- Checks were not cashed, or were just lost, prompting an internal audit.
- While putting together its annual report, the company discovered they couldn’t even find the correct data about its sales.
- In an effort to stay afloat, Fisker announced huge price cuts to its Ocean EV.
Fisker is teetering on the brink of bankruptcy after rescue talks with a major automaker collapsed, but while a slowdown in the EV market has been cited as a factor, a new report reveals that the startup has had plenty of other problems closer to home, managing to temporarily lose millions of dollars of customer money.
You might recall that one of the most eyebrow-raising details of Consumer Reports‘ recent less-than-flattering review of the Ocean was that Fisker never got around to cashing CR’s check, claiming that it couldn’t find it. An investigation by TechCrunch discovered that wasn’t an isolated case and that Fisker struggled to keep track of numerous customer payments, resulting in the launch of an internal audit in December.
Although the firm was eventually able to locate most payments – some of which were the full price – and get customers whose payments methods had expired to make new ones, TechCrunch sources close to the matter say that some other cars were delivered without Fisker taking any money, as Consumer Reports’ was.
“Checks were not cashed in a timely manner or just lost altogether,” one of the people told TechCrunch, whose sources blamed poor internal processes for the chaos. “We were often scrambling to find checks, credit card receipts and any wired funds a few months after a vehicle was sold.”
Related: Desperate Fisker Slashes Ocean Prices By Almost 40%, But Would You Buy One?
PWC (PricewaterhouseCoopers) discovered that same level of disorganization permeated other areas of the business, finding when it was putting together Fisker’s annual financial report that the company couldn’t provide the right details about its EV sales. Fisker still hasn’t released its 2023 report.
This isn’t the first time we’ve heard stories about the administrative disarray going on inside Fisker. The company itself admitted last November that it had problems with its financial reporting due to a shortage of employees with the skills to “analyze, record and disclose accounting matters timely and accurately.”
At the same time as this was going on, some owners were getting an idea that all was not running smoothly behind the scenes. TechCrunch learned that Fisker has had trouble making timely payments to state DMVs when setting up new customers, resulting in many spending months driving around on temporary license plates that even had to be renewed because they were expiring before Fisker worked though its backlog of registration niggles.
Earlier this week Fisker announced huge price cuts to the three trim levels of its 2023 Ocean SUV as it tries to bring in cash in order to stay afloat. The entry level Ocean Sport now costs just $24,999, down from $38,999, the mid-spec Ultra drops from $52,999 to $34,999 and the flagship Extreme is available for $37,499 instead of $61,499.