God, I hate these commericals that are on the airwaves.
Paying to have Big Brother help you out. We are unplugging our brains.
I hate them. I hate it.
This is a lame rant.
I don’t understand- if you’re paying someone to watch out for you, how is that “Big Brother”? It isn’t like you’re forced to use the service. That’s like saying that having ADT monitor your home for fire or burglery is like having Big Brother watching.
I don’t have Onstar, but I wish I did. It seems like a great service in an emergency.
I’m completely with you on the commercials. They’re atrocious. Instant channel changer for me.
I heard a commercial for OnStar the other day on the radio, and was VERY surprised to hear that their basic service, which is basically just emergency services, is $17/month. That’s outrageous, considering you’ll probably never use it.
I was listening to the radio on my way to work this morning, and heard one of their commercials which I think was their worst yet. You hear the OnStar rep ask how he can help, and some semi-hysterical woman starts shrieking about her accident, and almost screams when she’s asked if she’s injured. I suppose the though behind using the clip was “oh, people will be impressed at how OnStar can help even if you’re that shaken up,” but my thought was “uh, I don’t want to hear this lady screaming - time to change the station.”
First of all I think the commercials are some of the best on the radio. I’m mesmerized by them. They have character development, crisis, and resolution all packed into 20 seconds.
Secondly, this has nothing to do with Big Brother, but **Zette ** already said that.
Man, I almost tear up every time I hear that little kid trying to get help for his Mom. Course, I really am quite the pussy about stuff like that.
Meh, I could see maybe that having a single button to push could be easier for a five-year-old, and the remote unlocking capability is not a bad thing if you’re a freakin’ idiot, but it seems like 90% of the adverts consist of someone who has OnStar calling 911, which anyone can do themselves as long as they have a cell phone. Even a phone without a current subscription can be used to call 911, so what’s the need for OnStar? Color me unimpressed.
I don’t understand the rant. OnStar basically just provides contact with a call center to help you.
I can believe the price; it’s a massively expensive business. It’s very hard to staff call centers, let alone so much that they answer in the time that OnStar must. (Someone at my work used to work at OnStar.) You can’t just put people on hold for five minutes. I forget the actual stats but I think it’s something along the lines of a representative must answer within 5 seconds 95% of the time, or something really incredible. You have to maintain high staff levels all the time – far more than you will need to actually have working with customers. I bet that’s what you’re paying such a high price for – training and maintaining a high staff level at all times.
IIRC, don’t they have a GPS tracking beacon in the vehicle, as well as being able to sense remotely if your airbag goes off? I was under the impression that in the “talking to the 5-year-old” commercial, the OnStar rep “called” the vehicle saying something like “we’ve detected that your airbag deployed, is everything OK?” and then the little kid pipes up.
It’d help if you were in a crash where no one was able to call for help, especially if you were in a remote area and unlikely to receive help from passers-by. I can see how it’d help in some cases, but I expect most people would use it as infrequently as they use their auto insurance - and I suspect that’s the same reasoning behind those who want the service, that you don’t want to have to use it but if it happens to be needed, it could really be useful.
The commercials are lousy, but the service can be handy. More than one patient has been brought into our emergency department who was knocked out but because their airbag deployed, OnStar called the ambulance for them and gave their location so they could be brought in. Who knows how long they would have been sitting there if they didn’t have that service.
Also, the remote engine check thingie would be nice if your check engine light came on. They do a remote scan of your vehicle’s computer to determine what the issue is for you.
But anyway, the commercials suck. I agree.
Ditto. Though I don’t see paying 17 bucks a month to give law enforcement another way to tap me.
Here is the case
And I’m sure the next level of firmware will be ‘required’ to have the tap and set to not deactivate emergency svcs.
OnStar has GPS, which means it can track you. This bothers me as most people who probably use Onstar don’t go out of their normal 25 mile radius of their home.
They are leading people to believe that this is a necessary product by constantly advertising.
It is one of those things I refuse to get, along with Satellite radio.
You don’t know what you are missing without satellite radio.
I have kids. So it is either their music or too much noise.
I would love to hear Satellite radio, but I cannot justify paying for a subscription for it.
I can barely stand paying my pay-as-you-go cell phone bill.
Don’t they also provide navigation and concierge services as well? You know, like “Where’s the closest Shell station from my position?” Some people might find that useful for $17/month.
I think that you have to pay more than the basic service $17 fee to get those services, though.
Methinks the basic fee is lower than $17.00/month. I have Onstar with my truck, and I thought it worked out to like just under 10 bucks a month if I prepaid (Which I did for the term of the lease.)
I think it was $199 to renew the “Safe & Sound” plan on my Cadillac, which I did not do. “Safe & Sound” gets you the contact with emergency services and remote door unlocking, which is fun the first few times I played around with it. But I don’t think I pushed the OnStar button after I left the dealership with the car. I think their concierge-type services are about twice that much, but they are also pretty cool. On a manufacturer Cadillac I drove around it at one point, I was able to have them guide me to a far-out-in-the-sticks restaurant, and they stayed with me, giving me directions the whole way. Pretty cool, but more than I want to spend. If I was a salesman who drove around a lot for work, thoiugh, I think it would be a good tool.