I picked up my Focus MK IV Active X in January 2025, and since then I have had no more than 5 DAB Traffic Announcement interruptions.  I listen to Radio 2 on DAB, and the TA flag for that station is showing.  TA is enabled in settings.

I reported it to the dealer, and the service desk were not able to give me an understandable reason, but I couldn't speak to the mechanic as he was under the car.  The service desk person just said that nothing was wrong and it's just a reception issue (even though I have travelled over 8k mikes around the country.

I do find that FM gets TA alerts, but Radio 2 is not now a TA station on FM.

So my question is, does anyone else have a MK iV Focus in the UK and get TA alerts on DAB radio, or has this service gone

Thank You in advance!

(Apologies if this has already been discussed, but I couldn't find anything on a search)

My Mk IV with Sync 4 receives TA alerts fine when listening to DAB, several per trip usually.
 

As far as I am aware, TA works purely on the FM band.  A second tuner is monitoring and when it receives an instruction to change frequency to a local station it will do so if that station is in range.  On my Mk3 with Sync 2 it worked better if the FM was left on a BBC national station (R2 for me). On the Mk4 it doesn't seem to make a difference.

Thanks Jeff for the response, can you confirm which Radio station you listen to on DAB to get the alerts?  is that also R2?

Yes, It's R2 on DAB too.

Could I just ask the Community if anyone else gets Traffic Announcement's via DAB.  I friend of mine has tried it on his Nissan and strangely he couldn't get any TA's on any DAB radio station, so would be good to get some more data to through over to the garage when its due back next week.

Thank You

2019 Focus Mk4, usually listen to local DAB commercial stations, like Smooth NorthEast. I don't get any TA.

I used to get the occasional TA if the radio was on BBC Radio2 but since they only seem interested in the South East, I don't listen to them any more.

I've got an old Golf that picks up TA while on DAB.  For some reason it defaulted to TA ON at full blast after a new battery was installed.  Station was mostly likely Radio X though I can't remember now.  I didn't think the station made any difference to TA over-ride?

Two of my friends have tried to get a TA on an DAB station, and both havent had a single alert.  It all seems a bit hit or miss.  I did read somewhere a suggestion that you need two tuners for this to work - and perhaps if this is true, could be the answer.  

Anyway, my car was back in the garage today for a number of things including this.  This time they agreed to raise it with Fords.  I'll report back here if I get a meaningful answer

I'm not sure about DAB actually carrying Traffic announcements, as I thought Announcements were only on FM.  If you listen to R2 on FM, as it carries Sally Traffic, then I don't think the radio switches to other FM services.  Perhaps if you leave the FM on R2, whilst you are listening to DAB, then perhaps it does not switch to any FM station carrying traffic....  Retune VHF to Radio3.....before you switch to Absolute Rock  ?

Years ago there was a DAB service labelled as traffic information, but I think that went a long time ago.  I did work on the DAB network up until about 2003, and a lot has changed since then, all my contempories are retired but I may be able to track down someone still looking after DAB.

https://getdigitalradio.com/

No information on here about DAB Traffic announcements, or on the BBC reception guide.

Below is an excerpt from the operating manual for an FM/MW/LW DAB:

Setting DAB announcements

Specific types of DAB announcements that you set can interrupt the currently selected source.

1 During DAB reception, press "MENU", rotate the control dial until “GENERAL” appears, then press it.

2 Rotate the control dial until “ANNOUNCE” appears, then press it.

3 Rotate the control dial until the desired type of announcement appears, then press it.

4 Rotate the control dial to select “ON” or “OFF,” then press it.

Notes

• The DAB announcement feature is available

when turned to other than the MW/LW bands.

• During a DAB announcement, the volume is

adjusted to the level set for TA in RDS

 

The implication of the above paragraph suggests that the analogue tuner needs to be set to an FM station for DAB Announcements to work ?????

 

Type of announcement

ALARM (Alarm), TRAFFIC (Road Traffic

Flash), TRAVEL (Transport Flash),

WARNING (Warning/Service), NEWS

(News Flash), WEATHER (Area Weather

Flash), EVENT (Event Announcement),

SPECIAL (Special Event), RAD_INFO

(Program Information), SPORTS (Sport

Report), FINANCE (Financial Report).

 

I look forward to being corrected !

As you can see from the attached photos, TA is definitely enabled on the Radio2 station, plus the station is showing TA in the top line.  Certainly on my last Focus Sync 3, it always worked, although I dont know if those announcements came from FM or DAB.  Anyway, I like your suggestion of checking that the analogue station is set accordingly, so today it was on Radio 2 FM which did in fact raise a Traffic Announcement (this is expected), so I changed to Radio 2 on DAB and I'll see what happens (assuming I understand you correctly) - thanks

 

would be rather odd if TA only came from FM broadcasts it was initially meant to go in the skip forever in 2012, it was suspended to 2015, then as DAB ad DAB+ are a joke and no one bothers with it - plus the world is set to end soon, they gave up killing FM till the bomb goes off or 2030 whichever is sooner

20 hours ago, GadgetMan999 said:

plus the station is showing TA in the top line

On my old radios, it also shows TP, I think for programmes that carry traffic announcements ?

19 hours ago, Botus said:

plus the world is set to end soon

So a good reason to keep Radio 4 Long Wave on air !

Happy Xmas and all the best for '26 !

7 hours ago, Paulkp said:

On my old radios, it also shows TP, I think for programmes that carry traffic announcements ?

Thats right, it stands for Traffic Program which indicates that the station broadcasts traffic information.  I think TP was only used for FM where the radio was equipped with RDS (Radio Data System).

Hi, I have a 2025 with sync 4, I can receive the traffic alert, flashes up on the screen but then it stops - doesn't continue so I can listen, the traffic announcement is on, but never get a complete message should I be pressing something on the steering wheel to get the full announcement ? Many thanks.

And are you listening to a DAB or FM channel?

BTW, when it happened, it should finish the announcement them switch back to the original channel usually within 30secs of the end

Issue solved, listened to Radio 2 and full traffic alerts came on, I've been listening via DAB and got an alert which then stops.

Thanks all 👍

Hi, I picked up my Kuga with sync 4 some weeks ago and have had the same problem as Morts (which is how I ended up on this site!). The traffic announcement flashes up on the screen but then it stops after a few seconds so I don't get a complete message.

The Radio 2 suggestion didn't work for me but I have now solved the TA problem on my own Kuga.

So just in case it works for anyone else this is what I did:

Press the Home button.

Press Settings.

Press Radio. and you will see Radio Settings.

Check that Traffic Announcements is 'On'

Scroll down until you see 'Alternative Frequency' and switch it 'Off'

Scroll down to 'Service Linking' and switch it 'Off'

Press 'Home' button (top right) to get back to home screen