I went to my local Mazda dealer and asked them to disconnect that loud, bloody annoying seat-belt alarm. The customer service rep wanted me to sign a waiver to cover his ass and the tech wanted to charge me $109 and said he needed the car for two hours. Well, I didn’t have two hours to spare and so I drove home becoming increasingly angrier as that alarm kept blasting away. I decided when I got home I would look in the owner’s manual and find the phone number for the Mazda Corporate Headquarters. For some reason, I knew they wouldn’t allow me to disconnect it but I was mad and was determined to complain about it. Then, on page 90 were the directions for “Deactivating the BeltMinder Feature."

Follow the steps carefully as one mistake will nullify your success.

1)Make sure parking brake is set.

2)Put gearshift in park.

3)Ignition switch is in the off position.

4)The driver and passenger seatbelts are not buckled.

5)Turn ignition to the run (on) position. (Note: do not start the car.)

6)Wait until the safety belt warning light turns off, about one minute.

7)Step 6 must be completed within 50 seconds after the safety belt warning light turns off.

8)Buckle then unbuckle 9 times ending in the unbuckled state. You must complete this step within 50 seconds after the safety belt warning light turns off.

9)As validation, the airbag light will turn on for 3 seconds.

10)Within 10 seconds of this light turning on, buckle and unbuckle one more time.

This will disable the BeltMinder feature and as confirmation the airbag light will flash four times per second for 3 seconds.

If this doesn’t work, go back and do each step precisely as indicated, it does work!