As Tesla expands its Robotaxi service — first launched in Austin in late June and now rolling out to other cities — the company is hiring an insurance claims specialist to handle incidents involving its autonomous ride-hailing vehicles.
The role was first detected by X user ‘Tesla Yoda.’
According to the job listing, the Elon Musk-led company is looking for a Senior Insurance Claims Specialist, who will “play a critical role in managing incident reporting and claim processes for Tesla‘s Robotaxi and ride-hailing operations.”
The role is integrated into the Global Risk Management and Insurance Team.
The listing comes just a few days after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reported the fourth Robotaxi incident since its launch in late June.
Robotaxi Expansion
Questioned in late September about the upcoming expansion of the ride-hailing service in the US, Musk announced that the company now plans to remove the safety drivers from its Robotaxi vehicles “within a few months.”
“Obviously we’re being very cautious about the deployment, because even one accident will be front-page headline news worldwide,” Musk said, adding that “it’s better for us to take a cautious approach here.”
Last week, Tesla expanded the geofenced area of its Robotaxi in Austin for the first time in two months. The service now covers about 80% of the city.
Incident Reports
According to a Bloomberg report in July, the auto safety regulator was investigating whether the robotaxi service violated traffic laws on its first day offering paid rides in Austin.
The claims were based on videos posted on social media and on information gathered from Tesla.
In July — the first month of full operation — Tesla reported three crashes involving its Robotaxi to the NHTSA.
Since then, only one additional incident has been reported, which occurred in a parking lot in September and was disclosed late last month.
Under an NHTSA Standing General Order, automakers are required to report any crashes involving their autonomous driving systems (ADS) or advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) within five days of learning about them.
The agency launched an investigation into Tesla in late August over potential delays in reporting crashes involving its Full Self-Driving (Supervised) and Autopilot software.
The probe followed an audit that found several incidents had been reported months after they actually occurred.
Crashes Reported
According to Tesla management, as stated during the latest earnings call in September, the Robotaxi service has already logged 250,000 miles.
“We continue to operate our fleet in Austin without anyone in the driver’s seat, and we have covered more than a quarter million miles with that,” Tesla‘s VP of AI Software Ashok Elluswamy stated.
The executive added that the company has crossed “more than a million miles” in the Bay Area, where the service is operated with “a person in the driver’s seat due to the regulations.”
This means the service has experienced roughly one crash for every 312,500 miles driven — a lower incident rate than competitor Waymo, which reports one crash for every 98,600 miles.
Waymo does not have any monitor inside the vehicle.
If considering only the Austin area, in which most of the rides have a safety monitor only on the passenger seat, the incident rate for Tesla rises to one in every 62,000 miles.
The NHTSA has investigated multiple incidents involving Waymo’s self-driving vehicles. The most recent probe, launched in late October, concerns the vehicles’ behavior around school buses.
Safety Agencies on Self-Driving Cars
In July, the NHTSA had requested Tesla for a drive on the company’s robotaxi service in Austin.
By August, the agency’s Office of Defects Investigation was seeking details about the service, including the anticipated geofence intended for public use, and the maximum operating speed.
The US Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy announced in September that the NHTSA would be updating requirements in the Automated Vehicle Framework.
The auto safety regulator was proposing three rulemakings to amend the FMVSS to address vehicles equipped with automated driving systems (ADS) that do not have manual controls.
In late September, the agency announced that the plan was in progress.
