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Toyota owners have to pay $8/mo to keep using their key fob for remote start
Automakers keep trying to get a piece of that sweet, sweet subscription income. Now, it's Toyota's turn.
Nearly every car company offers some sort of subscription package, and Toyota has one called Remote Connect. The service offers the usual fare, letting owners use an app to remotely lock their doors, for example, or if they own a plug-in vehicle, to precondition the interior. But as some complimentary subscriptions for Remote Connect come to an end, Toyota owners are getting an unexpected surprise—they can no longer use their key fob to remote-start their vehicles.
In terms of technology, this remote-start feature is no different from using the fob to unlock the car. The fobs use a short-range radio transmitter to send the car a signal that is encrypted with rolling codes. The car then decrypts the signal and performs the requested action, whether it's to lock or unlock the doors, beep the horn, or start the engine. RF key fobs have been around since the 1980s, and GM added a factory-installed remote-start option in 2004 (no subscription needed).
Key fob remote start has nothing to do with an app, nor does the car or the fob communicate with any servers managed by Toyota.
Toyota has been offering factory-installed remote start on 2018 and newer vehicles equipped with Audio Plus or Premium Audio. To use it, owners have to be within 50 feet of the vehicle and double-press the fob's lock button before holding the lock button down for a few seconds.
Yet recently, as 2018 Toyotas have passed their third birthday, owners have been discovering that the fob's functionality is dependent on maintaining an active Remote Connect subscription. Vehicles equipped with Audio Plus receive a free three-year "trial," while Premium Audio vehicles receive 10 years. Once those subscriptions expire, though, the key fob remote start stops working. Toyota didn't change the rules, though that detail was buried in the fine print. When the time comes, Toyota simply cuts off access to one of the functions on the key fob already in the owner's possession. To get the feature back, owners have to pony up $8 per month or $80 per year.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 14 2021, @08:03PM (3 children)
Seems like a cold weather thing? (Or maybe hot weather, too, for A/C?
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday December 15 2021, @07:38AM (2 children)
No point in starting your car in that case either. There are parking heaters that give you a warm car without the engine running.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 15 2021, @06:13PM (1 child)
You mean, block heaters? They're slow, power-hungry, and require you plug them in and set them up, which requires going out into the weather. Remote start is just press one button. When there's a foot of snow on the ground, inch thick ice on the windshield, it's very nice to just wait for it to melt off.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday December 15 2021, @09:33PM
Then they are definitely not what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is a device that's built into your car, and burns fuel to heat your car (just as the motor would, except that you don't waste energy for pointlessly generating mechanical motion that you don't use).
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.