Key takeaways: 

• Danny Roman returned his Model X before 2020, benefiting from Tesla’s seven-day, no-questions-asked return policy. They picked up the vehicle from his home.
• Two years after, he’s still making payments on a $116,000 car he does not have.
• His case against the electric vehicle designer is in arbitration.

Danny Roman purchased a new Tesla Model X and took delivery of the vehicle on February 28, 2020.

He told the firm he was returning the electric SUV under the seven-day, no-questions-asked policy Tesla CEO Elon Musk was trumpeting.

Today, almost two years since Tesla took control of the vehicle, Roman still doesn’t have his reimbursement or access to the car, which had a price tag of about $116,000 overall, including various options and fees.

Records show that Tesla did pick up his Model X, loading it onto a tow truck on March 8, 2020, after which he hoped his refund to come promptly. His bank urged him to ask the EV designer to start a “stop sale,” he remembers, and then his Tesla sales representative told him that his refund would be processed shortly.

Instead, some weeks after, as he was still corresponding with Tesla regarding the quality of his return, Roman got service attention from Tesla, telling him to come to pick up the electric SUV. The alert explained that it had been fixed in a service center in Burbank, California. However, he had initially bought the car in Century City, around a 40-minute drive away.

Roman told CNBC he was surprised by the service alert. He states he never requested or authorized any restorations and that Tesla has yet acknowledged he was returning the car.