BMW Reverses Course On Heated Seat Subscriptions

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BMW Reverses Course On Heated Seat Subscriptions

BMW is reversing course on one of its most controversial decisions, saying it will not charge customers a subscription to use their heated seats.

BMW ignited a firestorm in July 2022 when the company announced it would charge users $18 per month for access to the heated seats functionality in their vehicles. To be clear, the subscription was to use a feature that was already included and the customer had already paid for, but BMW wanted to charge the subscription to actually use it.

After a year of backlash, BMW has decided not to charge a subscription for features that are already built into its vehicles, according to Autocar.

Pieter Nota, the firm’s board member for sales and marketing, told the outlet that the company’s decision has been based on customer response:

We have some experience with that, and testing how the customer responds is part of that process.

We actually are now focusing with those ‘functions on demand’ on software and service-related products, like driving assistance and parking assistance, which you can add later after purchasing the car, or for certain functions that require data transmission that customers are used to paying for in other areas.

What we don’t do any more – and that is a very well-known example – is offer seat heating by this way. It’s either in or out. We offer it by the factory and you either have it or you don’t have it.

We thought that we would provide an extra service to the customer by offering the chance to activate that later, but the user acceptance isn’t that high. People feel that they paid double – which was actually not true, but perception is reality, I always say. So that was the reason we stopped that.”

BMW’s decision is certainly a welcome one for customers and should help the company avoid a showdown with regulators. In response to BMW, as well as other companies with similar plans, some legislators have pushed for bills that would prohibit companies from charging subscriptions to use equipment that is already built-in, as opposed to features like GPS that legitimately require OTA software updates.

BMW Reverses Course On Heated Seat Subscriptions
Matt Milano

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