Tesla has quietly eliminated one of the most irritating little scams in the modern automotive sector. For years, if you ponied up the $99 (or more, depending on your plan) for Full Self-Driving (FSD) subscription or opted for the vanity that is Premium Connectivity, you were paying for 30 days of calendar time. It didn’t matter if your Model 3 was merrily self-driving or was instead trapped in the Tesla service center purgatory for five business days, contemplating the meaning of life. You paid for those five wasted days.
The automaker has finally shifted policy: if your vehicle requires a service visit lasting more than one business day, your active subscriptions are now automatically extended for the full duration of the downtime. Owners get the full 30 days they actually paid for, without the need to engage in the deeply unpleasant act of haggling with an automated system or a human.
For those shelling out nearly a hundred bucks a month for the privilege of beta-testing FSD (Supervised, naturally), this small change is a monumental victory. No longer must owners track their lost days like prison sentences, agonizing over paying for a feature they literally cannot use. It’s a logical adjustment, the kind of thing one expects from a normal car company, but which feels revolutionary coming from a tech behemoth that prefers to move fast and break things.
This shift in Tesla’s customer service policy doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It aligns with other recent, slightly more “human” advancements, such as real-time repair updates and the mystical addition of in-app chat with advisors. With millions of Teslas now clogging up roads and service bays globally, the experience after the sale is finally becoming as critical as the range, the giant touchscreen, or the perpetually over-promising Full Self-Driving capability.
This simple policy fix was inevitable once the subscription revenue became large enough to warrant a robust, non-irritating customer experience. The rest of us will just applaud the minor miracle that Tesla decided to prioritize fairness over pocketing a few wasted subscription days. Go enjoy your full month of connectivity, even if it takes 35 days of actual time to get it.
