Porsche VTS _ Vodafone

[bobfair]

My 991 GT 3 is a year old so time to renew my VTS subscription. Called Vodafone this morning who now run the Porsche scheme and they were particularly unhelpful. Basically they refused to renew my subscription as they could not confirm their equipment was working. I suspect the problem is that where I live the mobile signal is very poor so I will probably have to take the car out to find a signal in order to get my renewal/valid insurance etc but my concern is how unhelpful Vodafone were. As we are currently experiencing Monsoon conditions here I would prefer to keep the car tucked up in the garage and drive when I want to and not when Vodafone tells me I have to. I subsequently had an interesting conversation with my OPC and Customer Services at Reading so will let you know how I get on.

Has any one else had the "Vodafone" experience

 

[salisbees]

My experience has been somewhat different but, although helpful, the problem has not been solved. I set off for the continent and stupidly forgot my driver's card, however, the VTS did not alert until I had driven the car for over two hours and loaded it on a ferry!! Not good[]

It has been checked out remotely by Vodaphone and my OPC at service, both of whom say all is OK. Since service it has alerted twice to say that the card is not in the car but it has been. My problem is "the ECU says there is nothing wrong" and no-one is prepared to take responsibility. Unfortunately, I have been here before with my last 991 and am beginning to think that the electronics in these cars are not as robust as they should be. Furthermore, Porsche has not got clever enough interrogation software and need to be a little more pro-active.

 

[ralphmusic]

I would be more worried about their not being able to "see" the car and moving it to another location to check again may be frustrating but probably a necessary step.

I had to have the entire VTS hardware in the car replaced before it would work reliably.

 

[Lancerlot]

The VTS kit is not factory fitted. It is installed by the PC during PDI. Vodafone will wish to check your system is working properly before taking your annual subscription, which seems fair enough to me. Clearly if there's no signal. it can't be done. Although it's not such a big imposition taking it somehwere where there is a decent signal, is it?
You don't have to renew of course, but there may be insurance implications if you don't.
Regards,
Clive.

 

[BigCat]

When I got my new 991 GTS in December 2014 I transferred the remaining 13 months of what had started as a 3 year Cobra subscription when I bought my 991 Carrera in 2013 to my new car. It took 24 hours for the system to become active but since then I have had no problems. I know it works because on the recent 991 European Tour whilst on the Channel Tunnel train I walked away from the car with the tracker tag in my pocket and received a "theft alert" SMS and then a phone call from Vodafone as the car was detected as moving without the tag. The Vodafone people were very helpful and reset the system after I passed their security questions.

I will be renewing the subscription in January so I will see what happens then.

 

[bobfair]

I may have been unlucky with the person I spoke to as the attitude was if you don't like it you can relieve yourself and go away, not helpful at all. To be fair my OPC & Porsche Customer services have tried to help and subsequent callers from Vodafone have been more polite but still insistent the car has to be moved. Whilst driving the car I love is no great hardship I would prefer not to do that in Monsoon season.

There also some interesting legal points here. Notwithstanding the fact the VTS hardware is installed by the OPC I believe it is covered by the warranty as a compulsory fit and cost over £1,000 to supply and install. If it is not working during the warranty period I simply take it back to the OPC to sort out. That being the case why should I be denied the service that I am wiling to pay for because they are unable to check if it is working or not at the time of renewal as the hardware is covered by the warranty anyway. If it is not working today it will be fixed by the OPC tomorrow so whats stopping the renewal? It seems that Vodafone are happy they can avoid any liability for a non working system provided they can show it was working at renewal. I confess I am not a fan of the VTS system which does not work well in areas with poor mobile coverage. Apparently several of the false alarms I have experienced are caused by the car moving from an area of no coverage into an area of strong coverage where the system thinks the car has been stolen even if the card is in the vehicle. I appreciate that for many of you this will be a non issue but if my car was out of warranty I would be moving to other tracking systems that cause less problems

 

[Lancerlot]

Hi Bob,
Presumably, no one will know whether it's working or not until it is tested.
Lack of an adequate signal is all part of the joys of living out in the sticks, I'm afraid.[]
Regards,
Clive.

 

[garyw]

I have had this same issue for the past few years! and prior to Vodaphone taking it over.
Year two and even with it sat in the dealers workshop where they knew it worked/received a good signal the car refused to be spotted!
That resulted in a new tracker box under warranty and possibly explained the lock out I had whilst in France!! [&o]

This year under vodaphone I had the same issues of only half strength signal and not reporting back, however it was reasonable weather so I took the car for a spin whilst hands free speaking to the agent.
Yet still the car would not respond to their inquiry, however after 10 minutes the obvious happened and I received a text and call from the operation centre that there was a movement of the car without the keyfob... oops! [] so it seemed to be working after all!!
Returning to the original call the agent confirmed it had responded and wanted the payment.

Usually I wouldn't have been too stressed but the new company had failed to send a reminder to renew, so I was under a bit of pressure to get it working.
So Bob, I would say they were about as helpful to me...

 

[pwebb]

Also, another negative is that if you sell your car back to the dealer, as I have done, Vodafone refuse point blank to refund the outstanding balance of the year's subscription.

 

[stokey]

Noticing my annual subscription was due by direct debit I thought call to VTS was due , firstly to check if the unit was
working having had a unit pack up, and other stories of units going u/s.
Secondly to check if the dd was still current having transfered the subscription from my old car in Jan.
To be fair having tried several times to get through to the customer help line ,I was called back by a very
pleasent lady she did a remote check and all was OK, she also informed me that all units were sent a signal
every 28 days and if any problems were found the customer was contacted, this was news to me and if true ?
very reassuring ??
The dd issue was sorted and a email came within a few minutes followed by a call later to take my payment as I had elected to
pay by debit card.
So Prehaps the taking over the service by Vodafone is a move in the right direction, time will tell I guess.??

 

[shorthouse]

Also, another negative is that if you sell your car back to the dealer, as I have done, Vodafone refuse point blank to refund the outstanding balance of the year's subscription.

They will accept 50% of the premium for 6 months cover, as did Cobra.

 

[MBGAS]

Had the same problem with the alert staff being very unhelpful , I sold my 997 GTS to the dealer but had an alert when I was at Silverstore for a sneak preview of the 991.2 , as I was speaking to them and apart from telling me they had no record of me or the car registration. ( Ive had the cobra tracker system in several cars for over 9 years ) I received a text telling me to call them ,I found the guy very unhelpful and unable to expain why they could not find me but could still text and phone my mobile ,after 15 minutes I gave up.
I will say that when I phone the service admin section later that day to check my new 991 GTS was in fact registered the woman I spoke to was very good and did a test on the car then phoned me back.
The strange thing is that the Cobra and Vodafone office and most of the staff have remained the same !

 

[bobfair]

In my experience when a company is taken over all kinds of strange things happen. The staff will have been transferred with the sale and they may have not been treated particularly well or to their satisfaction. Most acquirers do not put enough effort into integrating their acquisition and many takeovers fail to deliver what was expected as quite often the cultures are very different. Not saying this is the case here but it might explain some of the issues we are experiencing.
I had to take my car out and find a signal (the system was working fine as I suspected) or loose the cover and my insurance so now waiting for a dry day to get it clean again. Will be more careful next year

 

[bronk]

The other day I took my 991 for a drive leaving my tracker tag at home ... when it donned on me that I did not receive a call from Vodafone to let me know the car moving. I called Vodafone to see why this had happened as in the past I would always receive an alert and a call for verification if I left the tag behind. I was told that their was nothing wrong with their system (??) and that it may be a problem associated with the onboard VTS as they did not get a ping back from the vehicle. Took the car to the dealership who advised that there was a fault in the VTS and that it would need to be replaced. My 991 is just two and a half months out of warranty. Has anyone else experienced a VTS failure on their 991?
When I questioned Vodafone as to the frequency they test their system I was told they run a diagnostic once per month ?? So if you ever go away on vacation leaving your 991 at home you could come home to find your vehicle gone and you not knowing until you find it missing!
In comparison a monitored home security system checks that the system is operational every 24 hours at a fraction of the cost.
Does anyone know of options available for a new onboard VTS?

Thanks

 

[ralphmusic]

On my 981 Cayman, it took three visits to get it working with the last one to replace the entire VTS system.

I now get a call each time I forget the dongle and am best friends with Vodafone operators. I've never had a problem with their Customer Service on this or previous cars.

 

[salisbees]

I have finally had my VTS sorted after a year and numerous visits to my OPC. It appears the issue was a damaged GPS antenna that gave intermittent signals. Two things of interest arose during the investigations. Firstly, if the unit can 'see' the drivers card on start up it will assume that it is in the car until the engine is restarted. Apparently, if the card is within 10m of the car on start up it may be 'seen'. Secondly, to test the efficacy of the unit is is necessary to move it away from the OPC's premises. Mine was checked and deemed OK by Vodafone and the OPC yet when I got it home and checked it with Vodafone it was shown to be 50 miles away on the forecourt of the OPC! Persistence and talking to the right people is necessary to get to the bottom of these issues. Do not accept that the first answer is necessarily correct, if you have any qualms.

 

[geoff lane]

I was away with the 991 reg in Wales last weekend and while on the way to the hotel on the Friday I realized I had forgotten the fob and wondered why I had not had a text or call from Vodaphone. On calling them it appears my car was being tracked but it did not show the fob as being away from the car.
The office hours are 9 to 5 and I don't take the car to work so now need to find the time to be at home with the car and fob to get it configured again. Still I guess at least it is being tracked but still inconvenient

Geoff