Soul EV can be driven w/o the FOB!

Completely by accident, I discovered that the EV, once started, can be driven away without the FOB in it!! Yikes!

I carpool with a friend. On Wednesday morning, I had the FOB in my pocket. When I got out of the car, it beeped a tone for maybe 3-5 seconds, but when my friend climbed into the driver seat (after dropping me off), she was able to drive away. Had she not realized I didn't leave the FOB in the vehicle, we would have had an interesting problem to solve at 5pm!

I would have expected the car to not go into gear, and/or shut itself off when the FOB is present. They also need to get away from these stupid beeps. They are a meaningless manner of communication. IMO, the screen should have blanked and indicated the the FOB was no longer in the car, and refused to go into gear, or accelerate when in gear.

Every keyless car I've had (four models from four different manufacturers) behaves this way.

Imagine if the car freaked out when the key left the car or if the battery in the key died and the car couldn't communicate with it after starting!

I just thought it was odd ... but it is the first keyless car I've encountered. I would have actually expected it not to run. It looks like it has a warning for low battery in the FOB.

A friend told me today there is a FOB signal booster that thieves are using to steal cars in the driveway. They boost the FOB signal from your key in the house, to make it look like the FOB is near / inside the car, start the car, and drive away!

Maybe if the car could be configured for security to set the behaviour when the FOB is not in the car .... then you could turn off the feature when your FOB battery is low ... and to change configurations in the car, you have to start it first -although I guess that doesn't help if they can fool it into thinking the FOB is in the car when it is not ... maybe require a PIN to change that configuration? It just seems more security is going to be needed for these keyless cars!

At the same time, you cannot lock the car while sitting in it after you powered it down. This is a completely normal thing to do, and Soul just won't let you do it. I have to exit entirely before I can push the inside lock button (inconvenience) or I just close the door and use the lock button on the outside door handle or use the fob.

This actually bugs me a lot because I do this many times when I use the car...

As I said in the other thread, it this was Tesla, it would be fixed in a week. Kia? Not so much, obviously.

iletric said:

At the same time, you cannot lock the car while sitting in it after you powered it down. This is a completely normal thing to do, and Soul just won't let you do it. I have to exit entirely before I can push the inside lock button (inconvenience) or I just close the door and use the lock button on the outside door handle or use the fob.

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I'm not sure I understand the scenario here. You power down the car, you're still inside it, and you want to lock it? If you push the lock button on the door what happens?

I don't know that I've ever thought about locking a car from the inside after shutting it off. In what circumstance is this desired?

mtndrew1 said:

I'm not sure I understand the scenario here. You power down the car, you're still inside it, and you want to lock it? If you push the lock button on the door what happens?

I don't know that I've ever thought about locking a car from the inside after shutting it off. In what circumstance is this desired?

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I did this with previous vehicles - you power down/turn it off, open the door, hit the lock button, get out, close the door ... it is locked, and you don't give it a second thought. Even more so, if you get out with your hands full, after grabbing grocery bags or other 'stuff' from the passenger seat, you don't have to try to free a finger or hold the fob/key to lock it.

With the Soul EV, I find I just switched automatically to getting out and hitting the lock button on the door handle. I haven't tried locking it while in the car, with the door open ... I'll have to try!

I grew up with Hondas which won't let you lock the door from inside the car no matter how hard you try, even while having the old keyed system. You'd hit the lock button and it'd immediately re-unlock the driver's door. The only way to lock the car was with the key from outside or, in later models, with the remote key fob.

So I tried this last night out of curiosity.

Parked, shut off the car. Put the gear lever in park, doors remain locked. Locked and unlocked the doors and the car would let me do either with no problem.

If I opened the door and attempted to lock the car while me and the key were still inside it wouldn't allow me and would unlock the car immediately after pressing the lock button on the interior door switch.

If I stepped outside of the car with the key in my pocket and pressed the same interior door lock button it would lock and stay locked, which I confirmed by shutting the door to verify.

This is exactly how I would want the car to behave. If the car thinks the key fob is still in the interior of the car I want it to prevent me from locking my keys inside. Furthermore, if my memory is accurate, this is how my other keyless cars behaved (Toyota, Mazda, Chevrolet).

Is your experience different? I took some video of these experiments if you're curious. It seems that to accomplish what you want you must simply be outside of the car's cabin with the key when you press the interior door lock button to lock the doors. It's not necessary to use the keyfob or exterior button to lock the doors.

Good point on the smart key operation. A friend drove away in his Prius and didn't have the key with him. It was on a ledge in his garage. He luckily noticed and had to drive 30 miles back home to get it. If not one he turned it off he would have been stuck.

I think a Tesla auto locks after you get out and leave the range of the vehicle. I'll have to ask our friends if they can drive off without the key with them once the car is started. I'm pretty sure they can't. Tesla seems to think of these things so in 2017 we'll have the Tesla model 3.

jstack6 said:

Tesla seems to think of these things so in 2017 we'll have the Tesla model 3.

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Kia thought about it ... just the choice they made was to have the car emit a long beep, when you get out of the car with the FOB in your pocket, and the car is still running. They could have just as easily had the car auto-lock (that's a good idea!), or instead of displaying on the dash screen for a few seconds something about no FOB in the car, they could have lit up the console screen indicating the car is being driven w/o the FOB ... and depending on just how much the software controls and interacts with the various systems, they may have been able to limit the speed, if the car is even allowed to move (i.e. ignore the accelerator). In any case, a clear message has to be displayed in a way that draws your attention, otherwise you think the car is broken vs just the FOB missing.

Maybe it is more that Tesla understands their customers and what they want, and how they want the car to act ... I sure know I don't want it driven away w/o the FOB - plain and simple - if the FOB had to be near by to start it, then it needs to stay near by to continue to operate ... or at least allow you to optionally configure it that way, if you want ... and under some kind of security / pass code / only when not on, with the FOB present.

irfca said:

Even more so, if you get out with your hands full, after grabbing grocery bags or other 'stuff' from the passenger seat, you don't have to try to free a finger or hold the fob/key to lock it.

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This is where the cell phone app is great. In these scenarios I just focus on getting inside and then use the MyFord Mobile app to lock the car. I imagine that Soul EV owners could do the same with the Kia app.