Model 3 LTE Radio - Subscription After Year 1?

[northWETwa]

Just received our notice that after almost 2 1/2 years of waiting, our DM M3 will be ready - yay! And now we're ready to get into the nitty-gritty details of ownership.......we're not concerned about not having unlimited Supercharging, as this will be a 2nd car and will be charging 99%-100% of the time in our garage. What we ARE concerned about is having to SUBSCRIBE to receive LTE radio service after year 1. Is this correct??? If so, we are NOT excited about that, as the radio and music streaming service on our current P85 STINKS. It stutters, skips and drops dead all....the.....time..... We paid to upgrade to LTE. It made no difference and we still have the same extreme issues. As such, we're not motivated or excited to pay for (crummy) service on our M3.

So I guess our question is this:
- Is there an option to obtain this service for free? At the time of pickup? (Personally.....I feel that my allowing them the interest-free use of my deposit for 2 1/2 years, and our extreme patience in waiting this long, should qualify us! )
- If we're not able to arrange this service for free..... what's our work-around option? Or do we *have* to subscribe in order to keep our car rolling down the road?? In other words, are there other systems onboard that require this?

Thanks!

 

[Chak]

If you placed your order by June 30th you would have received free to life-time. Orders placed on or after July 1st 2018 get 1-year free subscription. I believe it's $85 per year.

From my about 10-days of owning M3, haven't encountered any issues with radio streaming.

 

[RTPEV]

I don't believe that there is a pay-one-price option. If you want the enhanced data option, you will need to pay for it. Although I've heard it will be pretty reasonably priced ($80 or $100/year).

Only certain things are considered "enhanced", such as real-time traffic and maps. I think I would expect streaming music to fall into that category as well, but I'm not sure. Standard data will still be available and includes what you need to "keep the car rolling" as you say (and probably a bit more, like telematics updates).

My question back to you though is if you've had a lousy experience with streaming music in the Tesla (and I can confirm that I have some major issues with it myself--although more with TunedIn podcasts than with Slacker that I don't really use much), then why would you use it at all? Why not use your phone instead and use Bluetooth?

 

[Derek Kessler]

Here's everything you need to know about Tesla Premium Connectivity.

- Free for life if ordered before 30 June 2018
- Free for one year with and S or X, and 3s with Premium Interior
- Pricing has not been set, but is expected to be around $100/year
- If Premium isn't paid for, then you get just Standard Connectivity for free. Offers standard maps (no satellite or traffic views). Premium upgrades the maps, does updates over cellular (Standard is Wi-Fi only for non-critical updates), music streaming, web browsing, plus any future Tesla connectivity features.

 

[northWETwa]

@Chak - Thanks a million for this info! Sounds like we're "in" on the lifetime option - whew! Yeah, we ordered on 4/1 with (most of) the rest of you and deferred our initial invite to obtain the dual motor. Now hoping that it's a step way-way up from our P85 service. If so, we'll probably go back to Tesla with our MS and see what they can do to bring it up to M3 quality. Fingers crossed!

 

[RTPEV]

@Chak - Thanks a million for this info! Sounds like we're "in" on the lifetime option - whew! Yeah, we ordered on 4/1 with (most of) the rest of you and deferred our initial invite to obtain the dual motor.

Ah, be careful. It's for ORDERS placed before 6/30/18, not reservations. Your 4/1 (assuming you mean 4/1/16) was only a reservation. If you did not actually put your order down (pay the additional $2500) until after 6/30/18, you are not "in".

 

[northWETwa]

@RTPEV - Re: why not use phone & bluetooth......we're of a "certain age" and just not that cool (Read: no longer have a 20-something at home to set it up and walk us through it ) Open to a For Dummies tutorial, though!

 

[northWETwa]

@RTPEV - Augh!! Yeah, our RESERVATION date was 4/1/16. Just looked and our official ORDER email is dated 7/4/18. SO CLOSE to the 6/30/18 deadline..... But I don't think that the DM was even offered until after the 6/30 date. We'll see what happens on D-day......

 

[RTPEV]

@RTPEV - Re: why not use phone & bluetooth......we're of a "certain age" and just not that cool (Read: no longer have a 20-something at home to set it up and walk us through it ) Open to a For Dummies tutorial, though!

It probably is a tutorial that's longer than a forum post, but the net is this: if your phone is paired to your vehicle (and hopefully you can have your delivery specialist set this up for you during delivery--it's not a long or difficult process), then you simply select "Phone" instead of "Streaming" in the audio selector. Now you can use whatever music/podcast or other player on your phone and it will stream through your speakers. Bonus: you can continue to listen to any playlists/stations/favorites on the phone or through other Bluetooth speakers you have at home (if you can get them set up--and yes, the process of pairing them is different for each device, but usually the manual will say what buttons to process).

Now, one reason you may not be interested in this solution is that you may be on a limited data plan on your phone. My plan is technically unlimited but throttles after a certain amount of data, but music streaming using most services is actually un-metered, so effectively unlimited. But even if you have to pay a certain amount for extra data to support music streaming on your phone, it may still be less expensive than the Tesla price (although that's pretty hard to beat), but the experience may be better.

 

[tivoboy]

It amazes me that someone buying an S or X (prior to 9/18/18) who still got free Supercharging for life, is going to be nickel and dimed for 100$ a year for LTE once their 1 yr. freebie ends. I mean, these were 100K-150K cars.

 

[northWETwa]

@tivoboy - Trying not to make it about the $$, but about the value of the SERVICE (or lack there of) being provided for the $$......but yeah, I've got to agree with you!

 

[Derek Kessler]

It amazes me that someone buying an S or X (prior to 9/18/18) who still got free Supercharging for life, is going to be nickel and dimed for 100$ a year for LTE once their 1 yr. freebie ends. I mean, these were 100K-150K cars.

On the flip side, if you can afford a $100,000 car, then you can certainly afford $100/year for LTE service (certainly it's far less than you're paying for your phone).

 

[Crispix]

When I got my S in 2013 they said at delivery, "We're going to start charging soon for 3G (no LTE at the time). The price hasn't been set, we don't know the start date, but until then it's free."

Yeah, it was weird not to know the pricing, but they were up front about the fact that it wasn't going to be free forever. At $100/year, it's fine and makes business sense, and it's inline with what other manufacturers do with satellite radio: first year free, then pay if you want to keep it. Seems reasonable. I pay more for my Apple Watch LTE.

 

[crackers8199]

@RTPEV - Augh!! Yeah, our RESERVATION date was 4/1/16. Just looked and our official ORDER email is dated 7/4/18. SO CLOSE to the 6/30/18 deadline..... But I don't think that the DM was even offered until after the 6/30 date. We'll see what happens on D-day......

dual motor absolutely was available before 6/30...i placed my order on 6/28 and went back and forth for hours over whether i wanted RWD or AWD.

 

[northWETwa]

I stand corrected on the dual motor availability date Yeah.....we debated for days on the decision when we received our first invite (back in May, I think??) to configure the M3, but ultimately decided to defer our reservation in favor of the dual motor.