Requesting Volkswagen to track the location of the vehicle in a robbery case of a car carrying a young child, but 20,000 yen is charged as ``the subscription period has expired''

An incident occurred in which a Volkswagen car with a 2-year-old child on board was stolen. Since Volkswagen provides a vehicle location tracking service, the sheriff's office that received the report immediately asked Volkswagen to track the vehicle's GPS, but the trial period for the subscription service had expired. It seems that he was asked to pay $ 150 (about 20,000 yen) for the reason.

For 30 minutes, tracking service wouldn't help Lake County deputies find stolen car with toddler inside - Chicago Sun-Times

VW wouldn't help locate car with abducted child because GPS subscription expired | Ars Technica
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/02/volkswagen-wouldnt-help-locate-car-with-abducted-child-because-gps-subscription-expired/

The incident occurred in Lake County, Illinois. A 34-year-old woman parked her Volkswagen Atlas SUV in her driveway and let one of her children out of the car into the house. After that, when I returned to the car to drop off the 2-year-old child who was left in the car, a man other than the driver got out of a white BMW parked nearby, beat the woman, and got into the SUV. He said he ran away. BMW also ran away following the SUV.

A woman who had been run over by a fleeing SUV and had severely injured her limbs managed to report it, and the Lake County Sheriff's Office learned of the incident and immediately began searching the car. The sheriff thought that Volkswagen's online service 'Volkswagen Car-Net' could acquire the location information of the vehicle and asked Volkswagen to provide information, but the trial period of Car-Net for the vehicle had expired. Volkswagen asked me to pay $ 150 (about 20,000 yen).

According to Christopher Covelli of the Sheriff's Office, he explained that the situation was imminent and pleaded, but the person in charge of Volkswagen did not give up a step as 'it is the company's policy'.

Eventually, the sheriff's office paid, but by the time Volkswagen provided the information, 'two cars had pulled into the parking lot, one of which had left a small child behind. ', The location of the vehicle and the child was identified, and 'the information provided was not valuable at that time,' said Covelli.

According to the sheriff's office, the woman is six months pregnant and is in stable condition despite serious injuries. In addition, the stolen SUV was found in a parking lot near the national highway, and the child was safe because the person who reported it immediately took care of it. On the other hand, BMW has not been found and is widely seeking information.

'Volkswagen takes the safety and security of our customers very seriously. Our thoughts are with victims and their families,' Volkswagen said in a statement. We have worked with and have successfully handled the process in the past, but unfortunately in this case there was a serious breach of the process and we are working with the relevant parties to address the situation.' issued a statement.