BYD Atto 3 deliveries to re-commence following four-week pause

UPDATE: The BYD Atto 3 now officially carries a five-star ANCAP safety rating in Australian and New Zealand.

Australian BYD Importer EV Direct and ANCAP have come to a solution for vehicles sold from November 21. Read the full story here.

Current BYD Atto 3 owners are encouraged to contact their dealer and have the required modifications made for their cars to be five-star compliant.

Our original story, below, continues unchanged.

The story to here

UPDATE November 14: BYD Atto 3 deliveries to re-commence following four-week pause

Local deliveries of the BYD Atto 3 electric SUV will re-commence in the coming days, following a four-week hold related to a compliance issue.

The small SUV – one of Australia’s cheapest electric vehicles – launched in September, but deliveries were temporarily paused in late October after it was discovered the Atto 3 failed to comply with an Australian Design Rule requiring a top-tether to attach a child seat in the rear-centre seat.

A top-tether for the centre seat has been a long-standing requirement for a five-seat passenger vehicle in Australia.

5

The Australian Design Rule 34/03 states: "Clearance shall be provided around each ‘Upper Anchor Fitting’ to allow latching and unlatching, without the use of tools, of the ‘Attaching Clip’ to the ‘Upper Anchor Fitting’ when it is installed in the vehicle."

An email sent to affected customers on November 11 – after EVDirect, the local distributor for BYD in Australia, promised to release more details on November 9 – said the delivery process will resume this week.

“As you may know we have been in discussions with the local authorities for the last 4 weeks trying to clarify a technical issue regarding the ADR certification of the Atto 3 vehicle,” said the customer notice from BYD Australia and EVDirect management.

5

“As part of that process, we made a decision to halt deliveries until such time as we could provide the necessary information to the department to resolve the issue.

“We are pleased to inform customers that we will now re-commence the delivery process of the Atto 3. This is great news for our customers, and we thank you for your patience as we worked through this process.”

It says the Atto 3 will now feature the following modifications for newly-delivered vehicles:

• The rear-centre seat will have a rear anchorage point available, allowing for the fitment of a child seat
• The ISOFIX child-seat anchorages in the front passenger seat will be disabled, removing the ability to fit a child seat.

5

“We realise the child seat positions do not impact the vast majority of our customers, but safety is, and always will be our number one priority which is why we decided to voluntarily halt deliveries whilst resolving this matter,” the notice added.

Late last month, EVDirect CEO Luke Todd told Wheels little more than “a Stanley knife with a very professional operator” is needed to resolve the issue with the rear-centre seat.

It’s understood the top tether mount is incorporated into the seat but was hidden behind the fabric of the backrest.

It is unknown if soon-to-be-produced examples will include the fix from the factory in China, or if BYD Australia employees will need to manually work on each vehicle as it arrives in Australia.

A dealer notice seen by Wheels said the plan to rectify all vehicles will be outlined by BYD Australia officials today, November 14.

5

The company is also yet to detail how it intends to fix hundreds of vehicles delivered to customers before the stop-sale was issued on October 21 to ensure the ADR requirements are met.

The compliance issue followed its five-star ANCAP safety rating, with Australian variants currently unrated – despite New Zealand and European variants receiving top marks under the same criteria.

“Once ANCAP is advised of the certification status and any rectification action proposed by BYD, we will review the information to determine whether an ANCAP safety rating for Australian vehicles can be applied,” said a spokesperson for ANCAP.