Cracking codes

▶ Radio codes – or more accurately, the lack of them – can be extremely irritating. Quite apart from the fact that cars in trade are often stood around long enough for a battery to lose charge causing the radio to ‘forget’ its code, it’s good practice anyway to ensure things like this are present in cars being sold so that a customer doesn’t have problems.

Nowadays though, more and more cars are being passed through part-ex dealerships with incomplete, or totally lacking, book-packs, and all too often, the card with the crucial four-number code on it, is missing.

Once upon a time, a missing code meant a trip to a main dealer and paying a charge of up to £30 and providing paperwork to prove ownership. I even came across cases where particularly officious service managers refused to accept a V5C proffered by a trader because the car wasn’t registered in their name.

Fortunately, these days many codes can be obtained online – Ford, GM/ Vauxhall, Peugeot-citroën, Fiat, Honda, Jaguar, Mercedes, Nissan and Vw/audi codes are generally straightforward, often available instantly or within an hour. The longest you’re likely to have to wait is 24 hours. The same applies to a lot of proprietary radio makes such as Grundig and Sony.

A few are a bit tricker – Volvo for example – and with some Far-east brands you may have no option but to contact a dealer. There is, though, a tip that might work with Kia and Hyundai.

On these, the radio code is sometimes the final four figures of the radio’s serial number with 1212 added – so if the serial number ends 2345 the radio code is 3557. This doesn’t always work, but it’s worth trying before calling a dealership.

Don’t, though, keep trying the same number if it doesn’t work; these radios are also among the most intolerant of incorrect codes and the time-delay before another code can be inputted can kick in after two or three tries. Some also lock after a wrong code has been inputted five or six times and clearing that WILL mean a trip to the dealer!

Online resources usually work on the radio’s serial number, and in many cases the only way of finding this is by removing the radio. Don’t, though, assume that’s always the case, as some radios will tell you their serial number if you press a couple of buttons on the front in the correct order. On many Ford and Sony radios for example, if you press either button 1 and button 6, or button 2 and button 6 and hold them down for two to three seconds, the radio screen will run through a sequence of various figures, including the serial number.

As always with online purchases, you do need to keep your wits about you and if something looks too good to be true, it probably is. I needed a code for my Mondeo recently and found an online source offering them ‘free’. So, I keyed my radio’s serial number in, and was given the choice of paying to get the code now “or we will email it free in 24 hours.” The charge wasn’t massive – £5.99 if I recall correctly – but as I didn’t need the code there and then, I chose to wait. But as I halfexpected, the ‘free’ code never arrived.

However, another provider who charged £7.99 did exactly what they said, the code arrived immediately, and it was right! The site I used was www.onlineradiocodes.co.uk – though I should stress that ‘other providers are available.’