Hi guys,

I bought my Fiat Punto Evo a little under two weeks ago. Unfortunately, it didn't come with the remote key fob, just the basic key. I've contacted the dealership and they say it's going to be nearly £300 to get a replacement.

Is there any other way of doing this?

Thanks for your help.

JammieD88

Hi

Other than contacting the previous owner by taking the detals from the logbook (V5), then the fob is an expensive replacement from the dealer.

Unless someone knows different.........

Did you not ask the seller if there was only one key?

T14086 said:

Did you not ask the seller if there was only one key?

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I bought it from the dealership. The remote key wasn't supplied.

They gave you 2 'plain' keys I take it?

JammieD88 said:

I bought it from the dealership. The remote key wasn't supplied.

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Nope. Just one 'plain' key.

JammieD88 said:

Nope. Just one 'plain' key.

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So anyone can just take your car with the spare then. Can never understand anyone buying a car from a dealer with 1 key, would always be a deal breaker for me.

I've been in to the Parts Dept. at the dealership today and stamped my feet a bit about the security issue of not having the other key. I basically requested that they make it so the other key doesn't work in the car. They said that the price of a new key was ~£250 and that I would be liable for it. I told them that this wasn't good enough.

The guy in the Parts Dept. then called the previous owner to ask where the remote key fob was and he told them that he'd handed both keys in when he traded the car in.

With this information I told them they either needed to find it, or pay for a replacement as it was them that lost the key.

I'm waiting to hear back from them about what's happening with it.

chances are they've got it in a box full of FIAT keys,

had this with my mums MERC.. supplied 2 keys,
MONTHs later went to use the spare key..WAS for a different car..

went back to dealer and had a rummage through a tin FULL of keys to find the correct blade profile key,

strangely it worked remotely and everything..!! Result..!!

unfortunately Fiat are 1 of the most expensive car manufacturers for keys & remotes. Also nobody has managed to my a copy remote unlike with most other makes. Hopefully somebody will pull their finger out & make a good reliable copy remote like they do for most other cars

actionman37 said:

unfortunately Fiat are 1 of the most expensive car manufacturers for keys & remotes.

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With security comes costs, I doubt a Merc or BMW key is any cheaper tbh.

Most Easterly Pandas said:

With security comes costs, I doubt a Merc or BMW key is any cheaper tbh.

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Wrong, BMW dealers are nearly half the price of Fiat dealers. My mate was quoted £165 in total for a BMW 1 series remote. The push in the dash type. The older style keys for such as the E46 with a fixed blade are even cheaper.

I can get aftermarket BMW keys so can undercut BMW quite a bit. BMW keys come pre-programmed to start the car as the immob info is stored on a database in Germany. So customer walks in, collects key, puts it in the ignition & it starts the car straight away. They just have to sync the remote locking if they have the older style fixed blade remotes. Which is easy & takes less than 30 secs to sync all remotes back in.

When i do BMW keys i have to remove the immob from the car. Read the eeprom data from it. Add the new transponder to the eeprom data then write it back to the immob. Fit immob back to the car. Put new key in ignition & it starts straight away

oh & as for Merc. They're 1 of the few i don't really do so not sure what the costs are with those. The equipment that i use for BMW came with Merc software built in but with Merc my equipment requires you remove 3-4 modules from the car, open them up & solder wires in to make a loop between them.

I know from what i've seen some of the connection points are scarily close to parts you don't want to be touching & i've heard of a few horror stories of people bridging pins by mistake & frying modules. Also i don't think Merc dealers are that expensive so it doesn't work out cost effective for the customere by the time you've stripped half of the dash to get to all the modules

Doesn't sound particularly secure then, if you can manage it then whats stopping super thiefs

i manage it because it's my job! so have plenty of different key programming equipment which you're average car thief isn't going to have

I've heard that there are ways of starting BMWs and Audis by plugging a laptop into the OBD port.

Yes, i think it was on Watchdog over a year ago.
Cant recall how they opened the door, but with the laptop the car was fired up and away.

Yes it was. The tool is about £6k. I looked into it a while ago but it just wasn't worth me spending that kind of money on BMW equipment. The tool i use doesn't work by OBD, I have to remove the CAS module(immob) from the car & program the new key directly into it via laptop.

The CAS module is right behind the little glovebox to the right of the steering wheel. Takes me less than 5mins to remove it & only takes a few mins to program the key. Then another few mins to fit it back in place so not exactly a long or difficult job so definitely not worth spending the extra £5500 or so on the OBD tool

I think they just smash the glass in the door, then they can reach in to plug into the OBD port. When you're stealing a car worth that much it's not too much bother to have to replace a window whilst you're changing the car's identity!

in the length of time it took them to smash the window they could've just picked the lock. A genuine Lishi 2 in 1 pick & decoder is about £100. Would save a bit of noise, a lot of mess & can be used repeatedly on any BMW, Range Rover etc with the same lock type