[nidhikapoor]

Writing this post in order to help Volvo owners on tbhp.

So, a close friend bought a Volvo S60 recently [absolute beauty to look at and superb to drive as well], and he faced a strange issue.

His car came with 3 keys

1. A black keyfob with 3 buttons
2. A yellow keyfob with 3 buttons
3. A black sealed key with no buttons

Pics are courtesy my friend who owns the car.






The black key and the yellow key 'look' identical for all practical purposes, but they are VERY different. They also both are openable and have a 'blade' or physical key to open the car in case the keyfob battery is dead.

The black sealed key is a waterproof 'sports' key with a limited battery life, and the battery is not user replaceable. Whether they will replace the key under warranty if the battery dies, is not a known factor now.

The car also has 3 driver profiles and a 'guest' profile.

So, he linked the black key to his wife's preferences, but when he tried to link the yellow key to his own profile he found that it was 'locked' to profile number 3. He thought it was something he was doing wrong, but a quick internet search showed that it was nothing that he was doing wrong, but it was something that Volvo was doing 'stupid'. This was Volvo's new 'policy' from 2021.


Three major downsides to this yellow key

The yellow keyfob is called a 'care' key and is locked to the last profile. It is supposed to be for giving your kid or a valet, and you can set the speed limit on that profile, from anywhere above 30 to below 120 kmph. As it's meant to be given to someone else, they are not allowed to make ANY changes in the given profile.

The second downside is that one cannot 'lock' the profile and so any changes made while driving with the yellow key gets saved automatically to that profile

The third downside is that if the car is opened when both husband and wife have their keys, and the car 'detects' the yellow key first and opens with that, one cannot make any changes, so if the wife, who uses the black key wants to drive, she needs to open the car, get out, lock it, and re open it with her key, with the yellow key out of range from the car.

A summary of what each key can do.

Black Key

Can select driver profiles
Can edit driver profiles
Can lock profiles

Sport Key

Can select driver profiles
Can edit driver profiles
Can lock profiles
Doesn't have buttons
Waterproof
Short Battery life
Battery not really DIY replaceable
One allowed replacement under warranty [?????]
Doesn't have Blade key in case power is dead to open door
Solution: Use your phone to open door but this function is unavailable in India

Yellow Key

Is permanently linked to profile 3
Speed restrictions can only be overridden with Black key and Sport key
Profile 3 can only be edited with Black key (or Sport key)
If the car is stuck on orange key and all profiles are greyed out even with black key - leave the orange key in the car and use black key to lock/unlock car - orange key is disabled
Orange key can have speed restrictions

So, he saw innumerable complaints on multiple Volvo fora. People were really pissed, as Volvo told them that if they need another 'fully functional' black key, they would have to pay 500 dollars/euros for it.

Well, some did, but enough raised so much of a ruckus that, Volvo relented and issued a 'technical journal', which allowed dealers to re program the car such that the yellow key would behave identically as a 'fully functional' black key. The Indian dealer did this for my friend but on other fora, people are still having to argue with their dealers in the US and EU.

Funny why Volvo would do this in the first place. They could have just allowed the yellow key to be used either as a fully functional key, or a reduced function key, and that setting could have been made applicable only when the owner was sitting in the car with the primary black key.

Mods-I had started this in assembly line and reported it for shifting. Reposting here as it did not get shifted. Please do shift it to the appropriate section if this is the wrong one.

[Shreyans_Jain]

I think this yellow key system is a very reasonable concept. I will sleep better knowing that my teenage child or my driver are not setting 0-200 times in my fancy new car behind my back. 120kmph is fast enough, the max speed one can legally do in India anyway. This yellow key is the one I’d have for daily use, keeping the black one for self driven use only.

[nidhikapoor]

Originally Posted by Shreyans_Jain

I think this yellow key system is a very reasonable concept. I will sleep better knowing that my teenage child or my driver are not setting 0-200 times in my fancy new car behind my back. 120kmph is fast enough, the max speed one can legally do in India anyway. This yellow key is the one I’d have for daily use, keeping the black one for self driven use only.

You missed the point. The yellow key concept is fine *if* the owner is given the choice to set the profile. With the way it was implemented, a husband and wife could not have their own key linked profiles in a functional manner.

That is a severe limitation if two people are going to be driving the car.

[Turbanator]

Thanks for bringing up this info, Nidhi. I will agree with Shreyans, it seems to be a good option to me.

One downside looks that if the black key is misplaced or damaged, we will need to order a new one immediately, unlike regular. It could have been easier if Volvo had given 2 Black and 1 Yellow key perhaps.

And Yes, instead of Yellow getting precedence, Black one should have got the priority when both keys are present.

Originally Posted by nidhikapoor

This would work only if you are OK with a single driver profile. If you share the car with say your wife, it's impossible to have two functional profiles.

I think, all cars allow multiple profiles via setup or seat settings. I haven’t used on any of the cars so no personal experiences but am sure, one doesn’t need 2 keys to have a different profile.

But I get what are you expecting, yellow for husband and black for wife and both have different settings and options to program, which sadly does not appear the case if we go by opening post.

[nidhikapoor]

Originally Posted by Turbanator

Thanks for bringing up this info, Nidhi. I will agree with Shreyans, it seems to be a good option to me.

One downside looks that if the black key is misplaced or damaged, we will need to order a new one unlike regular keys immediately. It could have been easier if Volvo had given 2 Black and 1 Yellow key perhaps.

Sorry, but you missed the point too.

This would work only if you are OK with a single driver profile. If you share the car with say your wife, it's impossible to have two functional profiles.

To give my friends example. 3 cars in a long driveway. Whoever leaves the house first takes the outermost car, so they don't have a fixed car for him or his wife. That was not workable with the yellow key.

Volvo can always add speed limitation to any key but the choice should be left to the owner. It's all software driven anyway, so easy to implement.

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[GTO]

Definitely uncool to keep the second key restricted by default. For 2 of our cars, me & my brother use both keys (we live separately in the same building) and we'd hate it if one of us ended up with driving limitations! As Nidhi said, both keys should've had full control by default, with the option to limit one of them (optional, not compulsory).

Ford has done it better with MyKey:

The available MyKey feature allows you to configure one or more of your Ford keys to control your vehicle’s safety settings, even when you aren’t behind the wheel. Whether you’re trying to keep a teenage driver safe or reinforce better driving habits for another family member, this video shows how to use MyKey to set your vehicle’s maximum speed, radio volume limit or seatbelt alerts.

MyKey allows you to program keys with restricted vehicle modes that promote good driving habits. All but one of your keys can be configured in a restricted mode. The keys that remain unprogrammed are referred to as administrator or admin keys

[nidhikapoor]

Originally Posted by GTO

Definitely uncool to keep the second key restricted by default. For 2 of our cars, me & my brother use both keys (we live separately in the same building) and we'd hate it if one of us ended up with driving limitations! :

Absolutely. It's not only the driving limitations. When the yellow key is linked to profile no 3, you cannot 'lock' the profile. So, any changes to seats, screen settings, AC settings etc, get saved 'automatically'. That makes the 'profile' a complete fail.

The Ford system - is it implemented in India too?

[Lowflyer23]

Originally Posted by nidhikapoor

Absolutely. It's not only the driving limitations. When the yellow key is linked to profile no 3, you cannot 'lock' the profile. So, any changes to seats, screen settings, AC settings etc, get saved 'automatically'. That makes the 'profile' a complete fail.

That's an absolute bummer . Trying to incorporate complex features, manufacturers sometimes overlook the basics.

[ronford]

Originally Posted by nidhikapoor

Absolutely. It's not only the driving limitations. When the yellow key is linked to profile no 3, you cannot 'lock' the profile. So, any changes to seats, screen settings, AC settings etc, get saved 'automatically'. That makes the 'profile' a complete fail.

The Ford system - is it implemented in India too?

Yes, this feature is available in the top 2 variants of the EcoSport in India.

Never used it though since I don't have kids yet

It also has a valet mode for the touchscreen which will disable it until you put the PIN.