I just bought a 2010 HHR LT and understand I get one year of On-Star. I have not contacted them yet but is this worth it? It looks like the Driving and Directions and other services are add-on charges. What do you get for free for a year?

 

Unless it's changed since I bought in January, the Onstar and Directions and Connections are free for one year. If you buy after the free year expires, yes it costs more to have Directions and Connections.

My son loves it in his cobalt.

 

Got it free for a year with my 09. Also for 14.99 (+tax was 19.99) they gave me 110 minutes more of On Star phone time. I thought that was worth it. Has some good features and will probably renew it when its up. We will be using it for many cross country trips. However just get yourself a new portable widescreen Garmin or TOMTOM for directions-you can always swap in other cars.

By the way-good luck with your 2010 and congrats!

Mike

 

I only got one month of free directions. Didn't even use it.

 

you also get email diagnosis of your car every month.I thought that was cool,,,but thats all.I did not renew after the year. Cell phones are cheaper, gps units are cheap now, and I can keep track of my tire pressures, oil life, ect. my self, no need for the emails. And dont need another monthly bill.

 

Just a tip based on MANY, MANY posts from other sites (and my personal experience)......

DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES provide your credit card number for anything. OnStar has automatic renewal when you supply a credit card number for anything. If and when you decide NOT to enroll or for ANY SERVICES, it will be very difficult to stop the service or get a reimbursement.

If you like any of the services and wish to continue it, just tell them to bill you. You don't have a credit card.

 

We had absolutely no trouble after our free trial ended. We provided our credit card number to them for minutes for hands free calling.

 

we did the minutes for calling too. when ours was up, i didn't plan on renewing. I called them to cancel. They said try it for another 3 months, and 100 more minutes. Fine by me.

Next time I called to cancel, they said OK, sounds good, didn't try to sell me (i would have happily taken more free). Then I saw I was still getting charged. I called them back up and whomever "cancelled" it basically put in a cancellation date for 8 months in the future... Why, I don't know.

Never used it for a lock out, no crashes, only used the phone on it.

I would keep it if

1. it was A LOT freakin cheaper. I mean, they are pulling in 200-300 a year from each car, compared to how much it probably costs to run it all...yeah, not happening.

2. I would pay that if it covered all my cars, but for just one, not a chance.

Not saying it is always the case (and I know I lucked out) but the commercial where he spins the guy around so he is disorientated always gets me. I flipped my jimmy end over end, landing on my driver side. I pulled the phone off my belt, dialed 911, dialed my in-laws, then climbed out the back hatch window (or where a window used to be). I know it can happen, and like I said i was lucky, but i've been there.

 

i subscribed to it on my 06 malibu. My wife got in a bad accident (not injured though) and Onstar came on just like you hear in those commercials. She also locked her keys in twice. We did cancel for about 6 months and we where able to get them to offer it at 12.95 per month . All in all with my wifes tendency to forget the keys I thought it was worth the price.

 

I guess if you routinely wreck your car, lock the keys inside and fail to maintain your car Onstar may be worth the cost.

At ~$13/month..$156/year

I've been driving for 45 years, no accidents. I did lock my car keys inside once so I would have paid $7020 to have the door opened.

AAA costs me about $80/year and they will open the car up for me and I have used the towing a few time when my car died on trips. Only a cell phone call away.

My Garmin GPS moves from car to car and was a one time cost of $129..