Do you know the feeling when you get or buy something new that comes with an instruction leaflet and you desperately want to try it – without having to go through pages of explanations, safety features, specifications, warnings and “useful” tips?
Well, it happened to me too! When I got my new car more than a year ago I roughly went through the basics and thought I was ready to go (this might be a rather female approach to the problem). I learned how to operate the navigations system, the air conditioning, ABS, ESC, lights, headlights, cruise control, seat heater (!) and more. Maybe I should have payed more attention to the “Smart Key” section in the owner’s manual …
However, first things first. A couple of days ago a friend of mine and I helped with a book fair at a local school. During lunch break, my friend decided to get her wallet to buy some books for herself. We had put our handbags in the trunk of my car, so I gave her my car keys and the whole “mystery” started. When she got back she told me that she locked the car with the remote key but the tailgate wouldn’t lock. I thought she might have pressed a wrong button and tried it myself – just to find out that she was right. So, what is the purpose of a central locking system if the tailgate won’t lock, right? Back home I decided to give it another try and asked my son to open the tailgate after I locked the car and put the keys back in the house. I couldn’t believe what happened then. He tried to open the trunk but couldn’t. It was securely locked! I finally came to the conclusion that there must be something wrong with the locking system and told my husband that I would call the car dealership in the morning to make an appointment for a check. He asked me for the key, locked the car and checked the tailgate. Guess what? It opened easily and just confirmed my suspicion that something must be wrong within the system.
To make a long story short: 10 minutes later my husband got back in the house with a broad grin on his face. He never actually believed that there was a problem in the first place, opened the car, got the owner’s manual out and did what I should have done months before: Read it carefully. He handed me the booklet and pointed to a text passage. I slowly read: “If you are within 28-40” from the outside tailgate handle, with your smart key in possession, the tailgate will unlock and open when you press the tailgate handle switch”. What a great feature! When you’re coming back from grocery shopping, bags in both hands, the tailgate will automatically open to make it easier for you to load the trunk. Oops. How embarrassing! Of course the tailgate wouldn’t open when my son tried it because I had the key and I was not close enough to the car when he tried to open the trunk. Can you image what would have happened if I actually had scheduled an appointment at the dealership? Honestly, I don’t want to …
Sometimes, it truly pays off to read the manual!!
(Carmen)
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