PAAK: “Restart Now, or Key Is Needed”

[Mirak]

Has anyone else been getting this message using PAAK? With increasing frequency?!

Within the past week or two, I’ve started getting this message at least once every couple of days.

My door entry delays also seem to be increasing, and I’m having to enter my passcode with greater frequency.

PAAK seems to be getting worse. Can anyone else attest to any of this?

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[macchiaz-o]

Mine hasn't gotten worse.

 

[Nklem]

Are you holding your phone in your hand when you open the door And approach the car? Also, make sure Ford pass is open on your phone. Are you placing your phone in the charging tray after getting into the car and pressing the start button? These are essential for PAAK to work reliably. Please report back. I had one issue since the update but I found Ford Pass had shut down on my phone.

 

[Mirak]

Are you holding your phone in your hand when you open the door And approach the car? Also, make sure Ford pass is open on your phone. Are you placing your phone in the charging tray after getting into the car and pressing the start button? These are essential for PAAK to work reliably. Please report back. I had one issue since the update but I found Ford Pass had shut down on my phone.

FP remains active on my phone, and I also understand that these suggestions help.

But I have typically tried to treat my phone “as a key” - meaning I try to keep it in my pocket the same as I would a fob. And this has typically worked pretty well. Not as well as the fob but pretty well.

Until the last week or so when PAAK performance seems to have declined rather dramatically. So I know the tips to improve performance - thank you for the suggestions - but I’m trying to figure why this has gotten worse and if anyone else is seeing this?

And what the heck is the “restart now or key is needed” message??

 

[generaltso]

Are you holding your phone in your hand when you open the door And approach the car? Also, make sure Ford pass is open on your phone. Are you placing your phone in the charging tray after getting into the car and pressing the start button? These are essential for PAAK to work reliably. Please report back. I had one issue since the update but I found Ford Pass had shut down on my phone.

If all of that were really required, I would not use PaaK at all. Luckily, it’s been working fine for me just leaving my phone in my pocket like a fob.

 

[Jimrpa]

FP remains active on my phone, and I also understand that these suggestions help.

But I have typically tried to treat my phone “as a key” - meaning I try to keep it in my pocket the same as I would a fob. And this has typically worked pretty well. Not as well as the fob but pretty well.

Until the last week or so when PAAK performance seems to have declined rather dramatically. So I know the tips to improve performance - thank you for the suggestions - but I’m trying to figure why this has gotten worse and if anyone else is seeing this?

And what the heck is the “restart now or key is needed” message??

Have you had the customer satisfaction update done? PaaK has behaved much better for me since then.

 

[Mirak]

Have you had the customer satisfaction update done? PaaK has behaved much better for me since then.

If you are referring to the update which was notified in FordPass, I tried to schedule that update but the dealership called me and cancelled the appointment because they didn’t have the right guy available to do the update and they claimed Ford was telling them to advise people to wait for OTA. The whole mixed messaging is very frustrating.

 

[Gullwingdmc]

I have gotten that message when turning the car off several times in the last week. Never had before. I did however get it occasionally on my 2014 Fusion, so it’s not specific to the MME. Still have no idea what it means, never had an repercussions on my Fusion.

 

[bkboygenius]

PAAK has got significantly worse for me over the past two days. It used to work about 90% of the time, now it's down to working less than 20% of the time. I'm going to try removing and re-adding PAAK and see if that helps. I constantly get the message "Bluetooth Disconnected".

 

[Jimrpa]

If you are referring to the update which was notified in FordPass, I tried to schedule that update but the dealership called me and cancelled the appointment because they didn’t have the right guy available to do the update and they claimed Ford was telling them to advise people to wait for OTA. The whole mixed messaging is very frustrating.

Call back and be more insistent that your communication from Ford told you that dealers CAN do the upgrade if customers are experiencing issues. Your dealer is being lazy. My dealer wasn’t too thrilled to have to do it either, but I was gently, and politely insistent about it. The documentation is clear that dealers should do this if customers are reporting the issue.

 

[Mirak]

I got the PAAK update today. Took less than 30mins. I will start testing it and hopefully things will work better this week. Getting tired of the sluggishness and the dumb “restart now or key is needed” warning.

 

[AZBill]

I just enabled PAAK a few days ago, and already had the latest update 21B36, before I enabled it. Before today it seemed sluggish a couple of times, took a while to be able to unlock. Then today it would not work. I was able to unlock the car from Ford Pass app, but then had to enter the passcode.

Fortunately for me, I got the dealer to program a second fob for free when I got the car, I already knew from this forum that there were issues. I am just going to carry the fob from now on, it is not worth the hassle. My wife and I each have our own profiles tied to the fobs.

That specific message occurred for me after I got home and shut the car off.

 

[Jimmy2]

Agree, why not just carry the FOB with you? Problem solved.

 

[Gullwingdmc]

@Jimmy2 I used to get this message on my 2014 Fusion too, with the Fob obviously, so I don’t know if that will necessarily solve the problem.

 

[EELinneman]

Are you holding your phone in your hand when you open the door And approach the car? Also, make sure Ford pass is open on your phone. Are you placing your phone in the charging tray after getting into the car and pressing the start button? These are essential for PAAK to work reliably. Please report back. I had one issue since the update but I found Ford Pass had shut down on my phone.

Sounds like the ghost of Steve Jobs with antenna gate on the iPhone!

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