You’d assume that procuring an extra key for your vehicle would be a straightforward task. However, for one Jeep Renegade owner, it reportedly turned out to be a more formidable challenge than outfitting the same SUV for a jaunt on the Rubicon trail. It’s a saga of epic proportions – encompassing months of frustration, countless trips to the dealer, and an ever-growing pile of keys – all in the name of finding a solution. And, as fate would have it, even that “solution” turned out to be something beyond the dealer’s reach.
According to Reddit user Liamemsa, his troubles started when he bought a 2015 Jeep Renegade but failed to receive both keys from the seller. In August of this year, he contacted a local dealership to acquire a duplicate of his original key. They placed an order for a new key and scheduled him to visit for programming on September 2nd. Unfortunately, this initial attempt failed for reasons unknown at the time, prompting them to order a second key.
You can’t make these things up
On September 23rd, he returns to the dealer to repeat the process and gets told that it worked! Good news, right? Well, not exactly. When he tried to start the Jeep with his original key, nothing happened. Instead, his new second key worked, and his original key now only opens and closes the door locks. He was informed that he would need to drop the car off the following Tuesday for further diagnosis.
Read: Tesla Owners Stuck Waiting 9 Months For Repair Estimates After Prangs
Third time’s a charm?
On the 26th and 27th of September, the dealership struggled to identify the root cause but eventually agreed to order a third key and provide it to the owner free of charge. On October 7th, he arrived at the dealership with key number three and left the car there for the day. When he returned, he discovered that the team hadn’t repaired the car but had spent the day confirming that the key would be covered internally, and the customer wouldn’t be charged for it.
Two days later, Liamemsa drops it off again and is now told that the issue is actually with Jeep corporate. Reportedly, they only allow dealers to order one of two options. Option one is a blank key and the other is one that is VIN-programmed. He needs the latter but the dealer didn’t realize that and wasn’t ordering the right part. On October 12th, the Jeep owner is looking at a fourth key order and some Mopar store credit for his trouble.
Key-saga continues
Sadly, by that time, the UAW strike was well in effect and there weren’t any keys available. Finally, on December 7th, the dealer successfully ordered another key. It arrived on the 12th of this month but the trouble wasn’t done there. Evidently, by December 7th, the dealer could order only one of two options, the blank key mentioned earlier or an entire lock set including not just one but two keys and new physical locks for the entire car. That meant that not only would the original key no longer work but neither would the second key that was currently working.
Problem finally solved
That’s when Liamemsa remembered that he had the key blade from his original key that he could then move into key four, which was properly programmed for his vehicle. After doing the transplant himself in the service manager’s office the problem was finally solved.
Is this truly the way that Jeep, and by extension other Stellantis brands, might be handling customers who want additional keys? It sounds kind of crazy. To that end, we’ve reached out to Jeep to comment on the story. If we hear back we’ll update this post with that information.
