Nissan Leaf battery replacement (Australia)

Phillip Carlson bought a Nissan Leaf in August 2012, which cost about $53,500. It’s seven years old today, and it’s worth maybe $12,000 - if you can find someone dumb enough to buy it. Let’s let him tell the story.
“I bought an electric car from Nissan with 5 years warranty on the battery. They claimed 175km range. From new I only ever got 120km. Now I can BARELY get 35-40km during winter or even 25km if I use the heater. The warranty says the battery is bad if it drops to 8 out of 12 bars, which mine has.

“I took it in and they claim the battery is totally fine and there’s nothing wrong with it and gave me a $33,000 invoice for a new one!!!!! Nissan just won’t listen and I’ve run out of all hope. I paid $53,500 for this car and it’s pretty useless now.” - Phillip Carlson

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Nissan Customer Service ??
https://autoexpert.com.au/videoblog/astonishing-30k-nissan-leaf-battery-replacement-bill

Based on what's quoted above, I don't see that warranty has anything to do with it at this point:

Phillip Carlson bought a Nissan Leaf in August 2012,

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It’s seven years old today,

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“I bought an electric car from Nissan with 5 years warranty on the battery.

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Now, if he had taken it in while it *was* still under warranty, and they gave him that runaround, he'd probably have something to gripe about.

But waiting until it's two years out of warranty to take it in, when it had problems to begin with, and *then* complaining about it, is pretty silly.

You think a Au$33k. Cost for a battery replacement is not an issue ?
..even after 7 years ?
Like the report says,..that makes it a “disposable” car .!

The situation in this story is due to a dealer that doesn't know what he's doing. It was in the news, and it has been addressed by Nissan.

Yeah, we at the AEVA maintain friendly relations with Nissan - we don't publicly shame them or tell people not to buy their cars, but we also don't shy away from the fact these cars don't have thermal management, and will therefore degrade faster than a battery which does.

Nikki did a great video explaining this story - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_6gpx10QtM

Nissan Australia will offer a like-for-like replacement of a 2012 Australian bought (not a Jap import) battery for $10k fitted.

Which is still a lot, but not awful for an out-of-warranty car.

We generally cannot manage the temperature of batteries full time. It takes too much energy to keep batteries warm/cool when the car is not operating. So we really need batteries that are more temperature independent rather than trying to temperature manage batteries 100% of the time. Nissan may be ahead of their time, but eventually all electric car batteries need to get there.

So we really need batteries that are more temperature independent rather than trying to temperature manage batteries 100% of the time. Nissan may be ahead of their time, but eventually all electric car batteries need to get there.

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Heh! Nissan producing batteries that they are willing to cook, and then replace if they have to, is not exactly forward-thinking.

BTW, I think I may know Philip Carlson from another forum: VisForVoltage...

Alan B said:

The situation in this story is due to a dealer that doesn't know what he's doing. It was in the news, and it has been addressed by Nissan.

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Addressed how ??
....with a free pack replacement ? (The smart business move , and correct thing to do in this situation)
... or, with a $10k pack replacement of refurbished cells ?..with what warranty ?
Everyone knows the early Leafs (pre 2015 ?) were a battery time bomb, and Nissan should recognise that and compensate those owners who still have the original cars, maybe by a buy back/ vehicle replacement scheme .
If the Australian Consumer authorities were doing their job, those owners would be entitled to a full refund..by law.

Hillhater said:

Alan B said:

The situation in this story is due to a dealer that doesn't know what he's doing. It was in the news, and it has been addressed by Nissan.

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Addressed how ??
... with a $10k pack replacement of refurbished cells ?..with what warranty ?
Everyone knows the early Leafs (pre 2015 ?) were a battery time bomb, and Nissan should recognise that and compensate those owners who still have the original cars, maybe by a buy back/ vehicle replacement scheme .
If the Australian Consumer authorities were doing their job, those owners would be entitled to a full refund..by law.

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In fact they might have that case - under the ACCC even if a product is out of warranty, it must be fit for purpose and not suffer a 'major fail'. A 7 year old EV with 75 km range, after just 40,000 km is a fairly major fail. Given there are only 640 of these original Leafs in Australia you'd be looking at a $6.5 million fix...

To add a bit of perspective, and let you all know this is not just a dig at EVs or Nissan,...
That same “autoexpert” site has several articles on ICE manufacturers attempting outrageous moves on consumers.
Ther are 2 separate examples of Jeep owners being quoted Au$50k and Au$30+k for fuel system repairs ( diesel pumps and injectors etc),. On cars less than 5 yrs old....and another Jeep owner being quoted Au$10k to replace an alternator that burnt out. Primarily These costs reflect extortionate pricing of spare parts from Jeep and unrealistic labour estimates from the dealers
In all cases jeep, (Fiat,Crysler Australia) had to be threatened with legal action before they relented and offered FOC repairs.
There are many other Australian examples from major manufacturers, with possibly the most notable being the woman who bought a new Range Rover that turned out to be a lemon, but was rejected by RRover until after much legal action, they were ordered to make a full refund (Au$200+k, plus legal costs $140k, plus dealer incurred costs Au$100+k...not to mention their own legal costs....so all up , over $500k for one vehicle !
I hope Nissan are aware , and prepared for the class action that is being assembled currently !

Everyone knows the early Leafs (pre 2015 ?) were a battery time bomb,

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In North America it was batteries built before April of 2013 (dubbed "Canary packs" by me) that degraded quickly. The old, bad chemistry was used for the first three months of the 2013+ Leaf "1.5" build as well, so many early 2013 owners got a nasty surprise. The battery was improved again for the 2015 model year (Nissan calls these the "Lizard packs"), but the later 2013 and 2014 packs (dubbed the "Wolf packs" by me) were fine as long as the climate wasn't too hot. I'm not sure when the chemistry was improved in Europe, but it's a pretty safe bet that a 2011 or 2012 European Leaf (all built in Japan as were the North American ones, AFAIK) will also have the bad chemistry unless it has already been replaced with a newer pack.

Nissan has also been producing Leaf and NV van battery packs in Sunderland UK since 2013 for its European sales.
Around here, you have to be careful to check beyond the registration date as It was quite common to see new 2012 build date Leaf’s on dealers lots right through to the 2015 pack update.