Phone as Key Issues

[RenMan68]

I have no doubt that you are right it's the Bluetooth.

Question: When you say unpair and re-pair the BT connection, is this just turning BT off and on again? Or do I need to tell the phone (or the car, or both?) to forget the connection, and then start all over as if I was pairing the phone to the car for the first time?

On the iPhone in Settings >> Bluetooth it should be there under "MY DEVICES". Tapping the 'info' button for it should take you to the next screen where you have the option to "Forget This Device". After doing that you'll have to pair it again. This should re-establish the bluetooth pairing. I hope this helps.

 

[SDKoala]

so far so good for me, I have a Pixel 2 XL. The phone key has only not worked like once or twice in the 3 months i have had the car.

I'm glad it's working for you to your satisfaction. For me, not working once or twice in 3 months is still too high of a failure rate. It also doesn't mean much without knowing how often you drive your car. I'm ecstatic to report that my phone key didn't fail once yesterday...but I also didn't drive the Model 3 yesterday.

This whole phone key experiment seems to be as much about finding out people's tolerances as it is about getting a new paradigm to work. I have no doubt that some engineering team in Tesla is tasked with making the phone key work "just well enough" to stop the majority of people from complaining. Those of us who have the audacity to expect a key to work 100% of the time are just going to be left to suffer.

 

[daniel]

On the iPhone in Settings >> Bluetooth it should be there under "MY DEVICES". Tapping the 'info' button for it should take you to the next screen where you have the option to "Forget This Device". After doing that you'll have to pair it again. This should re-establish the bluetooth pairing. I hope this helps.

Thanks!

 

[kavyboy]

Those of us who have the audacity to expect a key to work 100% of the time are just going to be left to suffer.

... or buy something else entirely.

 

[N5329K]

I'm glad it's working for you to your satisfaction. For me, not working once or twice in 3 months is still too high of a failure rate. It also doesn't mean much without knowing how often you drive your car. I'm ecstatic to report that my phone key didn't fail once yesterday...but I also didn't drive the Model 3 yesterday.

This whole phone key experiment seems to be as much about finding out people's tolerances as it is about getting a new paradigm to work. I have no doubt that some engineering team in Tesla is tasked with making the phone key work "just well enough" to stop the majority of people from complaining. Those of us who have the audacity to expect a key to work 100% of the time are just going to be left to suffer.

A phone doesn't even work as a phone 100% of the time.
Robin

 

[MistaEV]

The past couple of days the car has been opening for me with the phone, but then it demands the key card to go into driving mode. The past couple of times it would not go into gear and there was no notification. Tapping the card on the console got it to work. I exited the Tesla app and re-launched it, and we'll see if this behavior is fixed.

I have had this issue the past 2 days as well, however, restarting the app has done nothing for me. It is annoying to have to dig out the card just to use it. Thankfully I keep the card on my person at all times after inadvertently locking my phone and card in the car when playing with the features (such as hitting the lock icon when sitting in the car then getting out and closing the door).

 

[apacheguy]

The past couple of days the car has been opening for me with the phone, but then it demands the key card to go into driving mode. The past couple of times it would not go into gear and there was no notification. Tapping the card on the console got it to work. I exited the Tesla app and re-launched it, and we'll see if this behavior is fixed.

Since we have to have the card anyway, what's the point of the phone app? (Yeah, it has other functions, but they mostly don't work for me because without wi-fi connectivity, my car is off line when in the garage due to the totally crappy AT&T service.)

Been seeing this as well. Seemed to start after the second week of ownership, possibly after installing the 18.13 update. I’ve seen it happen with two iPhones.

 

[SDKoala]

There's potentially good news for Google Pixel users. The June 2018 Pixel/Nexus Security Bulletin that was just released yesterday has a patch that's supposed to improve BLE performance on all Pixel models.

This is a security patch that usually happens in the background and not a new version of Android, so you won't necessarily get an OTA update notification to install it. You can force install it by going to System -> System update -> Check for update. If you weren't automatically updated, your previous security patch is probably May 5, 2018 and this should update to June 4, 2018.

We'll have to see if this changes anything about the phone key.

Since installing this Android security update for my Pixel 1, the phone key has been much more reliable. It still fails to unlock right away around 10-15% of the time and the car will display the key card message when trying to open the door. However, what has changed is that within about 2-3 seconds of a failed attempt to open the car with the phone key, the Bluetooth connection establishes and I'm able to open the car without having to do anything with the phone like toggle Bluetooth or airplane more. I haven't had the car ask for the key card to get it to drive in the past week.

This is a step in the right direction and does show that there are both phone and car factors at play.

 

[nvx1977]

I have the June 4 security update and am still (rarely) having situations where I have to do an airplane mode toggle to resolve. One happened today. Stood next to the car for a good minute to see if the phone would eventually reconnect. It never did. App said phone key was "disconnected." my BLE scanner app showed all BLE radios broadcasting from the car.

I've also gone thru the process of deleting the phone key and BT from the car, rebooting phone and screen, then setting things up from scratch. I did this right after I finished the security update.

One thing about my situation is that I work from home quite often, where I'm near the car all day, often at the threshold of where the BLE connection breaks and reconnects a lot. I also notice more battery drain on the days I work from home.

 

[SDKoala]

Things worked great for a few days after the Pixel security update, then 21.9 got pushed to my car. I don't know what that update did to the Bluetooth LE, but my phone has failed to open the car on the first try nearly every single time since then. I was out today doing my errands and each time I came back to my car from the store (3-4 times over a couple of hours), I couldn't get the car to unlock without messing around with my phone. This is literally the worse it's been for me since getting the car. It's aggravating because Google did something on their end to improve the phone's BLE function, then the Tesla update completely broke it.

I'm pulling my hair out because I've done all the obvious things to troubleshoot it and now I have a nearly non-functional phone key.

 

[daniel]

Yesterday while out shopping I returned to the car and the phone would not unlock the car. I used the key card. The phone worked when I left home, and it worked again at my next stop. I'm used to this now. From time to time, for no reason I can discern, the phone won't open the car. Then the next time, it works.

Woe to the poor fellow who forgets to carry the key card along on the particular day when the car decides not to open or not to start without it.

 

[amitmishra4]

I had a funny situation and I’m sure others may have experienced it but I think it’s worth sharing.

I went out to take a couple friends for a drive and the phone key would not work so I pulled out the card and unlocked it, it still did not detect my phone and asked for the card when I got in so I placed the card by the cup holders and started to drive. When I got to my destination, I left the card by the cup holders and got out and walked away, at which point the car locked itself. When i got back, the car didn’t open again automatically and I thought no problem, I’ll just pull the card out, it will be quicker, but alas, the card was missing from my wallet and one peek inside the car revealed the card sitting by the cupholder. I had to fiddle with the app and finally got it working fortunately, but this is a great story of what the system should not have done and what needs to be improved in the workflow. If the card is sitting on the cup holder console area, don’t lock the car, especially more so if I used the card to get in and drive the car (I thought it does that but maybe only if your phone is dead or not in the car). If the phone connects at some point after charging or other reasons, maybe provide some notification to the user that the primary key has reverted back to being the phone. Either way, I hope they think through this phone key setup a little more and refine it so no one is locked out if the battery on their phone dies while stuck in my situation.

 

[daniel]

FYI: When the car demands the card to start, the card does not need to remain by the cup holders. Tap the card, then put it back in your pocket so you don't forget to take it with you when you leave.

This part I could be wrong: I don't think there's ever a "primary" key. If the car doesn't recognize the phone it will demand the card. Or the card can always be used instead of the phone.

The Prius will not lock from the door button if the fob is inside the car. It also will not lock if it does not detect the fob. This makes locking yourself out much more difficult. I think it can be done, but you have to work at it. It's one of the advantages of a fob.

 

[RodF]

I had a funny situation and I’m sure others may have experienced it but I think it’s worth sharing.

I went out to take a couple friends for a drive and the phone key would not work so I pulled out the card and unlocked it, it still did not detect my phone and asked for the card when I got in so I placed the card by the cup holders and started to drive. When I got to my destination, I left the card by the cup holders and got out and walked away, at which point the car locked itself. When i got back, the car didn’t open again automatically and I thought no problem, I’ll just pull the card out, it will be quicker, but alas, the card was missing from my wallet and one peek inside the car revealed the card sitting by the cupholder. I had to fiddle with the app and finally got it working fortunately, but this is a great story of what the system should not have done and what needs to be improved in the workflow. If the card is sitting on the cup holder console area, don’t lock the car, especially more so if I used the card to get in and drive the car (I thought it does that but maybe only if your phone is dead or not in the car). If the phone connects at some point after charging or other reasons, maybe provide some notification to the user that the primary key has reverted back to being the phone. Either way, I hope they think through this phone key setup a little more and refine it so no one is locked out if the battery on their phone dies while stuck in my situation.

This is the problem we are having. My wife forgets the card in the car because her phone would get her in the car but not start it. Then she is locked out the next time her phone doesn’t open the car. Of course she can reset her phone, etc. but she shouldn’t have to. This needs to be fixed. Hoping for a fob.

 

[SDKoala]

I had a funny situation and I’m sure others may have experienced it but I think it’s worth sharing.

I went out to take a couple friends for a drive and the phone key would not work so I pulled out the card and unlocked it, it still did not detect my phone and asked for the card when I got in so I placed the card by the cup holders and started to drive. When I got to my destination, I left the card by the cup holders and got out and walked away, at which point the car locked itself. When i got back, the car didn’t open again automatically and I thought no problem, I’ll just pull the card out, it will be quicker, but alas, the card was missing from my wallet and one peek inside the car revealed the card sitting by the cupholder. I had to fiddle with the app and finally got it working fortunately, but this is a great story of what the system should not have done and what needs to be improved in the workflow. If the card is sitting on the cup holder console area, don’t lock the car, especially more so if I used the card to get in and drive the car (I thought it does that but maybe only if your phone is dead or not in the car). If the phone connects at some point after charging or other reasons, maybe provide some notification to the user that the primary key has reverted back to being the phone. Either way, I hope they think through this phone key setup a little more and refine it so no one is locked out if the battery on their phone dies while stuck in my situation.

Unfortunately, there's no way for the car to detect the continued presence of the key card in the car. I don't even know if it can do that if it's in constant contact with the center console card reader.

Some people will hate it (as there are always people apt to hate any kind of forced change), but this is an argument for automatically disabling walk-away lock whenever the key card is used to open the door until the car is manually locked again, either by swiping the card outside or pressing the lock icon and existing the car. The question is whether it's more inconvenient to have to lock your car manually or deal with the possibility of getting locked out of your car. I know Tesla is able to do a remote unlock if you call them, but what if your phone isn't working or is lost and that's the whole reason you had to use the key card in the first place?

Although I personally never even remove the key card from my wallet and put my wallet back in my pocket after starting the car, this wouldn't be a solution for everyone. For example, if my wife has to use the key card to start the car, she's going to put it back in her purse. She could easily forget and leave it behind while getting out of the car for a minute or two, especially as she's used to the phone key working. That scenario would lead to a lockout with walk-away lock enabled as it normally would be.

 

[RodF]

I am glad it doesn’t keep the car unlocked. But we shouldn’t have to resort to using it in the first place. It should be be a unusual emergency measure instead of a 3 times a week requirement.

 

[apacheguy]

Phone has become inconsistent with the latest firmware update. I have the latest Tesla app version also, but I’ve needed to restart the app several times in the past week in order to open the door. iPhone 5s.

I’ll continue to post summaries every week or so until Tesla fixes this.

 

[landis]

I've learned a new trick (likely already up-thread) to keep handle popped out for a few seconds until it unlocks and then pull it open.
It has taken a 2 or three seconds several times, and sometimes puts up the keycard prompt on the display, but this hasn't failed yet since update to 21.9 last Tuesday.

I had used to wait a second and try popping the handle again, and again...
Of course now I've just jinxed myself...

 

[smak]

I've found since the last update the car unlocks every time...

But, sometimes it takes up to 10 seconds. Most times it does unlock when I get there, but quite a few times I have to wait a bit.

I think it was a mistake to get rid of the feature that unlocked it before you got super close to the car.

I think it should at least be a toggle.

 

[SDKoala]

I've found since the last update the car unlocks every time...

But, sometimes it takes up to 10 seconds. Most times it does unlock when I get there, but quite a few times I have to wait a bit.

I think it was a mistake to get rid of the feature that unlocked it before you got super close to the car.

I think it should at least be a toggle.

Re-establishing the phone key connection after a failed handle pull or trunk button press was working really well with the previous Tesla firmware after the Android patch. This is what has broken with the latest firmware for me.

The issue with unlocking upon approach was if your car was parked at home and you were walking in and out of Bluetooth LE range, the car would unnecessarily unlock and unfold the side mirrors every time you went near it, even if you had no intention of going in it.

I agree there should have been a toggle added instead of just doing away with it completely and they should have added an option to keep the car unlocked when garaged at home based on GPS coordinates (or wifi connectivity in the future).