Your Car Is Becoming a Subscription — What You Need to Know Before You Buy

Hey everyone and welcome back to the Straight Shift.

The podcast that cuts through all the automotive nonsense so you don't get screwed.

I have a story to tell you. If you remember last fall I rented a car in England as a part of our

transatlantic journey in my bucket list trip and when I booked it online I already knew that there

was an extra fee to use the built-in navigation system in the car. That was one of those clearly

listed things that they tried to upsell me when I was booking the rental reservation.

But oh navigation it's like an extra 20 bucks a day to know where you're going.

That's adorable. You know I have Google Maps. I'll survive. Thank you. So I declined it.

When I picked up the car in England, fired it up, the built-in navigation was there and guess

what it worked. I was like whoo-hoo free. Somebody forgot to push a button and it was lovely because

it was this British female voice to guide me through the countryside with at the roundabout.

Take the second to exit. I mean it was just delightful. It's what every navigation system

should sound like. But then when we stopped and turned off the car when we turned it back on again

poof. Gone. The navigation screen no longer came up. It said sorry this feature is not available

at this time. Contact blah blah blah. Oh so they figured it out. They turned it off.

Somewhere in a European server farm or computer decided I hadn't paid enough

to know where the hell I was going. So bummer. The reason I tell that story and if you haven't

seen the video of that trip you can check it out at drivingintheuk.com and I'll put a description

in the link. But it reminded me of what is really happening in the automotive industry right now.

Trends that we are going towards that are a little bit frightening. Cars are quickly becoming

software platforms. Meaning features can be turned on and off at the whim of the manufacturer

not necessarily you as the customer. So today we are going to talk about what features in your car

may only be available by subscription and which ones of those make sense. Which ones are kind

of in an iffy area I'm not thrilled about and which ones are just full blown bullshittery.

We're going to even name some names. I'll probably throw a few brands under the bus

but they've earned it because I want to explain why these systems are doing this why the systems

work the way they do and most importantly what you need to ask before you buy a car so that you

don't get ghosted by the navigation lady six months into ownership. So let's get into it.

One of the first subscription services available in vehicles was from General Motors and that's

OnStar. Most people have heard of it. It's been around since I think the late 90s and here's how

it works. It's designed to be an emergency services system. Every GM vehicle that is equipped with

OnStar which they all certainly are now they're embedded with a cellular modem so it works over

the cellular networks. It has a GPS receiver just like your phones so they know where your car is

and it has crash detection systems various sensors throughout the cars tied to the airbag system

crumple zones and of course there is a microphone and speaker system in the car. The benefit of this

is if you are in a crash the car will automatically detect the impact if it's severe enough if you

tap your own mailbox or little tiny fender bender that might not be enough to trigger it but if

it's serious it is automatically going to dial a call center where there is a human being who

has been trained not quite to the level of a 911 operator but very similar and they are going

to be able to send the GPS location get information from the car's computer as well as talk to you

keep you calm and they are going to call the emergency services police fire medic as you need

this is really great because in an accident things go everywhere in your car you may not

be able to find your phone you may be pinned you can't reach your phone to make that 911 call

you may be unconscious but the on star system will call for you and if they can't communicate

with you and know that you're awake you're conscious get an assessment of your injuries

they are going to have those emergency services haul but to get to your location and you can also

call them on your own maybe you're not in an accident but you're in a flood this actually

happened during the big flooding in texas just last year they handled about 4000 crisis calls

and supported multiple rescues there was an elderly couple trapped in flood water that

was able to use this technology to get rescue services to them and they were saved it's an

incredible infrastructure and this is one of the subscription things that i think makes great sense

super has one called starlink hunday's blue link works very similarly these are systems

that can literally save your life on star has answered over well over half a million emergency

calls since its inception and it gets more and more every year and they have literally saved

thousands of lives it's been shown that their involvement and the data that they can pass

on to first responders reduces the time it takes for first responders to get to your location

because they're better able to prioritize and triage they can know ahead of time did the airbag

deploy there's so much information that on star and these other systems can give to the first

responders that they are more prepared when they get to you and that saves lives so this is a

subscription that i personally think is well worth paying for after the free trial expires

especially if you do a lot of driving and especially if you have teen drivers

i love these systems they are absolutely phenomenal but of course things have evolved

over the years and now it's not just built into the car super system and hunday system they've

expanded it so that you have an app now on your smartphone that you can download and it gives

you even more control over your vehicle this is the benefit of cars being roving computers

they can not only interact with your smartphone simply from an apple carplay android auto standpoint

but now you can open your doors you can close your doors lock your doors make sure they're locked

you can remote start the car get the heater going this is great for people who live in places with

very cold weather it's so nice when the car is already warm already defrosted the seat warmers

are on when you get into that car in the morning to go to work it's absolutely fabulous when it is

you know 10 degrees outside there's so many other things that it can do it can also track the car's

location help you recover it if it is stolen in addition to all of those emergency services

that works through your phone where your phone is sending a command to the manufacturer's cloud

server via wi-fi or via the cellular networks the server then verifies your account make sure you

have paid for said services and then it does what you need to do and again i don't really have a

problem with those services it is kind of an extra add-on app not everyone may wish to use it

i personally think it's extremely helpful i'm not so thrilled that all that data gets collected

and the manufacturers are using it in ways that we don't even know about but you know unfortunately

that's the trade-off that i've talked about in previous podcasts about is your car spying on you

sometimes that spying can be helpful and sometimes it can even save your life

so i think those services can be well worth the money especially if remote start having

the carving nice and warm those things are helpful to you now we get into some things that are a

little more complicated systems like supercruise from gm and the blue cruise from ford these are

the hands-free driving systems that are continuing to evolve in vehicles you know it's what we call

self-driving cars they're not completely self-driving but the manufacturer has mapped out

certain highways in detail the car has all the sensors and the driver safety aids that allow

it to control the car to a certain extent so when you turn that on the car uses its gps to figure

out am i in a location that is approved for me to take over to a certain extent and if it is and

you've paid for it because it also verifies if your account is up to date then it uses all the

technology on the car to drive somewhat for you and it can receive updates over the air basically

the software can be updated through the airwaves being downloaded from the servers of the manufacturer

typically you get a free trial period because they want you to try this out and get hooked on it

and then wham they slam you with the bill for well if you want to continue this service you

have to pay blah blah blah and sometimes you can pay for it up front a lot of the time when you buy

a car that has one of these services you can pay for x number of years up front with ford i know for

example some of the cars come with x number of years of supercruise already built into the price

of the car and that will be on the windows sticker sometimes they don't because not everybody wants

that feature they have been pushing it pretty hard so always check to see if that service is

included because very often the dealers are going to try to sell you on it but you don't want to pay

twice for something that came with the car kind of like how they want to charge you for floor mats

like oh we added this protection package to the car that included rubber floor mats oh well you

know what i looked on the windows sticker and those rubber floor mats were already on the car

from the factory so i have already paid for them don't charge me twice always always check the

windows sticker to see what you have already paid for so they don't try to charge you again

but a lot of these features are are really very useful and you can choose to use them if you don't

like them then you can cancel your subscription you know unlike being able to cancel your subscription

to 2026 which is not necessarily started off so great but it gives you a little bit more control

over what features you want to use and i think it makes sense when that feature involves an outside

entity a service a call center we pay for things like netflix for streaming to get extra tv shows we

pay for things like pandora and we've been paying for satellite radio things like that for a long

time those we think of as subscription services but it starts getting into a gray area when

all of it is already in the car but you're just paying for whether or not to use it

i still think that the super crews and those systems make sense because there is a lot of

software involved with that and they are trying to recover their research and development costs

because it took a lot of money and continues to take a lot of money to develop those technologies

to map our incredibly complex road systems and to be able to figure out how do we handle this

in places where the signal might not be as strong or the roads are constantly changing

like they are here in charlie like i have no idea how those systems would ever work here

with the amount of road construction and new roads that we constantly have

and the changes they're making to the existing ones so i understand that that makes sense as a

subscription tesla started a lot of the pay for features subscription services that a lot of the

manufacturers have started to take note of and are trying to follow in those footsteps one example

is mercedes in some of their electric vehicle models you can pay annually to unlock additional

horsepower it's like yes your car is capable of going this fast but hey if you want to go even

faster you can pay another hundred dollars a month or whatever it is i just made up that number i

didn't actually look up what the cost is because i don't really want to know it's i think that falls

into one of those gray areas because the car is already built to go that fast and it is much

easier in an electric vehicle because electric motors are a lot more capable as long as you

have the battery power to be able to deliver the electrons to propel the car at those speeds

it's not like turning on and off cylinders although don't get me started that they might

since they figured out how to turn on and off certain cylinders in your car like they do with

the hemi engine they do that for fuel efficiency but it wouldn't be surprising to me if they figured

out a way to turn off like hey you only get four cylinders unless you pay for you know two or four

more i can see them doing that but it's so much easier to do an electric vehicle because of how

that technology works tesla really normalized this with being able to pay for faster acceleration

because literally it's just how the computer is programmed to allow those electrons from the battery

to flow to the electric motor all of that can be controlled with software makes sense right tesla

was a technology company that started building cars they are still primarily a technology

company in fact they're building fewer cars now because they're so focused on building robots and

sending us into you know the iRobot future that isaac asimov warned us about but you're paying

just to unlock features that your car is already capable of but that can be a good solution because

most people don't necessarily need the super high performance model or maybe they just want to play

with it for a little while but you don't need it all the time that's what i do with netflix i don't

pay for a lot of the tv subscription services i wait until a show that i like a new season comes

out like when stranger things final season came out waited till it was all there paid for one

month of netflix binge watched the whole season and then turned it off again because i don't want

to pay for it on a regular basis if you could turn on and off some of that technology like the

more power more acceleration hey you know i want to do a track day or i'm going to go up in the

mountains today and do a little driving being able to turn it on for a short period of time would

actually be really cool and then you turn it off just to go back to your normal life and don't use

it now if you're paying for extra power i do think that they should have a package that you can pay for

that not only gives you that extra horsepower that extra acceleration all that extra performance in the

car but possibly comes with a subscription to a lawyer to get you out of the inevitable speeding

tickets that you will probably get testing out that extra horsepower okay fine maybe that's just me

but i think that'd be a good idea you know tesla has always had paying extra for the full self-driving

capability that's where ford and gm followed in their footsteps with paying for super crews and

blue crews mercedes did the same thing with this permission-based horsepower and it's not

you pay for every horsepower it's not like oh every additional horsepower is another 25 cents

they might do that but you just pay to unlock like a new level like in a game you're unlocking this

premium level of power to be able to access but you're still just sort of paying for a capability

that's already sitting in your driveway so i'm have mixed feelings about it obviously let me know

how you guys feel about that and would you use something like that or if you have an electric

vehicle that has subscription based turn on turn off these features let me know if you like it if

you use it do you pay for it and if you do do you feel that it's worth it well between 2018 and 2021

toyota did a little experiment with this and we know that toyota is not exactly a leader in the

technology world they do things very well they make cars very reliable they make them safe but

they are never on the leading edge or the bleeding edge of technology just why they have the reliability

but they had this little period of time where they were smoking something and certain models

were equipped with specific infotainment systems that had remote start functionality that was built

into the key fob so instead of going on to your smart phone and remote starting your car which

things like Subaru starlink and Hyundai's blue link do this was actually built into just your normal

unlock the damn door key fob i actually have an aftermarket one of those on one of my old old cars

specifically to get it heated up in the winter but toyota tied this in but then they tied it to

a subscription that expired after the trial period ended wasn't every model wasn't every trim

but here's what happened once the subscription ran out and you didn't renew it the key fobs and like

entirely started stopped working like you couldn't even unlock your car and get into it without paying

for the subscription boy did that go over like a fart in a space suit people were none too happy

about that so i don't think that was toyota's intention i just don't think they tested it as

thoroughly as toyota normally tests things they struggle on the technology side so they backed

off of that pretty quickly after getting what you would imagine is quite a bit of backlash

and i mean that was also during the beginning of the pandemic too so we were already all very

pissed off and at our wits end so do not test our patience at that point it was kind of interesting

so fortunately they have backed off that and are moving more towards the things on your smartphone

and i get okay if you want to pay for remote start having these things through the app

having a subscription okay i can see that not everyone's gonna want it and it is

more heavily software based than it is actual hardware the bmw tried to take it a little too

far they tried to charge just to use apple carplay when that first came out that did not go over

well either they backpedaled really quickly after the internet completely roasted them over that

but it didn't stop them from continuing to test out some serious subscription bullshittery

they offered a subscription in the european markets um the uk germany south korea a few

other markets around the world a subscription to heated seats let's think about that for a minute

the seat is already installed the heating elements in the seat that's already installed

all the wiring is already installed and hooked up and the little button to push it is already in

the car connected to everything the car is physically capable from the factory of keeping

your butt nice and warm why should you have to pay a monthly subscription to activate it

that's like a tushy tax i am not paying a tushy tax nothing has to connect outside the car

there is not a human involved in helping you keep your bum warm the car is fully capable of it

the electrons are already built into the battery this is not something that you should have to

have a subscription to do it's ridiculous they tested it in a couple of us markets very limited

oh did not go over well did not go over well so even in europe where they are a little more

tolerant of paying extra for a lot of things and things being subscription based they did

not like this either if it comes in the car all the hardware everything you need to make that

entire system work is already in the car you've already paid for it it's not like paying extra

changes the number of electrons running from the battery into the heating element to warm your

took us no that's already there so it's just absolutely ridiculous so bmw that was the epitome

of bullshittery before it is now also contemplating some bullshittery of their own with what is called

the frunk you may have heard of a frunk that is the storage space in the front compartment of

an electric vehicle because there's not an engine up there so you have this nice little extra

basically you have two trunks a frunk means front trunk you know real creative for this

contemplating and testing out charging you to access it space that is already in your car

they want to charge you to use air inside your car it's literally a molded storage bin there's

no cellular data involved there's no satellite there is no call center it's literally air space

already in your vehicle yet because it's an ev software has the ability to allow you to access

it or not and so they're kind of testing out should we charge people to be able to access a portion

of their car that they've already paid for really hope this is not going to actually get rolled out

and they will be coming to their senses very very quickly because i don't even think the

europeans would tolerate that we americans oh my god now i have already paid for this

cars are rolling computers and i have said that tesla was a technology company that decided hey

let's make cars now the automakers are car manufacturers that are saying hey let's be a

technology company and obviously there has been some rough going on both sides but now the cars

have embedded sim cards they do receive more and more over the air updates some of that can be great

if you don't have to take your car into the dealership just for them to do recall work because the

recall is a software problem and they can just send it to you over the air fantastic that is one of

the things that tesla owners love about their cars and i'm perfectly okay with going in that

direction where it's appropriate but they are using all that data to say how can we generate

even more revenue without spending any more of our own money just to let people use the features

that they have already paid for so when you go car shopping and you're looking at cars with all

this new technology especially if the dealer talks a lot about oh well it has starlink or it has

blue cruise or it has these cool technology features be sure to ask does that come free with

the car or is there a subscription is there a free trial to it if so how long is that free

trial for and what is it going to cost me when it expires and then find out hey is there a way if

i pay for say three years up front is there a discount on that subscription versus yearly or

monthly whatever and ask what stops working if i don't renew the subscription don't be surprised

if the average salesperson at the dealership may not know those answers so i would get them from

multiple sources a lot of dealerships have people who are delivery specialists and all they do is set

up all the technology in the car salespeople sell cars that's their job they don't necessarily know

the technical nitty gritty details so be sure to ask the technology people so how does this really

work and what will i lose if i decide not to continue with this subscription and then what

happens if you sell the car if you paid up front for say three years or five years or it came with

the car like that five-year subscription to the blue cruise that forward includes in a lot of vehicles

what happens to that if i sell the car can i cancel and get a prorated amount of money back

like you can with an extended warranty or does that money just go poof into the ether or is it

transferable if you sell the car privately to the next owner a lot of extended warranties are

so ask that about the technology as well because these are now things that are costing you money

that you want to be sure you understand how this works we're already having to pay for

things that we don't use in the car a lot of the time simply because of the way the manufacturers

package options i'm working with a client right now who says i don't even want to think about

german cars because i don't like that you have to pay for this super expensive package on this

really high trim level just to get this one feature and i understand that all the manufacturers

package their features and they package them differently and it sucks when you have to pay

four thousand extra dollars to upgrade to this super fancy trim level with a bunch of stuff on it

that you frankly don't need just to get parking sensors or a backup camera or heated seats

and different manufacturers prioritize these features in their packages differently for example

your japanese manufacturers and your korean manufacturers they tend to prioritize the safety

features so you're going to get pretty much all the driver safety aids pretty much with the exception

of the cruise control the automated cruise control maybe some of the little more advanced ones but

your basic driver safety aids the electronic babysitters i call them tend to be on the base models

now because they have given up in our ability to drive and would just rather the cars be safe

whereas the german cars you have to upgrade and pay extra for these features because in germany

they teach people to drive and i guess their philosophy is if you really need these things

yeah we're going to make you pay for it maybe you should just learn to drive

so the different manufacturers prioritize different things so be aware of what features come

and different trim levels when you are car shopping and that can be extremely frustrating

to figure that out i'm a big fan of creating a spreadsheet but resources like edmunds.com

they really show you very clearly what features are in what trim levels you typically get a lot

of features for your money with hunday and kia although kia packages them rather differently

you have to go up to the top level of the tele ride to get a feature that is in the mid-level

on the palisade but then vice versa it's really weird so it's important to really know what

features are important to you which ones are must haves which ones are that'd be great and

which ones like you know i can live without that if it means saving four thousand dollars maybe

there's another aftermarket solution to that or i can just live without it and then really look

carefully at those subscriptions and understand what the capabilities are that technology how

much it's going to cost you how long is your free trial and is that free trial the full features

or is it just a free subset of features just to kind of get you interested and hopefully you'll

pay more always understand where your money is going and what can be taken away from you

so let me know what feature would you pay for now i might for example if they can build cars

just build one level of car do not give me different trim levels just build one level of car

and then maybe i do pay for just the things i want i could pay for heated seats just in the three

months of the winter that i might need it here in charlotte and then pay for the air conditioned

seats for the three or four months where i'm sweating my butt off and then turn it off when

i'm not using it just like i do with netflix that might be kind of cool i might not need

navigation so i might not pay for that that might be interesting but only if they can make the price

of the car itself less because we are already paying through the nose for the price of the car

i'm sure it's heck not going to pay for something that's already in the car just for the privilege

of actually using it so let me know what would you never pay for what would you want to pay for

have you ever had something expire unexpectedly that no one explained to you and suddenly you

couldn't use your car anymore it's not easy out there folks but understanding how all this stuff

works will help to save you money in the long run and as you know that's already my goal so next

time i'll see you in the straight shift drive safely the straight shift podcast is copyright

lienne shattuck the car check all views expressed by guest and or co-hosts or those of the guest

and or co-hosts and not necessarily those of lienne shattuck or the car check

Your Car Is Becoming a Subscription — What You Need to Know Before You Buy

About this episode

OnStar

cellular modem

GPS receiver

crumple zones

airbag system

crash detection systems

Porsche 911

Hyundai Blue Link

Android Auto

Apple CarPlay

Remote start

emergency services

manufacturer's cloud

data collection

vehicle spying

satellite radio

Tesla

pay-for-performance features

subscription services

horsepower

Mercedes-Benz

electric motor

software-controlled performance

track day

Ford

General Motors

BMW

frunk

over the air updates

Hyundai Palisade

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