Update (16 May):

Today I received another email from Garmin. The online activation is working, no really, this time it really is. And low and behold, a visit to the site shows that indeed the under construction banner is gone and you can do an on-line something. I can’t test it since mine was manually activated a while back. Glad it’s finally working, really poor show Garmin in taking so long to get it sorted, but glad its finally done.

Update (26 April) :

I received a mail today from Peter Smith at Garmin today in reply to my very first website request to them for activation. In the mail he suggests that the online activation is (finally) working. I went back to garmap.co.za/traffic and found the same link to the same in under construction page. I mailed him back, he mailed back and suggested I shouldn’t go to that link. “Please go to www.garmap.co.za since that link you have does not work anymore . The webpage was redesigned . Go to products , Live Traffic and follow the pages”. I tried this and end up with the same page, tried refreshing, different browser etc. Not sure where the problem is or why Garmin thinks their new site is live when it isn’t. Anyhow, seems it is perhaps a bit closer to being live, though why they would mail customers to say its live when it isn’t is beyond me.  Did let Peter know, as well as suggest that if they are replacing the garmap.co.za/traffic page the least they can do is put an automatic redirect in place as this is the page referenced on the hard copy product documentation in the retail channel. We await further progress.

Original post :

I had a break-in back in November and after lots of disputes with ABSA they finally paid out. I used some of that payout to replace my GPS and with my dislike of traffic and being stuck in it opted to get a Garmin with Traffic adapter. After some further delays the company nominated by the insurance assessor delivered the goods to me. This was around 6 weeks ago.

I unboxed all the goodies and tried plugging it in. The traffic adaptor was recognised by the Garmin and it said it had a USA subscription that would be activated when it picked up the signal. I scanned a few times, no luck, time to read the instructions. Eventually found them and saw that South Africa has it’s own unique activation method. Ok.

Off to the website as instructed (http://www.garmap.co.za/traffic/), clicked on the traffic activation link, only to find this wonderfully helpful (not) graphic :

Read up some more, nothing of use, other than having a minor wobbly when reading on the site that the service is only available in Johannesburg, despite it being sold to me in Durban. Google then showed up press releases saying it was now active in Durban, clearly it was just the official website that was out of date.

Mmmm. Ok, so I phoned the Garmin SA traffic number 0861 427 646. They proceeded to tell me that the site was not working, but that it would be fixed over the weekend. That was about 5 weeks ago.

Since work was hectic I left things for about a month. Visited the website, nothing had changed. MMM. So I mailed support@garmap.co.za and received the following response.

Dear Sir
Thank-you for contacting Garmap, please accept my apologies, we have launched a new site and
are having some technical issues, will advise ASAP as soon as the site is up and running.

Please do not hesitate to contact us should you require any further assistance.
Kind Regards
(name removed) Garmap Support

I was somewhat bemused by the response, since they had not provided any assistance (what do you mean further assistance) and gave no indication as to how much longer I should wait before being able to use this paid for product.

I then searched the Garmin forums and started posting there. The forums hinted that a manual activation can be done if you email the product code and traffic activation code (found in the first page of the manual) to tech support. I then did this, no reply. mmm.

The only ray of light in this whole saga appeared, a man by the name of “Shorty”. He advised me to phone the Garmin after hours support number on the Saturday. I tried a number of times during the day and eventually after 3 in the afternoon Jaco answered. He asked me to mail him the details which I had sent the support address, which I did that same day. No response by Monday so a followup mail. On Tuesday he sent me instructions to retrieve another code, which I did and sent back that same afternoon, nothing nothing then finally today, Thursday the activation code was received back (after me posting more complaints in the forum).

What an ordeal. Thanks Shorty for the assistance. The device is finally working 6 weeks after purchase. Really pathetic support and I wouldn’t recommend anyone getting one of these devices until all this nonsense is sorted out. I see on the forums many others are in the same position as me.

Now the thing is working I hope to use it for a month or two and then write a proper review on how useful the live traffic feed actually is. Hopefully by then I have gotten over the hugely negative perception I already have of the product.

For those of you who already have (or bravely do) buy one of these and would like to try and short circuit the activation process a whole lot, here is what needs to be done.

First, you need to get the unit ID of the traffic receiver. This is the most complicated (if you can call it that) part of the process.

Plug your traffic receiver into the car cigarette lighter and into the Garmin, then :

Touch the tools icon in the bottom right of the screen

Now you need to press the settings icon :

Now press the traffic icon :

An error message pops up complaining about no subscription being active. Just press ok :

Now choose to add a traffic subscription :

The unit ID will now be displayed as follows :

1. Write down this Unit ID.
2. Get your traffic unit product code (it’s printed on the cardboard insert in the box, as well as on the cigarette adaptor part of the unit).
3. Get the traffic subscription activation code (printed in the first page of the instruction booklet)

Ok, that’s the simple part done.

Now get ready to email, phone, post in forums, and do everything required to get the required attention so that your manual activation can be processed.

Mail the above 3 items to support@garmap.co.za then phone them on 0861 427 646. Try and get a confirmation from them of a timeframe by when they will do the activation, and wait and hope you get the response mail.

It will look something like this :

Good day>>

Please connect the GMT25 to your vehicles power source and connect the GPS,

>> Select Tools> Settings> Traffic

> Select OK

> Select Add

> Select Next

> Please add the following unlock code to the unit : (your unique code here)

Basically you follow the same process you used to get item (1) above and then this time you have the unlock code to plug into the system.

Good luck, I hope your path is a whole lot easier than mine, and that some of the instructions above can help reduce your activation time. If someone else had written this up (and posted it to the Garmin website – hint hint) then my life would have been a whole lot easier. Hopefully this helps you.

P.S. Thanks Shorty for your support through the process.

 

Tags: activation, garmap, Garmin, GPS, help, how to, live, Live Traffic, traffic

Categories: Gadgets

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2 Responses

1. 

   Clue:

   Hi Justin!

   Thanks for pointing me in the right direction, glad to hear you are sorted! It was probably your complaints that sped things up for me as swell 😀

   15.04.2011 08:17 Reply

2. 

   Shorty:

   You’re too kind Justin.
   We received a “How To” from Garmap and this can be found in the Topic “Garmap 2011 no longer supports Garmin Mobile units” and scroll down to my post 13 April 22:47.

   Join the Garmap Forun to meet a happy place dedicated to all things Garmin & Garmap …. except the Rogues Gallery; the Bar and the Jokes sections Website being

   14.04.2011 23:06 Reply