I just picked up my 2010 Prius III last night. Among the myriad protection plans, extended warranties, was key insurance. For 199 dollars one would be covered for 5 years. During those 5 years, for a maximum of once per year, a the warrantee holder is entitled to one replacement key a year. The salesperson claims the smart key is upwards of 450 dollars to replace. Anybody buy this insurance? Have any experience with replacing a smart key? Having a soon to be driving teenage son who loses everything, it seems like a sound purchase.
The salesman lied about the cost. $300 tops including programming by the dealer. $200 is darn near cost. Assuming it is a reputable company providing the warranty, after the first year, go get another key anyway. That way you break even if the warranty provider goes belly up. FWIW, our dealerships offers this too.. and it is more than the $199 you paid.
But if you get a new key, doesn't the dealer have to reprogram all the fobs at once? Making the supposedly "lost one" useless (except on ebay ;-) rich
The fobs are not programmed. The car is programmed to accept the fobs, not the other way around. When you lose a fob, that fob is removed from the list of associated fobs. Tom
Tom, On all the cars I've had to program keys to immobilizers, the customers needed to bring me all the keys they want to work -- anything not present will no longer work after the programming. Is that different with the Prius?
With the Prius your program the immobilizer to the key, not the other way around. You can add a key without losing all of the others. I'm not sure of the details relating to deleting a key. I assume you can do it one at a time, as it is impossible to add a used smart key to a Prius. The Smart Key System only allows a key to be added for a limited number of presses. After that, it can't be used with a different car. This is a deliberate security measure. You can add it as a dumb key for the immobilizer, but not as a smart key for entry. Tom
