I know this seems like I’m against Tesla. I’m not. I want Tesla to be truthful about the car’s capabilities and its marketing because, in my opinion, they are not doing so at this time. They have not delivered anything to a retail customer that is fully autonomous. Anyone who bought a car with “Full Self-Driving Capability” was mislead into thinking that “some day” the car will drive itself autonomously. It won’t. A driver will always have to be at the wheel.

This YouTube channel, More Perfect Union, analyzed the autonomous driving systems that are available. They concluded that Tesla’s system, which relies solely on cameras, will not deliver the reliability and safety that is necessary to make it fully autonomous. They report that engineers resigned from Tesla rather than build a system that would not provide the safety that was the goal of the system. Hmm.

Even Tesla’s Robotaxi, built from the ground up to “self-drive” requires a human monitor and has remote drivers standing by. With a change in Texas law on September 1, Robotaxi monitors must sit in the driver’s seat.

The more I look at this issue, the more convinced I become that this is PT Barnum-style marketing that needs to be stopped. People’s lives are at risk and they are putting their hard-earned money into the promise of a technology that experts don’t believe will ever exist.

If you think you should get your money back from Tesla, write to resolutions@tesla.com. If that doesn’t work, poke around this website and see if you want to pursue Tesla in small claims court or arbitration.