EV complexity challenging Motor Vehicle Disputes Tribunal

Electric vehicles are among the factors adding technical complexity to disputes reaching New Zealand’s Motor Vehicle Disputes Tribunal, as the body records its highest annual caseload on record.

The Tribunal received 716 new applications in the year to 30 June 2025, up 22.6 percent on the previous year and more than double the 258 received in 2014/15. The figures are contained in the Tribunal’s annual report to the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, signed on 15 September 2025.

The report does not break applications down by powertrain, and gives no indication that EVs are driving the volume increase. It does however flag EVs specifically as an example of where technical evidence is making cases more complex to hear.

“The Tribunal continues to hear claims of increasing complexity, often due to the nature of the technical evidence arising,” the report says. A footnote attached to that observation points directly at electric vehicles.

The Tesla case

One case cited in the report involved a Tesla Model X P100D purchased for $71,778 with approximately 71,159km on the clock. The imported vehicle had recently passed New Zealand Transport Agency compliance.

It developed a range of faults shortly after purchase and then became undriveable, with a diagnosis of a failed HV battery pack and a replacement quote of $59,035.43.

The applicant sought rejection along with a wide range of additional remedies, including diagnostic and repair charges, window tinting, ferry and storage fees, loss of value of a second vehicle they could not sell because it had to remain in use, time spent on the matter, and insurance.

The Tribunal allowed rejection but declined several of the additional cost claims, finding some were not reasonably foreseeable as liable to result from the failure.

A separate case cited in the report involved more than 30 documents spanning over 200 pages, with the resulting decision exceeding 20 pages. The Adjudicator had to weigh which of two signed Vehicle Offer and Sale Agreements applied, whether the applicant had been pressured into signing the second, whether the trader had misrepresented the vehicle’s range or battery health, and whether the applicant had relied on those representations.

The applicant was ultimately awarded $750 for the cost of a towbar that had been agreed but never installed.