A hot potato: Never underestimate the power of bad publicity. After Tesla removed driver assistance features from a second-hand Model S 75D following its purchase from a dealer, the company has restored the Enhanced Autopilot and Full Self Driving, blaming the incident on a "miscommunication."

Last week brought news of an anonymous consumer who bought a 2017 Tesla on December 20 last year from a third-party dealer. Sold at auction, the car was listed with the driver assistance features, which cost around $8,000 when adding them to a new vehicle.

What the buyer didn't know was that three days after Tesla sold the car to the dealer, it performed a remote audit and flagged the features for removal. It was only after the car was sold that Tesla pushed out a software update that disabled them. When the buyer contacted Tesla, they were told the car was "incorrectly configured for Autopilot versions that they did not pay for." The company even offered to re-add the features for a price.

While there have been reports of similar incidents in the past, Tesla dealers insist that features wouldn't be removed if they were listed as part of a second-hand car's specs. Now, the buyer in this case has had them reinstated.

Writing on Tesla Motors Club forum (spotted by TNW), the buyer said they were contacted by a Tesla rep who "apologized for my troubles, told me that Tesla has restored all missed options." The reason the features were disabled? A miscommunication, apparently.

While this case was resolved, other people who don't get any media exposure could be experiencing the same problem. Hopefully, Tesla will learn from this incident.