Managing Connected Car Repairs and Insurance Safety Scores

As vehicles and their owners become increasingly intertwined with technology, repair facilities working on connected cars must pay closer attention to utilizing “service mode” settings to manage communications and access during vehicle repairs, including test drives. 

Illustrating this point, a reader of Repairer Driven News shared an example of how conducting essential driving maneuvers on a customer’s Tesla adversely affected their auto insurance Safety Score. When seeking guidance on the matter, Tesla suggested that the vehicle should have been placed in service mode during the test drive. Tesla’s Service Mode, as described on their website, serves as a diagnostic and repair interface accessible through the vehicle touchscreen, facilitating more efficient servicing by both internal and third-party technicians. It restricts remote access to the vehicle, implements a speed limiter, and enables repair facilities to perform necessary troubleshooting and repairs.

At the time of publication, Tesla had not responded to inquiries regarding whether deactivating Service Mode allowed the transmission of driving data or if Tesla could delete the test drive data recorded in the Safety Score.

Additionally, Tesla did not respond to queries from RDN.

As part of original equipment manufacturer (OEM) repair protocols, automakers mandate test drives to verify that repairs restore the vehicle to proper working order. The owner of the repair facility noted that post-repair test drives may sometimes require aggressive actions such as hard braking, steering wheel adjustments, and more forceful acceleration than usual.

Given these considerations, it might be prudent to include a clause in repair authorization documents where customers acknowledge that test drives could impact their connected insurance Safety Scores.

For instance, Nissan’s procedures stipulate actions like “perform action test to verify the customer’s concern” and “perform action test and check the system operation after system diagnosis.”

Specifically concerning test drives to evaluate lane departure warning (LDW) and advanced driver assistance system (ADAS) functionality, Nissan advises repairers to:

1. Confirm that the LDW system setting can be enabled or disabled on the information display.

2. Turn off the ignition switch and wait for at least 30 seconds.

3. Verify that the previous setting is retained when the engine restarts.

In a separate evaluation of seat belt performance (emergency locking retractors) during test drives, Nissan’s guidance for repairers includes:

1. Buckling both the driver and passenger into their seat belts.

2. Moving to a designated safe area for the test drive—an open, unobstructed space on a dry, paved surface.

3. Driving the vehicle at 10 mph while informing passengers of an impending abrupt stop to check if the retractor locks.

4. Applying brakes firmly to simulate a “very hard stop.”

5. During this stop, ensuring that seat belts lock and do not extend. If they fail to do so, conducting an off-vehicle inspection of the retractor.

By adhering to these guidelines, repair facilities can better manage the intricacies of modern vehicle repairs and minimize potential impacts on insurance Safety Scores.