Electric car manufacturing company, Tesla Motors Inc., announced that the company will stop offering unlimited free use of its Supercharger stations, worldwide. The news was released on the company's website just months before Tesla is expected to roll out their mass-market electric car, the Tesla Model 3.
In the company's website, Tesla stated that electric cars ordered after January 1, 2017, and delivered before April 1, will receive around 1000 miles' worth of credits per year. Those credits will be used as its charging fee for using the Supercharger stations. However, once the credits have been consumed, owners will have to pay a small charging fee.
Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk has previously announced that Model 3 owners would have to pay to use the Supercharger stations. This means that those who purchased Tesla's Model 3 won't get unlimited free charging since Model 3 is scheduled to go on sale in the second half of next year. And with Tesla having not less than 300,000 reservations for the Model 3, it could get really expensive for the company should all those owners started using the Supercharger stations for free.
Although Tesla didn't provide specific charging fee details, they implied that charging via their Supercharger stations would still cost less than filling a comparable gasoline-fueled car. Details on the charging fee would be released later in the year.
In the U.S., Tesla's Supercharger stations allow the Tesla electric cars to travel for longer distance since the Supercharger stations are scattered all over the U.S. According to Tesla, their Model S sedan has a range of 219 to 302 miles per charge, depending on battery and software configuration.
According to the company's blog post, the change in the company's policy will allow Tesla to expand their Supercharger Network, thus providing customers with improved user experience and bring sustainable transport to even more people.
