bkafrick

This is precisely what has happened in several of my rentals. Mostly the Fusions and Taurus, which I honestly havent had in quite some time now that I'm PC, but I had def had the same experience as Critic.

Most of the luxury line seem to have their Sirius/XM intact, even if a month or so old. The recent Caddys, Ford Edge Limited, and this week's Lincoln MKS all had it still running....

USirritated

I had Sirius running in Ford Taurus's (2), Ford Flex, and XM in Buick LaCrosse's (3 of them), plus all the Cadillac's, Infiniti's, and Hyundai Genesis's.

edweird

The Ford Fusion with about 1000 miles on it that I picked up at SFO yesterday still has SiriusXM working. Hope it lasts until my trip ends Friday.

GNALUZU

About 2 weeks ago I had a Buick Lucerne, out of CLE, with around 16k miles on it and the SiriusXM radio still worked.

DODiraq

i currently have a 11' camaro SS..XM works

bkafrick

I took a downgrade this week to a Kia Optima (quite a downgrade from my usual Caddy, but PWM seriously had no cars, it was that or a Lincoln Towncar or walk).

Anyway, its Sirius is working just fine.

I wonder if AVIS has gotten lax with deactivating the factory satellite lately.

In other news, I saw someone return an AVIS Blast unit at PWM. Never had actually seen one before. My home AVIS (SYR) doesnt have them.

duxfan

I've had it 3 out of the last 5 weeks in CWA. The satnav even worked in the Pious (uh, Prius) I had a couple weeks ago. If I have it or not isn't a big deal anymore, and I certainly wouldn't pay for it. But then again, I have both Pandora and SiriusXM apps on my iPhone, so I'm ready.

I have Sirius on my personal cars, and it doesn't come activated from the factory. Either the buyer or dealer has to activate it once the car goes in service. So somebody somewhere in the Avis world hasn't gotten the memo to leave it off, at least on some cars...

Critic

In my experience, if a car comes with satnav, Avis doesn't try to deactivate it - although they won't tell you the car is satnav equipped in advance, so if you've dropped money on WhereTo?, you're going to have to go back to the counter.

Re: satellite radio activation - when I got my Fiesta last summer, the satellite radio was activated as part of the delivery process, so it's possible that if Avis (rather than a dealer) does the delivery, they might bypass the satellite radio activation step.

USirritated

Avis would not ever want to deactivate navi, because it is a very expensive option that increases the value of cars when they are ready to sell them from "Avis Car Sales" lots. Generally, the auto manufacturers charge anywhere from about $1,800 to $2,400 for the option at "non-fleet" retail, if it is not standard, such as in Hyundai Genesis.

Avis is getting some cars with navi without actually paying for it, such as if you see it in Buick LaCrosse (I have had one with it, and two without it) occasionally, or Ford Flex (just one time with this vehicle, and it had navi, so can't really judge). I think that most Cadillac SRX4's (three times I have had a SRX4, all three times it had navi) come with it as part of a package, although I can't swear to that.

Critic

I got a Ford Flex with touchscreen satnav last year in DEN - I believe it was the Limited trim, so I think the satnav would have been a standard feature.

USirritated

The Ford Flex that I had was from DCA, May 10-13, however I do not remember what trim level it was. Some manufacturers include it with a certain trim level, while others make navi a separate package of some type.

bkafrick

I'm in a Ford Flex SEL this week (one step below Limited) and I do not have nav.

I was in a Ford Edge SEL last week and did not have the touchscreen options.

I've been in Limited in both these vehicles and have had the touchscreen and the nav. I think the package from Ford that includes this is Limited... As least in my experience.

USirritated

You may well be correct, although as I said, some manufacturers include it with a certain trim level, while others make navi a separate package of some type. Navi is always part of a package, sometimes it is an overall trim level package, and sometimes it is something such as a "media/entertainment" or "multimedia" package. If I get a chance, I will stop by a Ford dealer to check it out.

TrojanHorse

i had an avis SUV a couple weeks ago for five days. Days 1-3, no problem, sat worked great, on the morning of day 4, sat worked on the way to work. Came out after work and it was not working.. and didn't work after that. I forgot to ask when I turned it in but what happened?

CrazyOne

Just another data point, normally rent Hertz but needed to go right away yesterday and Avis franchisee is right by my office (downtown Pittsburgh). Rented a standard and they gave me a really nice Taurus SEL with leather, and the Sirius was working at least for the first few hours. I don't think I used it on the way back; just used some regular radio and tried out the Sync with my iPhone, wow that is sweet! Someone said it upthread, Pandora stream to Sync via Bluetooth, that worked very well. (Although I first tried it with USB and couldn't ever figure out why it started out playing then later stopped and wouldn't play again.) This one didn't have the touch system, just Sync. I'm ready to consider getting a Ford myself just after this drive.

On return they told me they were selling the car as Premium because it was so nice. Hm. Guess I can't count on that kind of upgrade all the time. But it is some evidence that some cars at least still have the factory Sirius/XM activated. This car had about 2k miles on it. If it really was meant to be Premium, perhaps that is why they had the Sirius on. It actually had "Sirius Equipped" sticker on the door. I know back a few years ago they used to give XM free with all Premium and higher cars.