Waiting. That’s what I am used to. I know I wasn’t the only one keenly awaiting the delivery of a new car. Waiting lists for some popular vehicles can stretch out to 18 months.
But there are two key reasons why my case is different. Firstly it’s me affected and secondly my new car is an EV with every bell and whistle you could possibly imagine
I was one of the early adopters who ordered a BYD Atto 3. Well actually I felt the pressure from Trevor to be a guinea pig so was left with little choice.
I waited for them to finally arrive in the country. I waited for a test drive, I waited for the car to go from “Order Received” to “Delivered” on the BYDAutomotive website and then I waited for my Novated Lease company to pull their fingers out and pay the funds so I could finally pick it up.
After a few months I took delivery of my new extended range Atto 3.
Now you can’t enjoy all those bells and whistles if you have to be sitting in the car at the time to experience them. The latest in a series of tests to my patience was awaiting the BYD App
It was promised to arrive “in the coming months” which is just cruel and most annoyingly it was delivered to our Kiwi mates over the ditch ahead of us.
Today was the big day. After prematurely sending out the announcement last week (dated today), all of us on the BYD forums pretty much guessed it’s release was imminent
Functionality
So what is it like? What can it do?
As I gleefully explore the features, imagining remote parking or the ability to summon my car (both features I know aren’t current functionality of the car, but a guy can dream) I must say it’s a good start.
Setup was easy. After downloading the app you may be asked to set your country but I wasn’t
A quirk others have discovered is that when registering you MUST use the email address you used during the car purchase process. Otherwise expect an error saying “This account is not bound to any vehicle” so I imagine that is how BYD link your account to the VIN
Once you’ve jumped through the registration process my vehicle appeared and it was time to explore the features.
The dashboard. Sorry, bad pun
In the initial screens you can
- See the charging status & time remaining (don’t jump all over me for the estimated time remaining. I was only using the 10A granny charger)
- See the km left with your current charge
- Lock & unlock the car
- Display door and window status
- Flash the lights
- Beep the horn (5 beeps). I can’t wait to try this when my wife is leaning against it
- Turn on the air conditioning and adjust the settings. It will turn off automatically after a set time to your choosing
- Heat the seats
- Show tyre pressures
Status
Doors & Window status
Aircon controls – heat, cool, schedule, turn off or on and display outside temp
Seat warming – passenger and driver
Tyre pressures. – allows you to toggle between kPa, bar and psi
I’m sure the novelty will wear off and soon I’ll just go back to using the key fob to lock and unlock and remotely start the car but I am sure more functionality will come. I would really appreciate integration with Smart Home hubs such as Smartthings, Alexa or Google assistant. Now that would be a real game-changer. Perhaps “Matter” will come to the rescue here.
