Smart key issue

We have seen a few such reports with two Gen III cars. You can wrap his key in aluminum foil to stop the interference.

 

You can program your car to accept both your keys and his (up to 4). This may require a dealer for gen3s.

 

I've seen some of that.. why not take your husband smart key... hahahha

 

Otherwise hold your fob up to the button when his interferes. This will let you start with the short range RFID installed in each fob, which, incidentally, is the backup method when your fob battery dies.

Tom

 

In the summertime I like wearing basketball shorts which have no pockets. So I've gotten quite used to sticking the fob into the slot itself. A nice place to hang the key, so to speak. Also makes it harder to forget.

 

Except that the OP has a Gen III Prius - no slot.

Tom

 

Oh, so no manual override?!

Whoever came up with THAT brilliant design?

 

It has an override, but no slot. With the Gen III you hold the fob up to the button.

Tom

 

What if the battery in the Fob is too weak?

 

It doesn't use the fob battery. It uses RFID, same as the Gen II fob.

Tom

 

Oh OK. I got it. My bad!

 

My wife & I each bought a 2011 Prius and are having the same problem where it will not recognize the correct key. The dealer does not know how to fix it.

I've tried to contact Toyota directly but have not gotten an answer since last week.

Does anyone know if Toyota has a software update for this key problem?

 

At this point I haven't heard anything about a fix. In the mean time use one of the suggestions posted above.

Tom

 

So far I've just had her hold her purse out the window until the car starts. Not very elegant but it works. I'm still hounding Toyota for a real fix.

 

It does seem pretty silly. This has to be a situation foreseen by the Smart Key designers. Most families have more than one car, and many own two from the same company.

Tom

 

This is a new problem. Both my wife and I traded in our older models (she a 2008, mine a 2009) and never had this problem. So this issue is either because of the new key or because we now have the same model year.

Hard to believe Toyota never tested for this.

 

I always wondered what happened if your key battery died. Thanks for the tip!

 

My wife and I have a 2011 Prius IV. Last nite we went to pick up some Chinese food and she left her pocketbook in the car, with her Prius key. When I touched the door handle to lock the car, I got the "key in car" message and had to push the lock button on my key fob to lock the door.

While I appreciate that the Prius recognized that a key was in the car, why didn't it also recognize that one was out of the car and let me touch the handle to lock.

I guess it's smart, but not that smart!