Tight fit

A Tesla owner in Nova Scotia, Canada, made an unfortunate discovery after his vehicle received an over-the-air software update.

As Electrek reportsthe vehicle got stuck in the narrow driveway between his house and that of his neighbor. Indeed, a new firmware update broke Tesla’s “Summon” feature, which previously allowed the owner, identified as Jamie, to move his car in and out of the restricted location remotely.

When he tries to use the feature now, it just cycles through error messages, he said. Electreksuch as “Unable to find a clear path to the PIN” or “Stopped due to an unexpected error”.

The incident shows how the electric vehicle maker’s frequent updates not only improve the experience, but also completely block certain features, an unfortunate reality that can lead to owners being locked out or, more generally, losing control what is happening with their vehicle.

Stupid Summon

The news comes a month after Tesla released unexpectedly an update to the “Summon” feature called “Actually Smart Summon”.

Despite its name, the driver assistance feature, limited to private properties such as parking lots or long driveways, is still quite imperfect. For example, last week, a driverless Tesla hit a woman’s car in a shopping center parking lot, and even “continued after impact.”

In 2022, Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla announcement that Tesla’s autonomous driving efforts will rely exclusively on camera sensors instead of LiDAR and radar like its competitors, which he long mocked like a “crutch”. As Electrek points out that a “smart” version of the Summon feature disappeared once the automaker removed radar sensors from vehicles, but returned with the rollout of Actually Smart Summon earlier this year.

But judging by Jamie’s experience with what Tesla is today call the version “Dumb”the automaker has a lot more bugs to work out, especially given Musk’s plans to launch an autonomous carpooling service.

Not to mention Tesla Well-documented deficiencies in customer service. Jamie had to crawl into the trunk of his vehicle to drive it to a nearby service center.

Although the center staff was able to recreate the problem by stacking boxes next to the car, they were unable to offer a software restoration, much less a timetable for resolution.

Learn more about summoning: Woman annoyed when driverless Tesla suddenly crashes into her car