The automotive media has been helping Slate Auto to promote its future low-cost battery-electric pickup truck by only telling you part of the price you’ll pay to Slate Auto to drive one home. It feels uncomfortable to us, especially since many outlets swear they always try to clearly convey the full consumer cost when reporting on vehicles. We’ll lay out the facts and let you decide if that is happening in this case.
The Real Consumer Cost of a Slate Auto Pickup
Slate Auto has said that its truck has the following three charges when you buy one:
1) $24,950
2) The Destination Charge
3) The Doc Fee
We’ve reached out to Slate Auto and asked them to share the full cost of the truck they are now accepting pre-orders for, but they’ve gone quiet. It’s hard to understand why a company won’t share the full cost of its product, particularly after letting journos and content creators drive it.
Let’s now total up what the full cost a consumer will pay Slate Auto to buy a bare-bones pickup. We’ll need to look first at the Destination Charge. We didn’t come up with the idea that Slate adds this charge on our own. It’s right there in print on the company’s pricing page.
Consumer Reports pored over all of the Destination Charges from all the automakers earlier this year and says that in 2026, the lowest Destination Charge is $1,150, and the highest they found at that time was $3,250. In its reporting, Consumer Reports said:
Destination charges are now a major cost when buying a car.
The average Destination Charge is in the $1,500 to $2,000 range today, but let’s give Slate the benefit of the doubt here. Let’s just use the lowest cost of $1,150.
Next up, we need to determine the Doc Fee. This fee is not to be confused with state registration or title costs. Those are paid to the municipality, not the automaker, though the seller often collects the state fees, just like they do sales taxes. A Doc Fee is a fee that supposedly covers the cost to prepare paperwork or something. Since it’s made up, it’s hard to really define it. This fee is paid to the seller, be it a dealer or a direct seller. Slate Auto is planning direct sales, so as a buyer, you’ll pay Slate Auto directly. Again, Slate Auto tells anyone who wants to listen that it will charge a Doc Fee. CarEdge maintains a report that it updated just this month which pegs the average Doc Fee at $400 right now. Since we know the average and we were pretty kind by using the lowest Destination Charge, let's add the average Doc Fee to the cost for our calculation.
Based on the facts we have, the price a consumer will pay to Slate Auto for a bare-bones truck will be as follows:
$24,950 + $1,150 + $400 = $26,500
Why Don’t Automotive Publications Include the Full Price To the Consumer In Their Titles?
What I just did there wasn’t hard, right? Super simple, actually. All the information to calculate the consumer’s price of a Slate Auto pickup is publicly available. And yet, many outlets pretend the truck's cost is lower than it is. Are they doing this to generate page views? That’s our only guess. Let’s look at a few examples.
Here’s a really weird example, and it’s one that we just don’t understand. Remember how we used Consumer Reports above as the trusted source for the range of Destination Charges? Well, Consumer Reports has a summary page about Slate Auto. It lists the truck's price as $24,950 and says nothing about the Destination Charge or Doc Fee. All that is said is, "The 2027 model starting price is $24,950." Does this surprise you? It surprised me.
Let’s use one more example. Edmunds is a trusted source among other automotive media. We look to Edmunds for data, and we trust it implicitly. Just last week, Edmunds ran a very helpful consumer-guide-type story that lists and explains all the costs of buying a car. It goes into detail on Destination Charges and Doc Fees. Yet, that same publication used as its headline “We Rode in the $24,950 Slate Truck. Here's What It's Like.” In that story, the author and editor don't mention the Destination Charge until you scroll down to two images and a summary. No Doc Fee was mentioned that we could find. Why are these substantial consumer costs buried so far down the page? When this story is viewed on a phone, that’s like five swipes down.
Why is everyone trying so hard to give you a false impression about what you will pay for this particular vehicle? We honestly don't know. Maybe you can tell us in the comments below.
About the Author:
John Goreham is a 14-year veteran of Torque News. An accomplished writer and a long-time expert in vehicle testing, Goreham also serves as the Vice President of the New England Motor Press Association and has a growing social media presence. He’s also a 10-year staff writer and community moderator for Car Talk. Goreham holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering and an undergraduate Certificate in Marketing. In addition to vehicle and tire content, he offers deep dives into market trends and opinion pieces. You can follow John Goreham on X and TikTok, and connect with him on LinkedIn.
Top of page image by John Goreham. Second image is a screenshot of Slate Auto's pricing fine print pop-up.
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