Sam Altman shares email showing $50,000 Tesla booking still undelivered after 7 years with no refund: ‘I understand delays but…’

In a post titled “A tale in three acts,” Altman shared screenshots of his email exchanges with Tesla.

Interestingly, Altman isn’t the only public figure to give up on the long-delayed Roadster

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently amused the internet after sharing a string of emails documenting his seven-year wait for a Tesla Roadster — a car he reserved with a $50,000 payment but never received.

In a post titled “A tale in three acts”, Altman posted screenshots of his exchanges with Tesla. The first email, from 2018, confirmed that his payment had gone through: “We have successfully received your reservation payments. Your reservation is now paid in full.”

Fast forward to 2025, and Altman was still waiting. “Hi, I’d like to cancel my reservation. Could you please refund me the $50k?” he wrote in a follow-up email. But his request bounced back — the address reservations@tesla.com, which once confirmed his booking, was no longer active.

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“I really was excited for the car! And I understand delays. But 7.5 years has felt like a long time to wait,” Altman wrote in an update.

Check out the post:

A tale in three acts: pic.twitter.com/ClRZBgT24g

— Sam Altman (@sama) October 30, 2025

Altman’s post quickly went viral, sparking a wave of humorous reactions online. One user wrote, “That’s the Tesla experience in 3 acts: hype, hope & heartbreak. Act 4 is Elon tweeting ‘soon.’” Another quipped, “Funny, this is exactly how people feel waiting for OpenAI to be a real nonprofit. Any day now, Sam.” A third joked, “We have Tesla vs Sam Altman drama before GTA6.”

On its website, Tesla describes the Roadster as an “all-electric supercar” that “maximises the potential of aerodynamic engineering—with record-setting performance and efficiency.” But as Altman’s experience shows, even Tesla’s most anticipated models can remain out of reach for years.

Interestingly, Altman isn’t the only public figure to give up on the long-delayed Roadster.

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YouTuber Marques Brownlee (MKBHD) revealed in September that he had reserved two Roadsters back in 2017, and had just cancelled one. “Tesla has been sitting with my 50 grand for eight years and hasn’t done anything with it, obviously,” Brownlee said on his Waveform podcast.

He explained that the cancellation process wasn’t straightforward — there was no option on the order page, and he had to spend days dealing with voicemails before finally receiving a $45,000 cheque. Tesla, however, kept his initial $5,000 deposit.

“Tesla’s just had that money the whole time. I could have done so much with that. I’ll do something else with it now,” he added.