I've posted both good and bad experiences with the TL Nav in different threads. I think most agree that it's good at getting you there once you know the address, bad at finding addresses in the first place.

Yesterday, I had a real-life experience that drove me nuts. I had a package to drop off and thought I knew where the fedex office was, so didn't bother to get directions or an address. When I got there, however, I realized it was the UPS store - my stupid mistake! So I figured, I should be able to use the NAV to find the fedex office. I tried everything - fed ex; fedex; federal express; federal e...(search); fed...(search). I tried by name, by keyword, and then by category - but could not find a logical category for a shipping company (but tried several anyway).

As usual, it came up with offices 3,000 miles away (no kidding). but nothing even within California. I was in San Mateo, CA at the time ... a rather large and popular area. I finally gave up, used my phone's browser to hit 'google', and got the address immediately.

I'm curious if there is any way to find FedEx - I'm always eager to learn the tricks of this thing, as I've stopped carrying my trusty NUVI now.

 

certainly not the most ideal situation...but use google on your cell phone, get the address, input into nav.

 

Not that it helps you, but there have been some hints (survey questions, etc) that Acura may be putting some kind of internet connection into the 4G. Would be handy in situation like yours.

If you could not find FedEx using "Fed" then SEARCH, it sounds like it's not there at all.

 

Try "Kinko's" -- that will get you some retail Fed-Ex locations (post-buyout of Kinko's).
You might also try the categories/keyword approach and put in "transportation" or "Shipping" - I might have done that when I was looking for a FedEx terminal.

 

This is what I would hope to see in the next gen TL:
http://www.mbusa.com/navigation/trip...-send/index.do

Look up directions online and send to the car...pretty damned slick

 

That would be a nice feature in general, but a) requires a subscription to their 'tele-aid' service, and b) would not have helped me find FedEx while I was out and about!

I've found that using "google local" on my internet-enabled cell phone works great at finding addresses, and once you have the address, it's easy to enter in to the NAV. That's what I did when stuck looking for FedEx.

What's interesting and annoying about this 'Acura Nav' issue is that I see very recent information in the restaurant section - restaurants that only opened a few years ago are in there, so clearly the 'overall' database has been updated recently. Yet I've failed to find two Costco's in my area, one of which opened about 8 years ago.

Regarding this particular Fed Ex issue - I tried Fed Ex, FedEx, Federal Express, 'Fed<search>', 'Federal<search>', etc. I did get several hits for each of these attempts, but typically I'd get some location in Tennessee, or Florida, or whatever (I'm in CA). Each 'result' requires you to navigate down a few links before you discover it's a stupid listing, so it's a time consuming and frustrating process. My overall conclusion, based on two pretty 'mainstream' examples (Costco and Fedex), is that they have done a piss-poor job of managing their 'places' database. As a former database programmer and data analyst, I think there's really no excuse for this - it was obviously a badly managed project with poor QA.

Acura should provide a way to get user-feedback on the database ... user-supplied corrections, and offer a 'prize' (a free update DVD perhaps!) when your updates are validated. But page 108 of the nav owners manual tells you they are not interested in any feedback on the POI info. They do encourage map corrections, sending you to update.navteq.com (also page 108 of manual) and once there, the navteq page seems to allow for POI corrections ... but since they don't show the POI's, it's not clear how to 'correct' them.

Anyway, for me, it's going to be google on my cell phone to get address, then transfer that to the NAV system. I'd use 411 also, but my company freak out when they see charges for 411 calls on the corporate cell phone bill!

 

Next time try 1-800-FREE-411... same info with a 15 second advertisement first. Your company will appreciate it

 

Google runs "1-800-GOOG-411" (1-800-466-4411) which is free, with no ads when I used it a couple of months ago.

It's a preset on my cell in case I 'm not in the TL, or the Navi doesn't locate what I need.