Settings Pilot not retained

[kevinnice]

I have recently got a MG S5 EV. I used Pilot to set my preferences. I saved them and a confirmation was shown.
Went out in the car the next day all my settings had gone and I had very annoying beeps from speed limit, driver concentration and so on.
It was maddening.
I stopped and changed the settings and saved them.
Two days later it had forgotten them all again.
Is the car defective or am i?

 

[Lovemyev]

Remember, when you enter the car the next day you have to swipe down on the info screen and select the MG Pilot button.
It will the prompt you to confirm.
You are now into the personal settings you have saved.
You have to do this for every trip or the car will default back to the factory settings.
You can do this on the move if you forget, but better to select before you set out.

 

[kevinnice]

Thank you. I will try that. But my experience is that all the settings have been changed in Pilot.
Your reply makes sense, even though the MG system is itself nonsense.
On what other car would you be expected to select your preferences every time before you drive???
And while I am at it, the "concentrate on your driving" message is not only useless, it is dangerous, as the constant beeping interrupts driver concentration on the road - the very thing it is intended to help with. I am driving, looking straight ahead, and the ****** thing is beeping every 5 seconds.
IT DOES NOT WORK AND MG SHOULD FIX IT.
As I said elsewhere on the forum, if I had bought it from Amazon, it would already have been returned.

 

[salty]

Sorry your not getting on with your new motor, Kev. Neither you or the car are defective, it's just the way it is. With MG anyway. Not sure about other makes.

But.

To the forum, anyway.

 

[Lovemyev]

Many manufacturers build in all these additional safety devices into the car, to help gain the higher 5️ safety factor rating.
They know it’s going to annoy many drivers, so the work around is to offer a personal setting to disable certain features.
When you select MG Pilot it flags up a warning to warn you that you are doing this.
Yes of course, having to do this for each trip is a pain, but that is how it has to be done unfortunately.
It’s not just MG either obtw.

 

[kevinnice]

Thank you for the explanation. I will be checking for this kind of design madness when I buy my next car. BTW I have a Kia Niro PHEV also, and when you get the car, you set the settings you want (from an infinitely more intuitive menu system than the S5) and those settings are saved and retained unless you ever want to change them: Like, for grown ups.
Whoever designed the menu system for the S5 is an imbecile who probably owns a Kia.
I would never recommend this car to anyone.

 

[Alb]

Sounds like a simple case of not following the correct procedure.
You don't have to reset everything for each journey but you do need to tell it you want to apply custom settings. Doing this is still a bit of a pain but it only takes a few seconds.

 

[Lovemyev]

On a cars made a few years ago, you could disable the settings and the car would remember them, but not on the newer models.
This is not a new thing like I said.
I remember in my BMW 3 petrol, you could disable the annoying “stop start” function.
But it would not save the feature !.
As soon as you restart the car, it would kick back in again !.
My wife has a 2016 Fiat 500 and you can disable the “stop / Start” function via a button and it remains disabled .
It has been this way ever since .

 

[Ian Key]

Thank you for the explanation. I will be checking for this kind of design madness when I buy my next car. BTW I have a Kia Niro PHEV also, and when you get the car, you set the settings you want (from an infinitely more intuitive menu system than the S5) and those settings are saved and retained unless you ever want to change them: Like, for grown ups.
Whoever designed the menu system for the S5 is an imbecile who probably owns a Kia.
I would never recommend this car to anyone.

NCAP change the requirements for a new car to qualify for their 5 star rating each year so depending when that model is released depends on what it needs to do to meet that rating.

The MGS5 was released last year so it needs to meet the 2025 requirements and that means the settings have to reset each time you start the car. Your Kia Niro was released before that requirement was implemented so it is able to retain its custom settings.

 

[kevinnice]

"Sounds like a simple case of not following the correct procedure."...
That is insulting, insofar as it says "it is the driver's fault, not the manufacturer's", when I am trying to point out how ludicrous the system is, which the manufacturers have created.
You must be the type of person who accepts whatever you are given - I am not.

 

[Ian Key]

Message deleted before I get censored.

 

[emmrecs]

@kevinnice

Politeness to other members of this community costs nothing but is highly appreciated!

It has been explained to you very clearly why the MG Custom Pilot behaves as it does. If you do not agree with that behaviour that is your right. But to berate others for understanding why this behaviour occurs and thus accepting "it is what it is" is unnecessary.

 

[PeterHR2]

Caveat emptor was the first thought that came to mind if this situation is of such importance to a buyer. Everyone should do their homework on all aspects of a purchase before going ahead with it. The idiosyncrasies of the MG infotainment/driver assist settings on MGs, including those of the MGS5, have been well discussed on this forum. And user manuals are available from the manufacturer/dealers' websites. So there can be no excuse for not doing the homework.

And as @Ian Key has let be known above, them's the NCAP rules as of 2025-2026:

---

AI Overview

[The] 2025 and 2026 Euro NCAP rules, in conjunction with European General Safety Regulation 2 (GSR2) laws, mean that many advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) must reset to their default "ON" state every time you restart the car.

This means that if you turn off lane-keeping assist, speed limit warnings, or driver drowsiness monitoring during a trip, they will automatically reactivate the next time the ignition is cycled.
Key Details Regarding 2025-2026 Rules:

• Mandatory "Default On": Systems like Intelligent Speed Assistance (ISA), Emergency Lane Keeping (ELK), and Driver Drowsiness & Attention Warning (DDAW) must be active by default at the start of every journey.
• Difficulty to Disable: The 2026 protocols require that these safety systems cannot be deactivated with a single button press; they must require at least two steps (e.g., a menu navigation or multiple actions).
• Physical Control Requirements: To counteract the annoyance of hidden settings, Euro NCAP’s 2026 rules (effective Jan 2026) are pushing manufacturers to bring back physical buttons for key functions, ensuring that if you need to turn off a system, it is not buried deep within a touchscreen menu.
• Speed Assist Real-World Accuracy: From 2026, ISA systems will be tested in real-world driving (not just test tracks) to ensure they actually read speed limits accurately, rather than just acting as a "bossy" annoyance.
  

Why This Is Happening
These rules are driven by GSR2 (General Safety Regulation 2), which became fully mandatory for all new car registrations in Europe (and widely followed in the UK) in July 2024. Euro NCAP is enforcing this with strict 5-star rating requirements for 2026 to ensure these systems remain effective. While some drivers find it annoying, manufacturers are finding ways to make the required "re-disabling" process faster using shortcuts.

---

So, to get around this, MG have enabled a shortcut to get around having to reset to personal preferences. Users just have to remember to use it.

 

[Alb]

"Sounds like a simple case of not following the correct procedure."...
That is insulting, insofar as it says "it is the driver's fault, not the manufacturer's", when I am trying to point out how ludicrous the system is, which the manufacturers have created.
You must be the type of person who accepts whatever you are given - I am not.

Not insulting, just reflecting what you have already stated.