Frustrated with ST!

Wiki Projects & Stories
22

Speaking up here myself. I have had issues with the ST Presence senors as well. However, my issues were related to interference in the 2.4 GHZ band.

A couple of things that I have done to resolve my issues here. First let me state that I have a 3000 sq ft house that is all one one floor, makes it a bit difficult to manage wireless communications here.

  1. I moved the Router and ST Hub to a central location
  2. Despite the central location, purchased a longer ethernet cable to assure that the router and hub were not close together (meaning for me 4 ft away)
  3. Set the Presence time out in the IDE for the HUB to 10 minutes (reduced errors when there was interference for a moment (Microwave, etc.)
  4. Went around the house, using a wi-fi signal strength meter to asses weak areas, and removed or added as needed additional access points or signal repeaters to improve signal strength.

I agree with others, that the mesh is very important. It is not perfect but it works well enough for my family.

Also, for phones, I have given up on the ST app, not sure why they cannot get that to work reliably. Would seem pretty simple to realize that you are at home and connected to the wi-fi or similar process. I currently use Life360 for this purpose, and it has the additional benefits of letting me see where my family was last located over the time of a day.

All my lights in my house are non-dimmer based. So it appears that other than scheduling and the occasional IFFFT issue, that things are working consistently. I am finding that Sunrise/Sunset is not reliable but
 I can work around that for the moment.

ST is working hard and I believe that what we are experiencing is a growth issue. I will be continuing to work with them,and will give them time to resolve the issues. Is it frustrating when things do not work, YES. But, when everything works well, I am just as equally pleased

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23

If your SmartThings hub is sitting on top of/ next to your wifi router/microwave oven/cordless phone/baby monitor/fish tank, this might be correct or if you have a neibour blasting high powered wifi, this can also be correct.

Every home will pose a different challenge, in my case my home is only 1000 sq/ft with 2 stories, but took 3 zigbee devices with in 20ft of each other plus the hub to get the fobs to work reliably due to LOTS of interference as I live in a condo complex that’s next door to a condo complex that’s across the street from a condo complex.

Your home will also pose its own unique challenges, but it is also possible your presence sensor is a dud and for that there is support@smartthings.com and support@smarthtings.co.uk.

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Last week I’ve changed my phone to a new one - Nexus 6p. I followed instructions given to me by the ST Support - first delete my existing phone presence from ST and then add new one.
Well that did it for ST. All of a sudden it would determine my presence at 4am and turn on the light in hallway and open my lock, while I am sleeping sound and being oblivious to the fact of completely unlocked front door. It happened twice in 3 days. I have since took off the “unlock lock” command from the routine. It would also behave strangely by turning some lights off at the “Night Mode” virtual button and leaving other lights on. Some lights I can easily turn off from my phone and some I can’t turn off or on at all. These are random lights, for instance it was my bedroom lights one day, and now they are working, while kitchen lights are acting out.
I have rebooted ST (and no, I don’t have batteries to keep it on) by taking off the power cord. Still not behaving nicely. For instance, this morning I left the house and it shows that my phone is away (while my wife’s phone present, which is correct), but it did not perform the “I am Away” routine.

What is going on with ST???

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25

My frustrated conversation with the ST support this morning:

Me: hello
ChrisP: hi
ChrisP: how can I help you?

Me: Last week I’ve changed my phone to a new one - Nexus 6p. I followed instructions given to me by the ST Support - first delete my existing phone presence from ST and then add new one. Well that did it for ST. All of a sudden it would determine my presence at 4am and turn on the light in hallway and open my lock, while I am sleeping sound and being oblivious to the fact of completely unlocked front door. It happened twice in 3 days. I have since took off the “unlock lock” command from the routine. It would also behave strangely by turning some lights off at the “Night Mode” virtual button and leaving other lights on. Some lights I can easily turn off from my phone and some I can’t turn off or on at all. These are random lights, for instance it was my bedroom lights one day, and now they are working, while kitchen lights are acting out. I have rebooted ST (and no, I don’t have batteries to keep it on) by taking off the power cord. Still not behaving nicely. For instance, this morning I left the house and it shows that my phone is away (while my wife’s phone present, which is correct), but it did not perform the “I am Away” routine.

Me: yeah, as you can see, a LOT OF PROBLEMS
Me: so maybe we can start with the latest one
Me: why ST did not trigger “I am Away” routine when my phone registered away?
ChrisP: ok thanks
ChrisP: as I pull up your account
ChrisP: there are a few more things we can do to get mobile presence working
ChrisP: the next step would be to have your wife also delete mobile presence from her phone, and add it back
ChrisP: are both of you using your own accounts to login? OR are you using one account on both phones+
Me: one account
Me: how is deleting mobile presence help?
ChrisP: ahh, ok that is why it is doing this behavior
Me: What do you mean?
Me: I was told that ST does not have capability of having two different accounts yet
ChrisP: so mobile presence needs to have two separate accounts logged in to SmartThings
ChrisP: right, that was turned off while they worked on it for the last bit
ChrisP: but it is coming back soon, possibly this next week
ChrisP: We have released it internally
Me: so you are giving me advise for something that is still not exist on your end
ChrisP: as of Monday
ChrisP: and are testing it
Me: Yes, but I as a consumer still cannnot use it
Me: this set up was working perfectly for the whole week
Me: however, as you can see, the ST
Me: registers that my phone is away
Me: if so, it should perform “My phone away” routine
Me: no?
ChrisP: right now it thinks there is only one phone, so if yours went away, it may have moved to present on your wifes
ChrisP: and not run that routine, since it thinks they are the same
Me: Did you see my routine settings?
ChrisP: looking at each of them
Me: Ok, please do.
Me: What you need to see basically is
Me: “GoodBye Edgar” routine
Me: and then take a look at my Activity Feed
Me: to see that ST understands that my phone has left, at 7:40am
Me: but for some reason, it did not initiated routine "GoodBye Edgar"
ChrisP: right, that makes sense, pulling up each of those to verify that
ChrisP: but also to let you know, if you are both logging in with the same email address, despite it saying you left, on the back end it will cause issues and not perform correctly if you are both logged in with the same email address
ChrisP: yea, I see where your phone said it was not present at 7:40 this morning
Me: Let me repeat it once more - ST did not have this issue last week. It was registering me leaving ok, it was registering my wife leaving home ok, performing routines, on leaving and coming
ChrisP: I understand, and appreciate you clarifying
ChrisP: you saw your mobile presence working last week
ChrisP: for both you and your wife
ChrisP: and was performing routines, leaving and coming correctly
ChrisP: did I get that right?
ChrisP: just want to make sure you and I are on the same page
Me: yes
ChrisP: ok great.
ChrisP: So we have seen, when two people are logged in with one email address, it will start to cause issues on the back end, as it was designed to have them login separately
ChrisP: so those issues may not happen immediately
ChrisP: but over time will absolutely cause issues.
ChrisP: thankfully, we are releasing a fix that will make this work more consistently for you
Me: Do you have an ETA when it will be released to the public?
ChrisP: we are testing the account sharing internally, and if we don’t hit any snags this week, or even if we do and they are addressed quickly, next week should be released

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26

@Edgar_Igor_Tsissar when I first joined ST, both me and my wife were using the same account on iOS. Most part it was working for weeks but it did eventually fail for the exact reason that Chris P stated. The right way is to register the two mobile devices as two separate mobile presence devices. Unfortunately that functionality has been pulled back for now.

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Preoccupying. I purchased the 6P yesterday and didn’t think about ST. Sigh


28

Yesterday at night, it again opened the door while I was out, but my wife was home. I deleted my wife’s phone from ST to see if it will fix anything. If ST does not come out with the fix next week, I will be calling quits and returning hub. My whole reason to choose ST Hub to ensure that it recognizes phones and operates based on it. If it opens my entry doors during the night time or evenings when I am not home then it is endangerment to my family and a HUGE flow in the system.

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@Edgar_Igor_Tsissar I would advise you to remove the lock from ST until there is a fix. Even though I live in a safe town, I wouldn’t like my door to unlock by itself. Put a ticket with support if you haven’t done it by now.

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30

It’s not the phone. I have a ticket in on random unlocking since the last platform update, something I’m pretty sure never happened before.

I am mostly homebound, use a wheelchair and spend most of my time in one of two rooms. The doorlock is in one of those rooms and the other one is the next one over where I hear it when it unlocks. Also, my dog is trained to run over to the door when I unlocks, so that’s two of us who would have to miss it.

It’s unlocked all on its own at least three times in 10 days, possibly more. Once in the morning, twice at night, no actuating events in the log.

We are moving it to a non-SmartThings controller this week. It’s a major safety issue for us, not because of a burglar coming in, but because of my service dog thinking he’s supposed to go out and opening the door for himself. The whole reason I got a door with an auto lock was so that I could feel confident that the door would always be locked in a way that the dog could not open unless a person had intentionally opened it for him. So the person undoes the deadbolt, and the dog works the lever handle.

If the door unlocks on its own, the dog can work the handle and go out. Not good. So while I’m sure there will be a fix eventually, I can’t wait.

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I agree, I believe its a BS that ST support feeding us. They made something in their updates that triggers these horrible acts of home no home actions which in turn locks/unlocks doors locks. Also, its not just locks, but some of my lights been acting out as well - showing always on, or not communicating with hub one day and ok next day.
This is HORRIBLE they (ST) should be all over it because it is a SECURITY and SAFETY issue caused on their end.
What if because there is an unlocked door burglar can come in to the house unsuspected by owners? What would happen if that family gets killed in the process? Who the F be responsible for it? The product ST sold me clearly identified that I can trigger smart locks, lights, etc with their Hub. Nowhere in their advertising I saw “Caution your door can be unlocked during night time and you can become a victim to the burglar”. Also, I never read that this is a beta item and it is still in development and many options may not work properly or act on you one or the other way depends on the update. Anyone?
If it is testers they are looking for I understand it, give the item for free and monitor its activity. But selling this as a fully built product - unacceptable.

I am tired of half a$$ baked products released to a market for the early adapters to do all the testing. It seems to be a trend in the new Millennium, product is barely working, full of bugs, but nevertheless, it is being released to the public. Why? Release product later, but make sure it WORKS!

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@JDRoberts @Edgar_Igor_Tsissar as you both know, (especially JD), ST is a work in progress. I have had locks unlocking before this update, and honestly I have a check in place to relock if that should happen. However, it is still an issue and ST needs to figure out what has destabilized their system. Maybe too many updates in too short of a time, maybe no QA checking? Not sure what the overall issue is, but when JD walks away it is a sad day for ST.

Like I have said in prior communications, ST lack of communication to the customers is what is most upsetting. I think we can call adjust to this, if we know what is wrong and what the plan is to fix the hub,

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ST has been owned by Samsung, a multinational consumer electronics corporation, for over a year now. When I buy a Samsung TV, a dishwasher or a fridge, I expect it to work 24/7 as advertised. Last time I checked, there was no warning on SmartThings box, saying “Beware! Work in progress”.

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I bought a product that said “Samsung SmartThings” on the box. It didn’t say “Startup SmartThings”. This is what frustrates people the most.

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Yes, most users who have been on this forum for more that a year have been very patient and forgiving, discounting all the recurring reliability issues as “growing pains” and recognizing the SmartThings has a “potential” to become an excellent HA product. However, after more that two years on the market, an acquisition by one of the largest consumer electronics company in the world and a complete overhaul of both the hardware and the mobile app, this can no longer be an excuse.

We have critical bugs that affect many users that go unfixed for two month and more, we have almost daily reliability issues, we have new bugs introduced with every backend update, we have some mysterious events that no-one can give a reasonable explanation for. We’re in exactly the same quagmire we were a year ago, if not worse. Only this time there’s nothing to look forward to. The V2 has been out for more than two month and made no difference at all.

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I couldn’t agree more. I work for a company that supply capital equipments to Samsung and the expectations they put on us is beyond reasonable so maybe it’s time they get their shit together.

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37

I still look forward to the future, but I think the future will be next summer when they have to have something to compete with a more robust HomeKit ecosystem. (Which isn’t here yet)

My personal opinion, which I know is unpopular, is that Samsung bought SmartThings not for the technology, and not for the user base. They bought it for the name and the history of good reviews and the ability to keep themselves top of mind with journalists covering the IOT industry. So that two years from now in 2017 when their appliance and home entertainment devices are all IOT capable, they can use the SmartThings name and there will be this long history attached to it showing them as leaders in the space.

Which leaves the original SmartThings management with that amount of time to prove that their product/service is in fact a viable offering moving forward.

Like I said, I know that’s not a popular opinion. It just seems to me to fit the facts about where Samsung (not the SmartThings division) has put its IOT time, money, and energy since the acquisition. And in the conflict between statements from the ST founders saying “we’re not going to release it until it’s ready” and what we saw released timed for the big Samsung keynote speeches.

“Your life is your philosophy” and Samsung’s target market for the last year has clearly, it seems to me, been journalists and industry analysts.

But what do I know? :sunglasses:

But, that’s why i am hopeful. As long as HomeKit was vaporware, Samsung only had to compete on the vaporware level. Something in the field was better than nothing.

Now that HomeKit is becoming a real mass-market product, that puts more pressure on Samsung (again, not the SmartThings executive team) to produce something real that can compete. Or they won’t be winning any IOT product of the year awards for 2016.

I don’t know if that something will have anything to do with SmartThings as we know it today. I do hope it will. And I think we’ll know the answer by summer of 2016.

meanwhile, it just comes down to whether you’re getting enough value out of the existing system for the time and money you’re putting into it. And that calculation is different for everyone.

JMO.

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Respectfully, I disagree. Back in summer 2014, the user base was pretty small. My estimate was no more than 50,000 users, of which only half may have been “active”. Technology, on the other hand, was very promising - a cloud-based service, exactly what all the big wigs were craving for. Besides, Samsung had to show something to investors to counterbalance Apple’s HomeKit announcement and Google’s Nest acquisition. So, based on this, I believe the acquisition was mostly technology-driven.

You’re exactly right that the major outcome of this acquisition was supposed to be integration of SmartThings hub into every 2017 Samsung Smart TV model, so that Samsung can sell all their smart appliances (their biggest money maker) as an integrated Smart Home solution. This means that SmartThings has exactly one year to deliver a product that will potentially be sold to several hundred thousands of non-technical customers every year. Not geeks, not home automation junkies, but regular customers who don’t care about protocols, network topology, polling frequency, device handlers, etc. Can you imagine what it’s going to do to support and how many frustrated customers will be yelling and screaming and demanding a refund?

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Or not. We obviously don’t know what Samsung’s strategy is. Putting hub technology into a TV set in and of itself doesn’t mean they would be launching into the existing ST ecosystem. An alternative could be relatively limited functionality available through a connected TV, and not necessarily marketed as “SmartThings”. Think, limited private label (haha, Samsung) subset of ST. As you correctly observe, they certainly didn’t make the acquisition for customer base or revenue model or present financials, or any of the normal acquisition motives.

For all we know, ST could just be a sandbox to shake things out – what works, what is problematic, what is rock solid (hahaha), etc. Use it as a lab, as the leading edge experiment, but not as the main consumer vehicle for [fill-in-the-blanks] some strategy yet to be manifest around Samsung appliances.

Of course, all of this is rank (as in stinky) speculation, not worthy of much thought or dialog.

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40

Ok, that is it for me.

Last night, I was seating in my living room, maybe 10 feet from the HUB and all of a sudden it shuts down all of the lights and closing my door. I look a the ST app and I see that I have left house! Really? In 5 minutes I have arrived back and door was opened for me, while all this time I have not moved an inch from the couch.
Mind that my wife’s phone was deleted from the system for at least a day, so definitely not her being on my account problem. Good bye DumbThing from Samsung. Maybe I will be back in a year if they get their act together.

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This happened to me once. It actually arm my alarm so when the kids started running around the siren went off. I’ve learn not to rely on presense sensor again. I am now trying to build a better presense detection system. I have an ultransonic car detector in the garage now so If the car is parked then ST thinks i’m home. Still trying to figure how I can AND the car detector with the phone as my presense (2 factors presense sensing).