i recently purchased a Focus 1.0 ecoboost MHEV 125 Active edition - registration year jan 2022.

However despite downloading the manual for this car, I couldn't find anything about autolock. It only mentions Autounlock but the description of how it works is unclear. It states

However a separate link from Ford.com states

Automatic door locks^* automatically lock or unlock your vehicle doors based on your speed, driver's side door, or how close your key fob is. 

• Autolock: Your vehicle doors will automatically lock when your speed exceeds 12 mph. 

• Autounlock: Your vehicle doors will automatically unlock when the engine is turned off and the driver's door is opened. 

both statements cant be true? Either the car locks OR unlocks when it reaches 12mph.

I have lock / unlock buttons on the driver door where i can manually lock the doors. However I want the car to automatically lock the car when stopping at traffic lights to prevent any potential car jacking but unlock the door when travelling above 12mph

The settings on the dash shows

when I asked the main dealer, they said "No Fords are designed with auto locks. They don’t like them for safety reasons "

can anyone clarify this apparent confusion?

Almost every Ford model that is manufactured since the early 00's support autolocking. It is however deactivated in the vehicle configuration as standard. This means that it must be activated in the vehicle configuration.

Ford Europe/UK does not support autolocking because of legal reasons. The possibility to activate the autolocking functionality in the vehicle configuration is greyed out in the Ford diagnostic system software since 2007. This basically means that a Ford dealer cannot activate autolocking.

The strange thing is that some Ford commercial vehicles do have autolocking working as standard while it is disabled on the passenger cars.

If you want to activate autolocking, you need a Ford specific diagnostic system that has the ability to activate the autolocking system. For example, the free Forscan software in combination with a suitable diagnostic interface. Once activated the autolocking functionality can be switched on/off on the Focus MK4 from within the instrument cluster menu.

27 minutes ago, surfing69 said:

However I want the car to automatically lock the car when stopping at traffic lights to prevent any potential car jacking but unlock the door when travelling above 12mph

Why would you want the doors to unlock again at speed? Are you intending to bail out on the motorway?

I've never seen autolocks on any car that unlock again at speed. If you enable autolocking the doors remain locked throughout the whole drive.

i am referring to the manual that states the autounlock unlocks all the doors when the vehicle reaches speeds over 12mph - pls see above

if ford dont support autolock why do they have the option Autounlock listed in the settings? This suggests that the doors have been locked and Autounlock them when certain conditions are met.

So - ford are happy for the driver to manually lock all the doors ?

I came across the following post from Ford.com which suggests that autolock can be activated via the lock/unlock buttons on the door - https://youtu.be/X9VXONMv7OM?si=SANTWn7pGnkxlmZt

Finally, is it possible to receive email notifications that someone has replied to my posts?

9 minutes ago, surfing69 said:

- ford are happy for the driver to manually lock all the doors

Yes, exactly that.

Your relatives can't sue Ford when you burn to a crisp inside a car fire if you've chosen to lock the doors yourself.

Ford don't care about you. They do care about lawsuits!

The auto-unlock section of the manual looks like a typo. I can't work out why anyone would need the doors unlocked at speed? (For reference, I have enabled Autolock in all of my cars for traffic lights etc as you said, so I totally understand that part). You'll have to test the auto-unlock and see whether it does unlock at speed after manually locking from inside.

44 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

The auto-unlock section of the manual looks like a typo.

I'm not sure it is. My Fiesta Mk 8.5 manual reads the same (below) and is clear that all three conditions have to apply. I interpreted that as meaning that the car will have had to have travelled at 12mph for the function to be activated, not that the doors will unlock at 12mph.

Being old enough to remember the Pinto scandal, when Ford customers really did get burnt to a crisp, I fully concur about Ford and lawsuits!😀

Autounlock Requirements



Autounlock only works if all the preconditions are met:

1. The vehicle speed exceeds 20 km/h (12 mph).

2. Your vehicle comes to a stop.

3. You open the driver door.

Note:   Autounlock operates for only 10 minutes after the ignition is switched off.

12 hours ago, Eric Bloodaxe said:

I'm not sure it is. My Fiesta Mk 8.5 manual reads the same (below) and is clear that all three conditions have to apply. I interpreted that as meaning that the car will have had to have travelled at 12mph for the function to be activated, not that the doors will unlock at 12mph.

Ah! That makes more sense.

Very poorly worded. Could maybe excuse it if it was translated from, say, Chinese...but Ford manuals are presumably written in English, (even if it is American English). 🤔

"You open a door" doesn't really make sense either. How is that even possible before auto-unlocking? From what I remember of auto-lock, it required 2 pulls of the handle to open. The first to unlock the door. The second to open.

15 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

Very poorly worded. Could maybe excuse it if it was translated from, say, Chinese...but Ford manuals are presumably written in English, (even if it is American English). 🤔

Perhaps they outsource handbook writing to China like most things these days?😀

I never lock the doors when I'm in the car anyway - on balance I'm more concerned about being trapped in there than I am about car jackers!

5 minutes ago, Eric Bloodaxe said:

I never lock the doors when I'm in the car anyway - on balance I'm more concerned about being trapped in there than I am about car jackers!

There has always been debate around this as long for as I can remember when auto-lock threads come up.

I suspect it largely depends on where you drive and your stature. Shortly after I started driving, as a scrawny teenager, I had to do a lot of driving at night around rough areas of town for both college and work. I quickly got in the habit of locking doors manually doing that!

If I was a hench alpha, I doubt I'd have done the same. Equally, I never felt unsafe driving B-roads and villages where I lived at the time.

It's not just car jackers either, anyone can open a door or the boot while you're stopped at lights and steal your laptop or toolbox or whatever else they can grab and run off with.

10 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

I suspect it largely depends on where you drive and your stature.

Yes, I guess so. I never used to worry in my (pretty well built) youth, I forget sometimes that I'm not that guy now until I'm brought back to reality with "Oh, yeah, and what are you going to do about it Grandad?" or similar!😀

There still used to be areas I'd avoid years ago though, where they'd steal wheels off a moving car, so I bet they're even worse now.

Since the merger of Ford of Britain and Ford of Germany into Ford of Europe in 1967 the European headquarter is located in Cologne Germany and is therefore considered to be a German manufacturer.

I suspect that all user manuals are primarily written in German and afterwards translated into other languages. The latest vehicle user manuals are no longer available as paper versions. The most recent web-based versions may well be translated by AI.

Anyway, you need to buy a V-Linker or OBDLink-EX adapter as recommended by FORScan

Then get FORScan set up on a windows PC and activate auto locking in central configuration