Dome lights and liftgate flakiness
 

(First of all, the forum search functionality is hard to filter to just the Q7 group -- am I using it wrong? :)

2015 Q7 TDI, bought "new" a year ago. Sometimes when it's off, the dome lights don't turn on when I open the doors. This is kind of annoying, but they do turn on when I press the On button (even without turning on the engine).
But even worse is that when the care is in this state, the power liftgate doesn't work. If it's closed and I press the outside button, it does unlock, and opens about an inch. Subsequent presses of the button only make an unlocking noise, but the motor doesn't move the gate. I've also seen it happen when the gate is fully open, and all the dome lights turn off, and the button won't close the gate either. This is a much bigger deal, since it means I can't open or close the back easily.

Of course when I brought it to the dealer for them to look at it under warranty, it didn't happen for them.
It does seem to be happening a bit more with our "cold" snap around freezing temperatures (I know, this isn't very cold in other regions).

Has anyone else experienced this? Do you know what was wrong, so that I can tell the dealer something actionable for them to fix while it's still under warranty?

Thanks!

Did they check the battery? If it's weak, the car will shut down electronics to preserve power for the starter.

Agree, sounds like low battery. Throw it on the charger overnight and report back.

It's been happening for over a month, but a weaker battery does sound entirely reasonable. It's possible that we don't drive it enough for the alternator to charge it completely.

I don't think they checked my battery, because despite my detailed description of what was happening, they only wrote down 'gate doesn't go all the way up', so the people actually doing the work were probably looking for the wrong thing.

I always found it strange that the 12V supplies don't turn off with the engine, so my GPS unit is always lit up.

Thanks for the pointers!

It got better with the warmer weather, but then completely died last week. The dealer replaced it under warranty!
Even though the few things I found online implied that it was 1-year for the warranty, the dealer said it was 4 years/50k miles. The one independent shop I call said it would have been $500 to replace the battery (due to labour costs), so it was a pleasant surprise that it was free.

its because of all that electronic battery management system that shuts down aux systems like lift gates that they include the battery in warranty, otherwise it'd be a wear and tear part because its far too easy to deep discharge em and ruin it just listening to radio or running heated seats w/engine off.