Vehicle
2020 SUBARU OUTBACK
Manufacturer
Subaru of America, Inc.
Components
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM,UNKNOWN OR OTHER
Dates
Incident: 12/12/2021
Filed: 12/18/2021
Owner complaint summary
Battery drains when car sits idle for more than a week. No lights were accidentally left on. Had to jump start the car four times in less than a week. Subaru dealership attempted to tell me the battery was fine but the service advisor noted it was starting up sluggishly. Service did a full charge. Subaru's own website recommends driving the car at least a couple times a month, which is what I've done, but the battery still drains within two weeks. The Subaru dealership further told me that the battery has a memory and "learned" my driving habits (I purchased the car prior to the pandemic) and that is why the battery is not keeping a charge since I'm not driving it as often as they think I should. They also told me that I should disconnect the battery if I have to leave the car at an airport, for example if I go on vacation. That is absurd. The service advisor further told me that the warranty would likely not cover the battery replacement because they believe I'm not driving the car enough. I am concerned that the battery not holding a strong and sufficient charge will cause the car to not be able to restart at a traffic stop if I have not remembered to disengage the fuel-saving feature. While I carry a jump starting kit, I would need to get out in the road and try to hurriedly jump the car. There are several reports online with a parasitic drain where the computer does not go into a sleep mode when the car is off.
Official record ID (ODI): 11444264. This page is the human-readable source link used across afterwarranty. The raw JSON link proxies NHTSA's public API for machine verification; prefer this page when reading the complaint.