Email: SiriusXM for a Fee
 

In the monthly email I just received, noticed this banner:
And a link: https://www.nationalcar.com/en_US/ca.../siriusxm.html

From the linked page:
I'm wondering how this is going to work. Will they have all cars deactivated from the factory and then hand out the little plug-in radio receivers? Or have some way to activate SXM in each car as it rolls off the lot?

Seems quite interesting. And this past week I had a 2016 Explorer with only 500 miles on it that did not have a SXM subscription. I can't imagine that car has been in the fleet for more than a couple weeks...

Maybe they'll have a direct link to Sirius to send a turn on signal to the car.

Meanwhile, it would literally be cheaper for you to call Sirius and have the unit in your car activated yourself, then cancel after the rental.

And a brand new unit not having Sirius activated is a bad sign for those of us who like it. I guess it's good just about all new cars have Bluetooth.

Who on earth is going to pay $6 a day for SiriusXM when a Spotify subscription is $10 a month? :confused:

The same person who pays $10+/day for GPS rental?

Ron.

Someone who wants more than music?

Surely this will mean that all the newish cars with XM subscriptions included as a trial will be held back for people willing to pay 6 bucks a day for XM, meaning everyone else gets given the old stuff with expired trials?

Edit: Actually whats changed here, you've always been able to pay extra for XM, right?

The vast majority of my driving miles are in extremely rural locations. I often go without cell phone or AM/FM radio for parts of my journeys.

I actively seek out XM in the vehicles I'm going to rent. Since I'm now based at a non-aisle location, this occasionally means getting keys, walking to the vehicle, turning it on and hoping to get an XM signal, and if XM isn't activated, returning to the counter to get a different vehicle.

The agents are always accommodating, but it is a pain in the rear end.

The pricing stinks...you can regularly find XM subscriptions for less than $10/month. But, this definitely has my interest.

I can't imagine the logistics of that - so I grab a car from the aisle, tell the booth I want to pay for SXM, and they tell me to go put the car back and take another? They have to have a way to add hardware or activate the car at the booth.

I've often wondered the feasibility of SXM providing a "Road Warrior" subscription that allows you to move your subscription from one device to another as needed. Basically you get in the car, call up SXM, and tell them to activate that device for X days.

Similar to Netflix, they could just set a limit to how many receivers are activated on your account at any one time. I would pay a higher-than-usual monthly rate to SXM for this option.

I'm curious how they would offer it on the actual in car radio, since when you activate SXM, you have to have your car parked outside for a window of time to allow activation to take place. I'm guessing they will have separate units, like GPS to rent out.

I'm on the bandwagon w/ everyone else that if free trials are no longer included, this is really bad for the customer. $6 is really over the top, considering I can negotiate 6 months for about $25...

OK, then a SiriusXM streaming subscription for $15 a month. Point still stands.

I had always assumed that was mostly business travelers. I don't know of a lot of expense policies that would cover satellite radio...

Out of curiosity, what's the best way to negotiate that? My own car's trial is about to expire...

They'll mail you a letter giving you the 6 months for $25 offer. I've renewed our cars at that price every 6 months for the past couple of years. If the agent you speak with won't do it, ask for cancellation department and they will honor it.

So it looks like I can get a XM subscription for $15 / month and a cheap used radio on ebay. Is the activation fee a one-time thing or would I have to deal with that if I cancel / reactivate like people do with Netflix and other services?

It has become a bit of a chore lately seeking out a car with an active subscription. Obviously it's nice to have it included in the cost of the rental, but at least this way I could just pick the car I want without having to test a bunch of radios first.

You could try out this link, 6 months for $25. http://www.retailmenot.com/view/shop....com?c=7105350

I've never had to pay an activation fee, even for re-activating. SXM is by far the easiest company to negotiate rates with IME. IMO they have all the infrastructure they need vs. a cell phone company that has to add towers, update network speeds, etc. Therefore they are more likely to be reasonable with the customer because they might as well take any revenue they can get since their seem more fixed compared with other types of service providers. I don't know, maybe I've overthought it a little much...

I might consider the streaming subscriptions. As someone else said, most cars reliably have Bluetooth, so you get the same end result (of course, you need a data plan and cell service to support...but I have that already).

That's what I did on my last rental. I am already a streaming subscriber and have the SiriusXM app on my phone. I never used it because I thought the data drain would send me into overage fee territory. I was pleasantly surprised, though. Streaming through the app required very little of my data allowance and was a nice change of pace to the six songs played over and over on the SiriusXM demo channel.