NHTSA Complaint #11699198 — 2021 TOYOTA VENZA

This report covers 2 events for the same problem. The first occurred in the spring of 2025 and I did not document the date or time. The second one occurred on November 10, 2025 @ about 10:15 a.m. (1) Last spring my wife was driving the Venza up the street to our residence going a slow rate of speed. As she approached the house, she took her foot off on the gas and coasted toward the left curb so she could back into our driveway. At that point, car suddenly surged forward and accelerated toward the curb. My wife rapidly applied the brake and averted any problem. (2) The second event occurred on November 10, 2025 @ 10:15 a.m. My wife was starting to park at a parking lot in the Tanasbourne Town Center. She was going to back into a parking spot so she drove forward going slightly left. Then, with the car still in drive, the car surged forward. She quickly stepped on the brake and the car stopped abruptly. (She was angling the car and was about ready to stop and put the car in reverse when this happened) Again, with her quick response braking, she was able to avert hitting person or thing. As to which component or system failed, there appears to be a random malfunction of sensors or perhaps the CPU...something that is calling for full throttle when the gas petal is not pushed. The safety risk is possible harm to the driver, outside property, or the worse situation would be harm to pedestrians that might be in the way of the car. We have not been able to reproduce the problem. The same maneuvers have been repeated 100's of times without incident. As of this writing, the vehicle is being taken to the Toyota dealer to have the oil changed and at that time they will be asked to do a thorough inspection of the systems that might cause this, check for any recorded malfunctions, etc. To the best of our knowledge, there were no warning lamps or messages that appeared.