A Beautiful Disaster — Rivian Is Not Ready for Prime Time

[9527]

You make a good point. Parts supply issues are affecting other brands too.

Here is the problem though...brands like Kia/Hyundai, GM, Ford, VW, etc all have established dealership networks to service their vehicles. Rivian is still a fairly new brand so many potential buyers may be apprehensive especially when it comes to service/warranty.

I want Rivian to succeed...and...I think Rivian is doing a lot of other things right. Let's face it guys/gals...most current Rivian owners have multiple vehicles or otherwise understand Rivian is a new auto maker...but that is all going to change in the next year when R2 comes.

With R2 will come a different set of Rivian owners...those are folks more likely to have a Rivian as their only vehicle and they may depend on that vehicle more heavily. Those buyers...or most of them...will not have time for all this nonsense.

I am sure Rivian listens...not sure about the forums...but I had reached out to their leadership team about having the 3rd party authorized service perform things like field service actions in the past. perhaps Rivian already planned to do that...but it seemed to me like Rivian does listen.

Rivian, from my observations...is very reactive...this is one area where that approach will not work ...at least not long term. They need to reel this in and pivot or they are in for a world of problems a year from now.

Probably irrelevant to the original topic. Sorry.

The ratio of EV9 owners getting a buyback or lemon lawing their vehicles is far higher than Rivian. At least from what I’ve read in numerous owner groups and forums. Their HV batteries are shit.

Also a lot of EV9 owners were complaining about long service wait time. The main culprit is parts constraints. A lot of parts are still being shipped here from South Korea. Another reason for the delay is that there’re just not enough qualified technicians to work on these new EVs. Even with an expansive dealer network, only a fraction of dealerships have technicians who can work on EVs. And a lot of time those technicians get stuck and then they need to call Kia HQ for instructions. If they still can’t fix it, Kia will have a Kia certified tech flown in to their dealership and fix the car. That takes an eternity.

Letting VW dealerships take Rivians probably will not immediately solve the problem. They need to hire and train A LOT of new people.

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[shap]

Letting VW dealerships take Rivians probably will not immediately solve the problem. They need to hire and train A LOT of new people.

Not sure about this - they already have EV certified people (ID.4, Buzz, etc) and they only will need to train them on Rivian. Not an issue IMHO

 

[Electrified Outdoors]

Probably irrelevant to the original topic. Sorry.

The ratio of EV9 owners getting a buyback or lemon lawing their vehicles is far higher than Rivian. At least from what I’ve read in numerous owner groups and forums. Their HV batteries are shit.

Also a lot of EV9 owners were complaining about long service wait time. The main culprit is parts constraints. A lot of parts are still being shipped here from South Korea. Another reason for the delay is that there’re just not enough qualified technicians to work on these new EVs. Even with an expansive dealer network, only a fraction of dealerships have technicians who can work on EVs. And a lot of time those technicians get stuck and then they need to call Kia HQ for instructions. If they still can’t fix it, Kia will have a Kia certified tech flown in to their dealership and fix the car. That takes an eternity.

Letting VW dealerships take Rivians probably will not immediately solve the problem. They need to hire and train A LOT of new people.

I don't know enough about EV9 to make in informed argument on this topic. I will say that, from experience, if you come to any forum you will be turned off to the brand. People are much more inclined to come onto forums to complain or seek help for a problem than to share their positive ownership experiences. Except for the hard core car nuts ..myself included . Its a helpful data point as you point out ...but I would say that it can't be relied upon alone to draw any firm conclusion.

Your correct ...some dealership groups only have one EV tech that gets shared between that groups dealerships. Service times can be long for any new vehicle due to it being a new product and the dealership tech having to contact corporate, wait for responses, take troubleshooting steps, etc.

The issue with Rivian is the time to resolution. I had a minor issue with my R1T and it took 4 months to get it resolved. This was a combination of of wait time for appt, wait time to start work after drop off. Once they started working on it they had it turned around in 24 hours. 4 months or even 2 are not acceptable turn around times for service on a new vehicle...by any manufacturer.

I don't think anything will immediately solve this problem...it will take time. The strategy required to solve this or ...more reasonably....to bring about a significant improvement...will be multifaceted.

Working without knowledge of the internal goings on its easy for me to say some things that might work. I can say one thing for certain though...their current service situation is not sustainable especially when you introduce the volume in R2. As I said earlier the needs & expectations of those customers are likely to be much different than R1.

What I did...as a way to check myself...is I tried to look at it from the outside...taking away my emotional attachment and love for the vehicle.

For mainstream buyers (safe to say the majority of them) a vehicle is a tool...they are pissed when its not working...and when it is working they don't think about it much. When they make the initial purchase they may give it a lot of consideration though.

The longer it takes to resolve service issues the more pissed off customers you will have at any given time....I much prefer happy customers that I don't hear from until they need to buy my products/services again

 

[Guuma]

Probably irrelevant to the original topic. Sorry.

The ratio of EV9 owners getting a buyback or lemon lawing their vehicles is far higher than Rivian. At least from what I’ve read in numerous owner groups and forums. Their HV batteries are shit.

Also a lot of EV9 owners were complaining about long service wait time. The main culprit is parts constraints. A lot of parts are still being shipped here from South Korea. Another reason for the delay is that there’re just not enough qualified technicians to work on these new EVs. Even with an expansive dealer network, only a fraction of dealerships have technicians who can work on EVs. And a lot of time those technicians get stuck and then they need to call Kia HQ for instructions. If they still can’t fix it, Kia will have a Kia certified tech flown in to their dealership and fix the car. That takes an eternity.

Letting VW dealerships take Rivians probably will not immediately solve the problem. They need to hire and train A LOT of new people.

As an VW EV owner, I would suggest they have their own issues. I've had to take my car in 8 times in less than 2 years for recalls, service issues, and follow up to poor work the first round of service. I've had to have corporate engineers come in to help fix the issues that the local shop was having. The two VW shops near me only have 1 EV mechanic and they are struggling to find more.

Additionally, a lot of ID4 owners complain about 4-5 month wait for service appointments, so there seems to be an issue across many of the car brands.

 

[Hereforthesnacks]

Probably irrelevant to the original topic. Sorry.

The ratio of EV9 owners getting a buyback or lemon lawing their vehicles is far higher than Rivian. At least from what I’ve read in numerous owner groups and forums. Their HV batteries are shit.

Also a lot of EV9 owners were complaining about long service wait time. The main culprit is parts constraints. A lot of parts are still being shipped here from South Korea. Another reason for the delay is that there’re just not enough qualified technicians to work on these new EVs. Even with an expansive dealer network, only a fraction of dealerships have technicians who can work on EVs. And a lot of time those technicians get stuck and then they need to call Kia HQ for instructions. If they still can’t fix it, Kia will have a Kia certified tech flown in to their dealership and fix the car. That takes an eternity.

Letting VW dealerships take Rivians probably will not immediately solve the problem. They need to hire and train A LOT of new people.

EV9 had a ridiculous 12V battery issue which really killed a lot of their loyalty the first 6-9 months. FWIW - those issues are resolved at this point. Their HV is very good. The bad 12V killed HV batteries which is super stupid.

Wait times were due to new parts for a new car. Those times are substantially reduced now. HV batteries are still backlogged.

Like any EV, especially a Rivian, SCs will vary. If you are in a high density area, they will have several EV techs on hand. If not, lack of expertise slows things down.

 

[captainjp]

Letting VW dealerships take Rivians probably will not immediately solve the problem. They need to hire and train A LOT of new people.

VW has had EV’s since 2015 and has the ID line currently. Audi has had the e-tron since 2019. It may not “solve” the problem, but it would certainly take the edge off and quiet down some of the whiners. Especially those thinking their panel alignments should be Rivian’s top priority

 

[McLovin]

Not sure about this - they already have EV certified people (ID.4, Buzz, etc) and they only will need to train them on Rivian. Not an issue IMHO

No so sure I buy that. To me, it’s the equivalent of a manager saying “hey, this developer knows C++. We only need to train them on Java, and they’ll be fine.”

Trust me…it doesn’t work that way. Sure, they will be further along than most, but there will still be a learning curve. Maybe it’s cut by a third or half, but it’s not as if they come out of training an expert on the system.

 

[shap]

No so sure I buy that. To me, it’s the equivalent of a manager saying “hey, this developer knows C++. We only need to train them on Java, and they’ll be fine.”

Trust me…it doesn’t work that way. Sure, they will be further along than most, but there will still be a learning curve. Maybe it’s cut by a third or half, but it’s not as if they come out of training an expert on the system.

No question - there will be a learning curve, but as you also said, it will be shorter.

 

[captainjp]

No so sure I buy that. To me, it’s the equivalent of a manager saying “hey, this developer knows C++. We only need to train them on Java, and they’ll be fine.”

Trust me…it doesn’t work that way. Sure, they will be further along than most, but there will still be a learning curve. Maybe it’s cut by a third or half, but it’s not as if they come out of training an expert on the system.

Disagree. You fail to consider the fact that VW will be in-fact running hardware and software developed and built by Rivian. The learning curve is a lot straighter than you think. I wouldn’t be surprised if this training has already commenced.

 

[McLovin]

Disagree. You fail to consider the fact that VW will be in-fact running hardware and software developed and built by Rivian. The learning curve is a lot straighter than you think. I wouldn’t be surprised if this training has already commenced.

Sure…in 2 years maybe. But I highly doubt they’ve trained anyone on anything Rivian to date. 2027 (when it’s scheduled to debut in VWs) is a looong way off, especially in Software years. So much can change between now and then, like vendors of integrated parts, which will require API changes.

It would be stupid if VW to train anyone at this point. Who knows if those people will even be around come 2027? Or if the whole thing will slip to 2028, or dissolve completely?

 

[RedRaiderRivian]

You make a good point. Parts supply issues are affecting other brands too.

Here is the problem though...brands like Kia/Hyundai, GM, Ford, VW, etc all have established dealership networks to service their vehicles. Rivian is still a fairly new brand so many potential buyers may be apprehensive especially when it comes to service/warranty.

I agree with most of what you are saying but maybe I am one of those middle ground owners where even with the repair challenges my R1T had faced, Rivian service experience has been better than my wife's Ford. Ford doesn't have loaner vehicles for warranty repair work so the three weeks her vehicle was in the shop for warranty work on a transmission issue and cam phaser and then the week when her AC went out just outside of warranty were not easy. Our old reliable 2016 Nissan Leaf was the vehicle that got us out of a jam until we could get a rental car.

 

[Donald Stanfield]

Disagree. You fail to consider the fact that VW will be in-fact running hardware and software developed and built by Rivian. The learning curve is a lot straighter than you think. I wouldn’t be surprised if this training has already commenced.

This might be true eventually but not right now. VW doesn’t have anything currently using Rivian architecture in the USA.

 

[s4wrxttcs]

You should visit the Kia EV9 owner FB group. I almost pulled the trigger on an EV9 until I spent some time reading posts in that group. Kia has sold fewer EV9s than Rivian sold vehicles and there are tons of buy back and lemon.

One of the mistakes I'll readily admit with my R1T is I broke my own rule of buying within the first year of production. It's the same rule for all manufactures. I just had an itch to scratch as I was bored with my Tesla.

I'm sure Kia will pull it together with their EV9.

I'm still an R2 reservation holder. Part of the problem with the R1 is its just complicated, and the R2 removes some of that complication.

 

[socaladam]

No so sure I buy that. To me, it’s the equivalent of a manager saying “hey, this developer knows C++. We only need to train them on Java, and they’ll be fine.”

Trust me…it doesn’t work that way. Sure, they will be further along than most, but there will still be a learning curve. Maybe it’s cut by a third or half, but it’s not as if they come out of training an expert on the system.

maybe not

However, if I hire a sql developer, I can train them on the nuances between Oracle, MySQL/MariaDB, MSSQL, and PostgreSQL.

Mechanics are not single vendor trained. If you can work on a Ford, you can work on VW. Same would be true for EV brands with minimal training.

 

[captainjp]

Sure…in 2 years maybe. But I highly doubt they’ve trained anyone on anything Rivian to date. 2027 (when it’s scheduled to debut in VWs) is a looong way off, especially in Software years. So much can change between now and then, like vendors of integrated parts, which will require API changes.

It would be stupid if VW to train anyone at this point. Who knows if those people will even be around come 2027? Or if the whole thing will slip to 2028, or dissolve completely?

Disagree. Like I said before, VW group is not completely in the dark when it comes to EV’s. Any skilled tech would just need training specific to Rivian, which would not take long.
Stupid to train anyone at this point? Hardly. These technological advancements are closer than you think and it’s far better to be proactive than reactive. Your opinion is extremely short-sited.

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