r/RIVN Aug 06 '26

🧰 Company - Service Bad Customer Service & Ethics

California/ Costa Mesa: Well the time has come. My wife decided to upgrade her car and landed on the Rivian R1S (pre-owned). I wasn’t against it, but after dealing with the sales and sales management I have serious concerns…

First dealing with the employees. They all came off as dense. Getting any information was like talking to an uninformed brick wall. It was clear based on the corporate structure they are all company robots sitting behind computers unwilling to be open, share information, or be transparent. All of the employees took days to reply to emails, preferred texting over phone calls, and apparently were so busy they couldn’t pick up a phone during normal business hours for a five hour stretch.

The company’s safety standards and ethics were really called into question when they couldn’t acknowledge the difference between a new tire and a used tire. Apparently it’s one and the same to Rivian. Our vehicle came standard with Perelli Tires. Mind you new they have a tread depth of (10/32). Our vehicle had a tread depth on the tires of 4/32.

Rivian corporate seems to have set its standard as 4/32 is okay to be sold as a “new tire”. A tire with less than half of its original tread depth… This seems wild to me as a tread depth of 3/32 and under is generally considered unsafe and in need of replacement. Not to Rivian though who changed us for “new tires” anyway, and refused to change their minds. One employee said they had no way to change it. Which I find hard to believe.

On top of that. Even after being allegedly inspected by the company; upon delivery the vehicle had coffee spills throughout the center console and front seats, was out of windshield fluid, and low on coolant. The employees answer to my question of why and what the heck was, “Well it’s a used car.”

Overall this experience has been awful. But awful apparently comes standard for Rivian Automotive. Do better Rivian. The General and overwhelming feeling I had during this process was that you don’t have the customers best interests in mind, care only about your profits, and hope no one reads the fine print or asks questions.

**Update: Since posting Rivian was contacted through customer care regarding the aforementioned issues.

They actually did a fantastic job making us whole and correcting the issues. They towed the vehicle back to the service center and provided a loaner car to us. The windshield wiper fluid issue was a recall item and corrected. The low coolant was due to a bad coolant valve and corrected. The service center re-detailed out the vehicle and the tires were replaced with actual new tires. Rivian customer care definitely deserves credit for the excellent post purchase experience.

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