When asked what their least favorite 2024 fleet car was, nine Consumer Reports staffers named the same make and model. Debuted in 2023, it’s an EV with a sticker price ranging from $39K to more than $60K and an expected range between 231 and 360 miles. The model, an SUV, was meant to be the first of three offerings by the manufacturer. However, the automaker filed for bankruptcy just this summer. Production remains paused. What is it, exactly? “It’ll be an obvious one…” one staffer began.

Consumer Reports staffers say their least like vehicle this year is “almost a given.”

Fisker Inc. is a fairly new startup venture that went public in 2020 with husband-wife team Henrik Fisker and Geeta Gupta-Fisker at the helm. By mid-2024, though, despite raising eye-watering amounts in funding cash, the company suffered enough production and financial challenges to throw in the towel.

Just a couple of months before the filing, the Consumer Reports team received a Fisker Ocean. Their automotive staff say the test experience was both bizarre and disappointing.

“I think the one that really offended me was the Fisker Ocean,” one CR car expert lamented.

About a year ago, an actual Fisker Ocean owner listed off a litany of quirks after accepting the delivery, knowing they were an early adopter of a startup EV.

Some of their issues included:

• The shifter didn’t always work to put the vehicle in the proper gear
• Inability to adjust rear view mirror
• Camera views would not appear on the cabin screen
• Locking the vehicle when you walk away from the car didn’t turn off the vehicle as it should
• Poor key fob range
• AC on the driver’s side of the cabin didn’t work
• Car locator was inaccurate
• Too many operator alerts, including “Seatbelt, auto emergency brake assistance, lane change alert followed by “drive carefully.”

The owner said that their largest frustration was communication with the automaker in general. “The digital Rådgiver was not helpful and still haven’t heard from anyone since last week regarding these problems,” they explain, “Although there was no lack of communication when I needed to sign the documents to finance the vehicle.”

Keith Barry wrote the Consumer Reports first drive review for the Ocean, the same month Fisker filed for bankruptcy.

While the team purchased a 2023 Fisker Ocean Ultra for $63,981, it wasn’t delivered to them until February 2024.

“Our experiences with buggy software, features that disappear and reappear, and promises that future updates will activate options we already paid for,” made the initial drive experience questionable to their team, Barry said. He also mentioned two active NHTSA investigations regarding roll-away risk and partial loss of braking. At the time, injuries were reported from these problems.

“If you’re a consumer who is still considering buying an Ocean, or if you’re an auto industry exec who is considering purchasing Fisker in its entirety, we encourage you to read about our early experiences with the Ocean first,” the Consumer Reports journalist says.