Rivian EV Buyer Waited 3 Years For His Car – Then it Broke Down, While Others Still Have No Delivery

After a long three-year wait for an R1S, Mr. Merrill, 24 is a disappointed customer, with a bill of up to $2,100. His journey to a fully electric SUV, otherwise called, a sport utility vehicle, started with an urge from his family members, who are ardent fans of Rivians.

Merrill reckons that the transition took a lot of thinking, considering the love he had for his 2015 Ford Edge – specifically suited for the Adirondack Mountains of New York, where he lives.

Despite his fears, the new Rivian owner knew he is not turning back once he got behind the wheel of the $85,626 car on March 10—those worries faded away.

Merrill describes the moment as being “in a honeymoon phase,” during an interview with Insider. “It’s an incredible car, and it handles unlike anything I’ve ever driven,” he added.

Merrill’s Honeymoon Did Not Last Long

Two days after he got his R1S, Merrill decided to put it to the test, destination, a family-shared property in the mountains. Not leaving anything to chance, the Rivian owner maneuvered the vehicle on an unplowed, snow-covered road heading into the property.

He said that at first, the R1S seemed to be slicing through the snow pretty well, but suddenly it stopped, obstructed by a momentous amount of snow.

“I hit about 2 -feet of snow and it just stopped right there,” Merrill narrated. “I had seen all the Rivian marketing campaigns with the cars just eating through the snow so it was kind of like, man this is disappointing.”

Merrill reckoned that he has dislodged cars from tricky snow backs before, and the situation at hand didn’t seem different. He quickly arranged for another vehicle to pull his R1S out.

Unbeknownst to him, things were soon going to get out of hand because as he sat in the driver’s seat, with his seatbelt unfastened, trying his best to free the R1S from the snow bank, he mistakenly triggered a safety feature, which jammed the car between park and drive gears.

He would soon learn that his Rivian was nothing but a pile of metal on rubber—completely useless.
Merrill’s brand new R1S had to be mounted on a flatbed and towed hundreds of miles away to a service center located in Chelsea, Massachusetts – the towing fee was a whopping $2,100.

The uncalled-for experience has left Merrill mulling another car brand, a Toyota Tacoma or possibly a similar internal combustion engine pickup truck.

What Happened To Merrill’s Rivian?

Executives of the company said in an interview that the R1S Merrill was driving did exactly what it was programmed to do when faced with a dangerous slide-away circumstance, except in his case, it wasn’t slipping away.

“There was an unfortunate cascade of events and edge cases that led to this situation,” Wassym Bensaid, Rivian’s senior vice president of software development, told Insider in the interview. “But we take this feedback as a gift. It’s great input for us to improve the product.”

Rivian will nonetheless take Merrill’s incident seriously and try to figure out which cascading events took place. Bensaid said they will consider a new Rivian mobile app to gather feedback including allowing customers to report problems and check the FAQs for drivers whose cards get stuck.

Is Rivian Walking A Dangerous Path? – Risks Losing Early Adopters

The number of disgruntled customers has been increasing and Rivian is boxed in a tight spot where it is expected to keep the supply chain at full production to cater to its three electric vehicle models.

A series of interviews conducted by Insider across all Rivian customers – current and former order holders over the past several months revealed building agitation. Some customers are on the verge of giving up the hope of ever seeing their vehicles delivered.

Insider found out that some Rivian order holders had started seeking contingency plans by approaching other manufacturers of electric vehicles, hoping that another brand could arrive sooner.

Rivian, which didn’t quite achieve its production target for 2022, missing it by a whisker, has set a lower production objective for 2023 compared to what industry experts anticipated.

Moreover, the company has ceased the practice of providing timely updates on its substantial order backlog, which was previously a source of pride.

The long wait times are dangerous for relatively new players like Rivian, especially now that its early adopters feel burned. In the motor vehicle industry, these early boosters can either make or break a company’s reputation based on sentiments shared by analysts, Rivian investors, and shareholders.

Tony Caravano, Rivian’s head of customer engagement recently said that the company was exploring ways that will improve relationships with its order-holders.

As an example, customers are being given the option for faster delivery, as long as they are willing to alter the build specs at the order stage. Rivian is also going to be straightforward with its order-holders regarding delivery delays and why.

Merrill’s Rivian Is Back, But With An Error Message

According to an EV ownership report released by JD Power in February, Rivian topped other manufacturers in the segment. Most Rivian customers were happy with their vehicles.

As for Merrill, Rivian is not the problem, but the way his first real issue was dealt with. After the car had arrived in Chelsea, it’s when Merrill realized that the issue on the RS1 could have been solved by a simple reset step, which means he didn’t need to pay $2,100 to visit the repair shop.

However, this critical information never came up on the first call he had with the company’s customer service representative.

A Rivian representative later called Merrill to apologize for the misinformation in addition to offering to cover all the repairs except for the flatbed’s $2,100 – that’s where Rivian drew the line.

However, a call by Insider to Rivian inquiring about Merrill’s experience saw a company representative reach out to him with an offer to settle the transportation bill.

While this was a good gesture, Merrill was far from being a man in the “honeymoon phase” again as his R1S returned with a critical error message on the dash, requesting another check at the service center.

“The attitude the whole time from customer service was that a Rivian owner should be able to handle this no problem,” Merrill said. “They just think this should be nothing for me and it’s not nothing.”

As for Rivian, it is taking Merrill’s experience as an eye-opener for its customer support department, particularly how they handle new EV drivers. For first-time EV owners, the company needs to be “more communicative about key parts and key elements, Caravano, head of customer engagement, told Insider.

“There’s nuance to that ownership experience that we have to make sure that they understand,” Caravano said. “One of the great learnings here is for us to be even more even more communicative about key parts and key elements of the ownership experience when we know that customers live in more remote areas.”

This could be the end of the road for Merrill when it comes to driving a Rivian car. He reckons that he does not have the money or even the patience to be an early booster. Above all, he wants Rivian to do well.

“The car is super impressive and I want the company to do well,” Merrill said. “I think I’m just not the right person to be an early adopter.”

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