TomTom U.S. Traffic Subscription now $24.95?

I see it listed in TomTom Home 2.3 listed as Traffic Europe 1 year subscription at a cost of $29.95 US. It says that the service is not available in the U.S. or Canada, but if you press buy it... down at the bottom is says that people who purchase it in TX or CN will be charged Sales tax.

Go figure.

Roy

Verizon Treo 755p + TomTom GO 720 = Data

I?ve gotten my TomTom GO 720 to bluetooth pair with my Verizon Treo 755p for voice and data services. I couldn?t have done it without ?DAvidJVC? and his valuable notes posted on TomTomforums.com (http://tomtomforums.com/showthread.php?t=3342&page=2) ? thanks David! I?m updating his write-up with my own experiences below:

Make sure your phone has bluetooth and you have paid Verizon $15/month to enable the bluetooth dial-up networking (DUN) function in the Treo 755p. I also have a data plan with Verizon, but I don?t think that?s necessary for DUN to work.

1. Turn on the bluetooth settings on your phone, and make the phone discoverable (under ?visibility? select ?visible? or ?temporary?).

2. On the TomTom, go to the menu and select "TomTom Traffic." It will ask you to set up a wireless data connection. Select yes.

3. Before setting up the wireless data connection, follow the prompts to set up the bluetooth link between your phone and your TomTom. There are two ways I?ve done this:

a. Lasting through the entire process, keep an eye on your phone. It will prompt you for the password ?0000? multiple times. If you fail to enter it within a minute or so, the set-up attempt will fail and you'll have to start over. Repeat this process until they pair.

b. One possible way to avoid the multiple password entries, though, is to run the Treo?s bluetooth ?hands-free setup? at the same time that the TomTom starts the pairing process with the Treo. I did this, and they both paired on the first try. If they don?t, then repeat the process until they pair. They CAN eventually pair. The TomTom GO 720 must become a ?trusted device? within the Treo or it will never work right.

4. After bluetooth pairing is complete, the TomTom will attempt to set up the wireless data connection. Choose to set it up manually, and ensure that your Treo?s bluetooth is ?visible? or ?temporary? throughout this section. Here?s the information you will need:

Access point name: vzw3g
Username: mobile#@vzw3g.com (mobile# is your cell phone # without hyphens)
Password: vzw
DHCP: "auto"
DNS: "auto"
Dialup #: ?#777? (replace the *99 that TomTom enters there).
Log on script: leave it blank


If this doesn't work, turn off both devices, then try again. It took me a couple times to establish the link until I made sure that the Treo?s bluetooth was ?visible/temporary? during the process.

Once you have set it up, try to do at least a weather update to make sure you are connected. Once you are connected you can try to upload traffic data. If it fails, call customer support at TomTom, 866-486-6866. They can re-set your user name and password so you will be able to log on. This is where I had to go because I was getting a ?your subscription has expired? message. When I called them they re-set the account. They also asked me if I got error code 1506, which I had been getting. They said this was due to an error in the TomTom TRAFFIC function of the GO 720 in the United States, and they?ll be uploading a patch via TomTom HOME ?sometime soon.? It should fully work then. Having TRAFFIC was so close ? and yet so far! I also asked them for a free trial of TomTom TRAFFIC, and they did so for 90 days.

I?ve noticed that if my Treo?s screen is blank (after 30 seconds of inactivity), then my TomTom won?t connect the DUN. I have to turn on my Treo?s screen and press the center button to unlock the keyboard. It works, at least for getting weather.
Good luck!

I decided to take Brett's suggestion and call the 866 number for customer service and explain that I just recently was able to get my TomTom 720 paired with my month old Blackberry 8130 and my free subscription was going to run out in 4 days. After staying on hold for a little more than 2 minutes, I asked for another month of the free traffic service. The CSR said she had to check with someone else, and after a couple more minutes she told me I could have another 90 days. She also confirmed that the traffic subscription costs $24.95 for U.S.

Roy

Verizon Treo 755p + TomTom GO 720 = TRAFFIC Data

Low and behold ... my TomTom TRAFFIC suddenly works today. When I launched it, a message said my special promotion was in place. It immediately told me to get off the interstate because there was traffic ahead, so I did. It was right! I sent major good thoughts to TomTom as I sped past on the side road.

Brett1111 said:

Low and behold ... my TomTom TRAFFIC suddenly works today. When I launched it, a message said my special promotion was in place. It immediately told me to get off the interstate because there was traffic ahead, so I did. It was right! I sent major good thoughts to TomTom as I sped past on the side road.

Click to expand...

It's pretty cool when it works. Unfortunately for me, it had the opposite effect the other day. On the way to my in-law's house, it showed traffic on the road ahead, with three more exits to go until I was to exit the current road... a total of maybe 1.5 miles ahead. Knowing the area (rush hour traffic should be heading the other way at that time, and it was), and seeing brake lights and a slow-down ahead, I imagined an accident ahead, and quickly told TT to avoid delays, and it had me exit two exits early... sending me past several office parks and a major train station - at rush hour! When I finalyl crossed over the road I had previously exited, I could see that traffic was now flowing again, and that I probably would have been better off staying on the original road.

I think that the traffic service works best when the alternate route is also a highway, or some other road that is included in the traffic monitoring. Otherwise, it's traffic-avoidance efforts just send you from a route that it thinks is bad (traffic wise), onto a route it knows nothing about.

Michael Quinlan said:

I think that the traffic service works best when the alternate route is also a highway, or some other road that is included in the traffic monitoring. Otherwise, it's traffic-avoidance efforts just send you from a route that it thinks is bad (traffic wise), onto a route it knows nothing about.

Click to expand...

...or all those other TomTom users decided to get off at the same time you did, relieving the congestion. *shrug* At any rate, that's why you can set your TomTom to calculate the fastest route, vs. the one with the fewest delays. Sometimes you're better off staying on the current road. ...and yes, it knows very little about the conditions of surface streets, but sometimes the devil you don't know is truly better than the devil you know.

cputrdoc said:

...or all those other TomTom users decided to get off at the same time you did, relieving the congestion. *shrug* At any rate, that's why you can set your TomTom to calculate the fastest route, vs. the one with the fewest delays. Sometimes you're better off staying on the current road. ...and yes, it knows very little about the conditions of surface streets, but sometimes the devil you don't know is truly better than the devil you know.

Click to expand...

TomTom uses Inrix for flow data now and it looks like HD Traffic is 2 years away here so its possible they'll pick up the new Inrix product that covers secondary roads and city streets. That data would make the rerouting feature more capable.

http://www.inrix.com/totalfusion.asp

http://www.inrix.com/pdf/INRIX Total Fusion.pdf

$54.95

Spoke to 2 reps today and both said that data traffic is $54.95. Very odd that some people are being told $24.95 and TomTom's own news page about that pricing. Very odd.