Fears over possible fault in up to 10,000 Tesla cars on British roads amid US recall

Credit: Aly Song/Reuters

Regulators must "look again" at whether to recommend a recall of as many as 10,000 Tesla vehicles in Britain which may post a safety risk after the US said a glitch in some touchscreen systems could make it more likely for drivers to crash.  

The US’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) earlier this week asked Tesla to recall 158,000 vehicles over problems with the media control units in the vehicles, which it said could stop drivers from being able to use windshield defrosting systems and potentially "decrease the driver’s visibility in inclement weather".

It said the problem could also affect the autopilot system, stopping drivers from being alerted and “increasing the risk of a crash occurring because drivers may be unaware of system malfunctions".

However, whilst the UK’s road safety regulator, the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA), is understood to have assessed the same issue, it concluded it did not pose a safety risk and so was not recommending a recall. 

A spokesman for the DVSA said: "DVSA’s priority is to protect everyone from unsafe drivers and vehicles.

“After careful analysis and discussion with Tesla and NHTSA we have concluded that this issue does not meet the criteria for a safety recall in Britain.”

The decision has raised concern among charities, with road safety campaign group Brake urging the DVSA to "look again at the potential safety impact of the identified defects in certain Tesla models that the regulator in the US have deemed worthy of a recall".

"Anything which compromises road safety must be treated as an urgent issue and dealt with swiftly," a spokesman said.

Natalie Hitchins, head of home products and services at Which?, meanwhile, said: "These latest reports about a fault that prevents some Tesla owners from defrosting or de-fogging their windscreens, as well as the possibility of drivers not hearing warning chimes if something is wrong, are concerning. 

"Tesla must urgently clarify if UK-owned vehicles are also affected by this fault, and if so issue a recall. If it fails to do this, we’d expect the DVSA to step in and force a recall." 

It is thought there could be as many as 10,000 vehicles which are affected by the technical issue, based on data from the DVSA. This is the total number of Model S vehicles on the roads between 2012 and 2018, and Model X vehicles between 2016 and 2018.

The NHTSA had said these were the models which could “contain a defect related to motor vehicle safety".

Tesla declined to comment. It is not clear whether the affected vehicles are in the US or UK or both. Tesla did, however, late last year extend the warranty on the vehicles containing the media unit issue, saying on its UK site that it was aware one of the components in them "may malfunction due to accumulated wear".

The Tesla website makes it clear that the company is proactively fixing the fault, with the firm saying it would repair or replace the unit if customers brought their vehicles in.