Patent ID: 7679490

Claim:
A method for harmonizing a motor vehicle's status information between at least two ID transmitters of a vehicle-accessing device, comprising: transmitting the current vehicle stains, together with a current reference time, corresponding to the current vehicle status, of a reference timing element of a vehicle-side control unit by said control unit via at least one radio transceiver unit for receipt by any of a plurality of mobile ID transmitters within radio range of the transceiver unit; a first mobile ID transmitter capable of receiving transmissions from the radio transceiver unit and within range of the radio transceiver unit receiving and storing the current vehicle status and current reference time; a second mobile ID transmitter capable of receiving transmissions from the radio transceiver unit but not within range of the radio transceiver unit not receiving the current vehicle status and current reference time, the second mobile ID transmitter storing a previous vehicle status and a previous reference time; and the first and second mobile ID transmitters subsequently synchronizing vehicle status data by radio transmissions, including: the first mobile ID transmitter sending the current vehicle status and current reference time to the second mobile ID transmitter by radio transmission; the second mobile ID transmitter comparing the received current reference time with its stored previous reference time, determining that the current reference time is more recent than the stored previous reference time, and in response, updating its stored previous vehicle status with the received current vehicle status.