I just cancelled and it took about 30 seconds. They credited my cc account. They said they had my CC on file. Now i'm going to call gm customer service to complain to them. His last words to me were " You know we will no longer be able to call for help if your air bags deploy, track your car if its stolen, or unlock your doors in an emergency?" I told him " I have a cell phone and so does every motorist on the road, I pay alot of insurance if it is stolen, and there are plently of rocks laying around that I could put through the small side window (SIlverado) to unlock the vehicle, that would be cheaper than their $250 a year."

 

Onstar guy--

 

" I have a cell phone and so does every motorist on the road, I pay alot of insurance if it is stolen, and there are plently of rocks laying around that I could put through the small side window (SIlverado) to unlock the vehicle, that would be cheaper than their $250 a year."

Not really... again, everyone dismisses the chance that you will not be able to use your cell phone, or no one else is around with a cell phone, or you are in an area that, even if you have and use your cell phone, you can't tell them how to get to you.

Secondly, I'd much rather have the car unlocked for me than throw a rock through the window. C'mon.

As for the insurance, ya they'd pay for the market value of your car, so if you just bought a new car... say 7-8 months ago, you wouldn't get enough money back to buy the same car new again.... also, you could lose irreplaceable items that you had in the car when it was stolen that could be recovered if the car is found. Again... this is shortsightedness, and not looking at the whole picture.

And it's not $250 a year, it be $203.40 to be exact... basically chump change. If $16.95 is really THAT much of a concern to a family, then they probably aren't driving a new car anyway. And if it IS a concern, and they want the service, you can pay for it by simply not going to the movies one night a month... simply priorities as to what is more important...

Regardless, all that stuff is icing on the cake conpared to the greater gain being safer in case something happens while on the road.

I really don't expect much of a different attitude from the bulk of people on a muscle car website though... Safety is like rated like #26 on the list of concerns on a new car here... just behind "bigger wheels" and "bitchin' stereo"...

The majority of new car buyers out there will embrace this, I am sure.

 

Track your sister or anyone in an OnStar equipped car? No they will not do that. Only vehicle tracking initiated by the owner through the police in the event of a vehicle theft is allowed.

There's too many OnStar equipped vehicles out there to track them all on an ongoing basis. Once all GM vehicles have the OnStar equipment installed, that's around 4.5 to 5 MILLION a year ... mmmm tracking them all would be impossible from a technical and cost basis perspective. There's no way to track them all now. You gotta push the button or have the airbag go off to be noticed.

What the feds have planned for OBD3 and 4 is another deal entirely... that's something you might be upset with if they implement it. I doubt they could ever spend the money to monitor all vehicle emissions and get after every check engine light out there.

OnStar works for a lot of folks, and there's a big demand for it. It's a feature that's considered valuable for more folks that you'd think.

It isn't a big brother deal as big bro doesn't have the money to pay for the manpower and technology to do what some think they can.

 

Darth, YOU think its a bargain, I do not think $16 per month for something that I actually used once when the tranny was acting funny on my Silverado, and I could have just called on my cell. Oh and if you don't want to break that windown you can just pick up your cell and call your free GM roadside assistance. SO, how many times have you locked your keys in your car?

If your car is stolen you get full retail on the car. You get Onstar free for a year, so your example doesn't work. After a year, the car is worth more stolen than not. OBTW, most car theives know now that all they have to do is disconnect or unplug the onstar antennae or park it in a building. Also, don't crash your car alone in an area that Onstar cannot track you, like drive off into a mountain valley. Just look at where your satellite radio does not come in. When I used them when my V's rear broke in upstate NY, The call was constantly dropping. Also hope that antenna doesn't break off in your accident and that the battery at the front of the car is intact or it is useless....Yea, great unflawed insurance policy.

 

A great misconception is that you "only used it once" that, in itself is flawed thinking. You used it every minute of your driving. You were fortunate that you did not have to interact with it.

It's like my job. I work with computers. My job is to keep the network running for our company. I have a lot of downtime when everything is going well... but that just means I am doing my job well (less failures). If you apply the same line of thinking to the computer department, one of two things would have to take place. Either you want us to be doing more stuff, which means we'd be doing a POOR job to begin with, because everything would be failing, or two, you could cut the staff, but then when something DOES happen, you are in trouble.

Just because you are not using something in a physical sense, doesn't mean it's not actually being used.

FWIW, I have never used the remote unlocking service... haven't had to. But it's nice to know it can help me out of I do need it. Plus, that is only one aspect of the OnStar service.

Also, you can call Roadside service to have the locks unlocked, but, again, you risk having some tow truck guy or locksmith scratch your paint, or scratch the glass or other things with the slimjim... so you have tradeoffs with everything. Plus, you're certainly going ot be waiting a lot longer for the perosn to arrive than for OnStar to unlock the door. If you are in a bad area, you may not want to be hanging out by your car for 45 minutes waiting on a tow truck. And, again, if you are on a vacation and not sure where you are, then you have the issue of trying ot tell them how to get to you.

Insurance is not going to buy you a brand new car after it's 8 months old. At least not in every case. Sam eif it's 12 months old, or 16 months old.

That is debatable.

Some do, some don't, plus they can now go to a concealed antennae like C6... Parking it in a building doesn't always block the signal. I've driven in Pittsburgh parking garages that are 3-5 levels deep, and my OnStar indicator did not turn red.

I never said it was perfect, unflawed or without limitations. What I am saying is that it adds a LOT of benefits. You are unquestionably safer WITH OnStar than without. Just like safety belts, airbags, etc.

 

IMHO, it is not worth the money. Compare it to other technologies and IMHO it is not worth the money. For the price GM charges they could at least have it on its own battery system seeing how in a mjor frontal impact, the battery is usually toast. If they were serious about making it a good safety feature, all of the antennas would be built into the car so they are hard to snap off, and they would all have their own power supply or back up.

Oh and all of this did not give them the right to charge my CC w/out my knowledge or permission. If anyone else did that to you, would you still give them your business?

 

I would never defend them for charging the CC without permission. That is 100% wrong. Totally agree there...

I would also agree that there is room to improve the system. No doubt.

 

Since we're on the topic of Onstar, i just read an article today that mentioned how Saab will be offering 3 free years of Onstar on their 9-7X SUV. Customers will also get 3 free years of XM radio service.

 

They don't need to.

You know how speed and red light traffic cameras are owned operated? They are owned and operated by PRIVATE companies under local govt. direction. The local govt. simply picks up the money from all tickets generated.

The same business model could (and likely would) be applied for any other kind of monitoring technology that might arise.

And that's even worse IMO than having govt. directly doing the monitoring, since private companies and the individuals who run them directly beneift from the lucrative contracts and so tend to be far less scrupulous. On the other hand some govt. employee doing their 9-5 isn't going to get paid anymore if more people get tickets. You only have to look at the wheel clamping racket in the UK to see what happens when you let some very dodgy people (some of these companies are run by ex-cons or employ ex-cons) do what they want so long as it makes money. Or look at articles such as Pat Bedard's in C&D a while back, where he focussed on problems with speed cameras and red light cameras in this country that are sloppily or deliberately miscalibrated so as to generate a generous helping of extra tickets. I'm all for getting the aggressive, dangerous and selfish drivers off our roads but not when it means nailing innocent folk too.

 

The last time my elderly Craprice broke down in a fairly rural area, three motorists and one state trooper stopped to ask if I need help. This was in the 25 minutes it took for the flatbed to get there. I knew where I was, I had a cell phone and I had my autoclub membership. OnStar wouldn't have offered any additional help.

It just goes to show that OnStar is only worthwhile if you're the sort of driver that plans on getting into a serious accident, get lost frequently, tends to get frightened easily, or maybe all of the above. Maybe if you're the sort of person that absolutely needs OnStar, you shouldn't be driving at all.

1. Most every car these days has an immobilizer chip in the key - making it virtually impossible to steal a modern car unless you have the key. Unless you drive an older car (that isn't worth much anyway) autotheft isn't much of a worry and systems like Lojack (or the tracking function of OnStar) aren't neccessary.

2. People should worry more about resale value/depreciation instead of worthless "feel-good" features like OnStar. I'd rather have the security of a low-depreciation, high reliability Japanese vehicle. If worst comes to worst and someone steals/totals my Nissan, I won't take the same sort of financial hit as if I'd bought a higher-depreciating GM vehicle with OnStar.

3. I don't leave "irreplaceable items" in any of my vehicles - unless you're counting a set of jumper cables, a flashlight, a snow brush, an ice scrapper and a tire pressure gauge as "irreplaceable."

 

Ah, so this is what you actually drive?

Sure they did.

Somehow I suspect it was longer than that, but fine, we'll go with that.

That's great for this scenario. What about the next time when you don't have a cell phone, or you don't knwo where exactly you are? I guess you wait for "three motorists and a state trooper".

Probably not... again, I have never said OnSTar is the cure-all for every unfortunate situation.

No, that's totally untrue.

Do you think people plan to have someone runinto them?
Do you think people plan to run into someone else?
Do you think people plan to have a heartattack?
Do you think people plan to lose their keys?
Do you think people plan to have their car stolen?
Do you think people plan to be carjacked?
Do you think people plan to get lost?

Again, your simple, close minded comments leave a lot to be desired.

This is a totally ignorant statement. By your logic, maybe someone who is driving an "elderly Caprice" shouldn't be driving at all? Or rmaybe someone who is driving an "elderly Caprice" is someone who is "the sort of driver who plans to break down".



Cars still get stolen. A lot of the time, the thief steals the key first.

This comparison is useless. What are you trying to compare? Regardless of what this even means, if you get in a wreck, and EMS doesn't find you or get to you in time, and you die... how much is that imaginary extra resale value that a car without OnStar has gonna be worth to you when the car is wrecked and you are dead?


Irreplaceable items don't have to be stored in your car on a permanent basis to be in your car when something happens. You could be transporting something from one place to another, or any other scenario. Again, take off the short-sighted goggles, please.

 

EEEEEYEAH! Now I don't know a lot about boosting cars, but I have heard that GM's PASSKEY system is pretty easy to get around....there's only something like 12 different number combinations that the system uses to recognize the chips...if theives want a car, any car, bad enough it's as good as gone.

 

And if your so worried about your family breaking down, or being injured in a car accident, wouldn't you buy them a Toyota or a Volvo?

 

1. PassKey dates from the 80s and was the first of system of it's kind.

2. I thought it was more like 6 differenct combinations?

3. I've never heard of thieves circumventing PassKey or any other immobilizer chip.

4. Thieves need a key to steal most any modern car. Short of stealing one of the owner's keys - or getting a franchised dealer to make them a copy - a thief can't steal a modern car.