling with Tesla Motors' business model when it told the company to cut short three days of test drives earlier this month in West Des Moines. The Iowa Department of Transportation said the test drives were illegal for two reasons: Tesla isn't licensed as an auto dealer in Iowa and state law prohibits carmakers from selling directly to the public." While the article touches on the legal restrictions on selling cars in Iowa, it seems that Tesla was only providing test drives.
It will raise attention to absurdity of the situation, and folks looking to buy Teslas tend to be the upper middle class and above folks who are more likely to be influential, used to getting their way. Things will not turn out well for moronic states that try to maintain this ridiculous state sanctioned protection racket.
The sooner Tesla breaks open this idiotic "members only" crap, the better.
I'm not saying dealers don't provide a valuable service. Or that they didn't provide protections to consumers at one time.
The fact is, one angry consumer, TODAY, has orders of magnitude more power to make an automaker acknowledge a grievance than we EVER had in the past.
One nasty little YouTube video can, potentially, reach millions of consumers.
Wheras 80 years ago, if Joe Blow in Podunk, Idaho got shafted, what was he gonna do? Drive to Detroit and crash the gates?
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Tesla cars are allowed on the roads in Iowa. Iowa will even register a Tesla car and issue you license plates, etc. They've passed every safety test & regulation that any other car has.
You just can't *buy* a Tesla car in Iowa because of dealer-sponsored 'franchise' laws. It seems pretty weird that those laws cover giving out test drives--I'm sure Tesla's lawyers will look into that.
the whole dealer thing was to protect the consumer from purchasing a vehicle and not having any support for it.
Not true. It was to prevent manufacturers from running their own dealerships, which would have, arguably, provided even better service. My experience is that a dealership is the worst place to get your car serviced. Almost any independent mechanic will do a better job for less money.
expect an influx of inexpensive vehicles from SE Asia with no means of warranty repair or service.
... except for the tens of thousands of independent mechanics, garages, and body shops.
is it a good idea for the masses to be purchasing vehicles from Amazon?
Yes. They would likely get a better purchase price, and better quality service than from the existing rigged cartel.
Like Continental Subaru?
I had a problem with my brakes. On my Subaru Impreza WRX, they didn't work when I went over wet railroad tracks with the brakes applied (the ABS back-off algorithm wouldn't allow best braking). This would, on a road I regularly took, double my stopping distance. It was a major safety issue. When I noticed the problem, I looked online and found it a common problem. Subaru issued a voluntary recall to replace the ABS controller (the entire ECU, since they were linked). I called the dealer, scheduled the repair, gave the TSB number and confirmed they'd have the parts in. They called back "when the parts were in" and I took it in.
The next day, they called and asked me for the TSB number, as there were "no recalls for my vehicle". I took in two separate TSBs (the one I wanted, and one more I got that I didn't care about). They confirmed that there were, in fact, "TSBs" for my car, but the two I had marked "voluntary recall" were not recalls.
Despite giving the TSB number and indicating it was an ECU change and to not schedule me without having the parts in, I picked up my car that day, and waited another 3 months for them to get the part in. When it was finally changed (with a bill of $150 for warranty safety recall work done, because they needed to charge for their test-drive time), the car stopped much better, despite the TSB assuring me the NTSB didn't see any fault in the ABS, nor improvement with the new ECU. Apparently stopping with 100 ft to spare or rolling into an intersection because the brakes didn't work was all in my head.
But Thank God for Continental Subaru, who saw to my safety by scheduling me for a service without the parts on hand to complete it, being ignorant about what TSBs are issued for the cars they sell, arguing with me about which TSB I wanted done, and charging me for getting a safety recall done. Though I'm not sure a manufacturer could do any worse if they tried.
Learn to love Alaska
Advertising revenues from local news is the largest source of income for most local television network affiliates and local car dealerships are the foundation of their revenues. (TV stations get little or nothing for carrying national programming, just the right to borrow the audience for a couple of hours.)
Local television economics is a political protection racket with car dealers as the collection point for funds, precisely as kings and shahs and sultans handed out exclusive franchises for cloths and dyes and wines and every manner of goods.
Car dealers fund a local-news system that ensures that Congressional representatives and state governments are rarely reported on.
Threaten laws protecting car dealers, and get you a lot of enemies who don't want to show their faces.
I agree, claims of voter suppression and racism are bullshit. Is it suppression for all the other things that require ID in the modern world? I hope you never have to fly, buy alcohol, medicine, cash a check, or do anything else either.
As far as us being a democracy, our founding fathers had a healthy fear of it. The direct election of senators for sure messed up the system of government. If we want only representatives elected by the people, just drop the senate altogether. The house already represents the will of the people. The senate was supposed to represent the states, and now it doesn't... It represents the people, but in a horrible proportion unlike the house. In what world does that make sense?
Yes it's an anecdote! Were you expecting original research in a Slashdot comment?
I agree, claims of voter suppression and racism are bullshit. Is it suppression for all the other things that require ID in the modern world? I hope you never have to fly, buy alcohol, medicine, cash a check, or do anything else either.
I think that the point is that:
1. Black, hispanic and asian voters are significantly less likely to possess ID that is sufficient to meet the requirements of the laws. They are also less likely already to be registered to vote.
2. Election fraud is rare, and in-person fraud (the only type that could be prevented by these laws) is vanishingly rare.
3. These laws are being passed by Republican legislatures. Statistically, reducing the number of black, asian and hispanic voters is likely to improve their results in elections.
So what you have is a measure that claims to prevent a problem that doesn't exist, and, coincidentally, will make it harder for the party's opponents to vote.
I don't actually believe that that is a coincidence. I don't know whether it is racist or not, but I do think that elections should be fought by trying to convince the electorate that you are the best candidate, not by changing the procedure to make it harder for your opponents to vote.
"Do you have a theory on what grounds Tesla could use to take the matter to court?"
This is an interstate commerce issue and thus Tesla has the right to sue the fuck out of the states for violating that.
Done, easily provable, absolutely indefensible in the courtroom.
The states will fall in this legal battle. They hung themselves with this, and since there is record of it happening in a lot of states, Tesla is going to win.
I won't be surprised to see car dealerships getting named in the lawsuit, either. Tesla will win against them on illegal restraint of trade. Tesla will bring out every bit of campaign 'donation' and make the case that these states were bought out, bribed, and then go into RICO lawsuits.
Tesla's going to win. Any angle they take, there's evidence in spades to support their case and absolutely demolish the other side.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.