NHTSA complaint #11630752

Owner complaint summary

I was backing my 2023 Volkswagen ID.4 into my very tight driveway very slowly to avoid hitting my other car parked on the street, my house and my neighbors house. The parking collision sensor alerted me that I was close to my other car but I can see out my window that I had room to clear it safely so I continued to back into my driveway at about 1 mile an hour. All of a sudden, my car made a click click noise as it lurched back and forth and then the car took over control and drove into my house about 20-30 feet at maybe 20 mph (not sure exactly but pretty fast) and crashed into my house and my neighbors house/gate. I pumped the brakes 2-3x but they did not work and the car continued driving into my house at that fast speed. I remember thinking omg, the car is not going to stop until it hit the house. No collision sensors went off during the automatic reverse acceleration and no manual nor auto emergency brakes were employed. Even though I pressed the brakes 2-3x, the ring video did not show brake lights (which isn't a surprise since they did not activate). There was a man that just walked his dog behind my car a minute before my car accelerated backwards. He would have been hit at 20mph 2 feet from my car. He is an eye witness to the incident and agreed that this was no way human error. If it were human error and I had accidentally pressed the acceleration pedal, I wouldn't have gone that fast on my super tight driveway and street and I also would have had plenty of time to press the opposite pedal to stop before hitting my own house. I haven't been able to get access to the "black box" yet to see what the car's computer says and haven't reached out to the dealer or VW as my insurance claim is still being processed. My house, my neighbor's gate and my car are badly damaged but am thankful nobody got hurt. I had not seen any indication before that something like this could happen. It was a sunny day, November 23, 2024 12:50pm.