EdgarD
Member
- Thread starter
- #1
I've finally had my first disappointment with Rivian support. I know others have their stories. Here's mine.
I'm away from the vehicle for several months. I connected the portable charger and for two weeks I was able to use the mobile app to start and stop charging sessions. It was working perfectly. I didn't want to come home to dead batteries.
About a week ago, my troubles began, partially self-inflicted. I remotely installed a new version of the vehicle software. I had no need to do this, but I thought it was pretty cool to be able to do this, so I did. By all accounts, the install went fine. I then used the App to schedule a charging session. I decided to charge from midnight to 4 AM on a daily basis. I was thinking that if this worked, I wouldn't have to check in every few days and manually start and then stop a charging session.
Since attempting my first scheduled charge, I have not been able to charge the vehicle by any means. I'm slowly watching my charge levels drop from 50, to 40, to 30 %. Several days ago, I called Rivian for support. They are insisting that before they can proceed with any analysis that they need photographs of the electrical pins at all points along the circuit from the household plug that the charger is plugged into upto the pins on the charger handle connected to the charger port. They claim to need this despite the fact that I sent them photos of the charger body with the status lights illuminated GREEN and the status light on the vehicle port illuminated WHITE. Clearly there is power flowing.
I know that diagnostics are often down via a structured flowchart, with good reason. However, I'm not at home to take these photos and have to ask a neighbor to go do this. They've gone over and plugged/unplugged the charger in an attempt to initiate a charge. They've taken the two photos that I mentioned. What disappoints me is the thinking behind this. I mean the set was working fine. New software and a new capability was deployed and then an attempt was made to use it, i.e. the scheduled charging. The system immediately ceased to work and the thinking by tech support is that the hardware interfaces, i.e. the pins in the cables are somehow worth inspecting, despite the fact that status lights are illuminated on both ends of the cable. Wouldn't be my guess.
One caution. While I was attempting to get this working, I decided to uninstall and reinstall the Rivian App. Often times this will solve a problem, especially after new functionality is deployed. When I did this, I learned that in order to have access to the charging capabilities, PAAK has to be enabled. After the new app was installed, It wanted me to reinitialize PAAK which requires having the phone in the vehicle. Clearly not possible of me, so I'm in a bit of a state now. I see no reason what this capability has to be linked to PAAK, but that is a decision that they made. Fortunately, my wife has PAAK set up on her phone, so if this ever gets resolved, I should be able to use it for charging.
I've used Rivian phone support 3 or 4 times before, and have always been impressed. This time, not so much.
I'm away from the vehicle for several months. I connected the portable charger and for two weeks I was able to use the mobile app to start and stop charging sessions. It was working perfectly. I didn't want to come home to dead batteries.
About a week ago, my troubles began, partially self-inflicted. I remotely installed a new version of the vehicle software. I had no need to do this, but I thought it was pretty cool to be able to do this, so I did. By all accounts, the install went fine. I then used the App to schedule a charging session. I decided to charge from midnight to 4 AM on a daily basis. I was thinking that if this worked, I wouldn't have to check in every few days and manually start and then stop a charging session.
Since attempting my first scheduled charge, I have not been able to charge the vehicle by any means. I'm slowly watching my charge levels drop from 50, to 40, to 30 %. Several days ago, I called Rivian for support. They are insisting that before they can proceed with any analysis that they need photographs of the electrical pins at all points along the circuit from the household plug that the charger is plugged into upto the pins on the charger handle connected to the charger port. They claim to need this despite the fact that I sent them photos of the charger body with the status lights illuminated GREEN and the status light on the vehicle port illuminated WHITE. Clearly there is power flowing.
I know that diagnostics are often down via a structured flowchart, with good reason. However, I'm not at home to take these photos and have to ask a neighbor to go do this. They've gone over and plugged/unplugged the charger in an attempt to initiate a charge. They've taken the two photos that I mentioned. What disappoints me is the thinking behind this. I mean the set was working fine. New software and a new capability was deployed and then an attempt was made to use it, i.e. the scheduled charging. The system immediately ceased to work and the thinking by tech support is that the hardware interfaces, i.e. the pins in the cables are somehow worth inspecting, despite the fact that status lights are illuminated on both ends of the cable. Wouldn't be my guess.
One caution. While I was attempting to get this working, I decided to uninstall and reinstall the Rivian App. Often times this will solve a problem, especially after new functionality is deployed. When I did this, I learned that in order to have access to the charging capabilities, PAAK has to be enabled. After the new app was installed, It wanted me to reinitialize PAAK which requires having the phone in the vehicle. Clearly not possible of me, so I'm in a bit of a state now. I see no reason what this capability has to be linked to PAAK, but that is a decision that they made. Fortunately, my wife has PAAK set up on her phone, so if this ever gets resolved, I should be able to use it for charging.
I've used Rivian phone support 3 or 4 times before, and have always been impressed. This time, not so much.
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