- Elon Musk apologized to fired Tesla employees over improper severance packages, CNBC reported.
- The rare apology comes after the electric vehicle maker said at least 10% of its workforce was being laid off.
- Some workers previously told Business Insider that they were offered two months’ salary as severance pay.
Elon Musk apologized in an email to some fired Tesla employees after their severance packages were found to be “incorrectly low,” CNBC reported.
“As we reorganize Tesla, it has come to my attention that some severance packages are incorrectly low,” Musk said in the brief email sent Wednesday, according to the outlet. “My apologies for this error. It is being corrected immediately.”
Some employees were offered two months of severance pay, which would be paid through June 14, five laid-off workers told Business Insider.
Sixty days’ pay is the minimum that companies with more than 100 employees must give laid-off workers if there is no 60-day notice period before mass job cuts, according to the Adjustment Act of workers and notification of recycling.
Tesla’s CEO sent a general email Sunday evening announcing that the automaker was cutting more than 10% of its workforce. Some employees only learned they were affected after reporting to work Monday. Some were told by security that if their ID badges didn’t work, they would no longer have a job.
Ezekiel Love, who joined Tesla in Austin only about a month ago, was one of those workers. He now says he can no longer pay his rent after losing his job.
The massive layoffs come as Tesla faces a sharp slowdown in sales and growing competition from domestic manufacturers in China, its largest market outside the United States.
Tesla also lost some senior executives amid layoffs. Drew Baglino, who had been with the company for 18 years and most recently was head of powertrain and electrical engineering, has resigned and said he made the “difficult decision” to leave.
Rohan Patel, vice president of public policy and business development, also announced his departure Monday.
Musk is also grappling with lawsuits from four former Twitter executives, now X, who are suing him for $128 million in unpaid severance payments. The plaintiffs, who were fired after Musk’s takeover of Twitter in 2022, are former CEO Parag Agrawal, former CFO Ned Segal, former legal chief Vijaya Gadde and former general counsel Sean Edgett.
Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider, made outside of normal business hours.
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