[SOLVED] Binding an Alexa link to a single Smartthings location

Devices & Integrations
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Hello all,

I have the Smartthings Alexa skill enabled and all works as it should - for the most part.

However, I manage three different locations - my own home and two of friends of mine who are both disabled and heavily rely on their home automations for increased independence.

I can easily look at the status of their devices/hubs/networks through the Smartthings app on my Android phone or the my.smartthings.com portal, simply by switching locations.

The problem is with my Alexa integration - ALL devices from all three locations are passed through to my Alexa account.

Is there any way of just allowing one of the three locations (my home) to integrate with Alexa and not the other two?

I’ve searched here (only old semi-related threads) and on Google and haven’t found a way yet of limiting the Alexa skill to a sinlge Smartthings location.

Any pointers would be most appreciated.

TIA!

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I would create a new SmartThings account and add it as a member to your Location only. Then use that account to link to Alexa instead of your main account.

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@orangebucket - Thanks. I’ve done that, but that means I constantly have to log out of one account and into another on my app to look at/monitor the two other sites. It’s doable, but it would just be so much simpler if I could exclude the other two locations from Alexa.

It’s either that, or carry two phones with me all the time - that’s no bueno either.

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No, what I mean is:

  • Let’s call your existing account with access to all three Locations your preferred account.
  • Create a SmartThings account only to use for linking to Alexa - let’s call it the linking account.
  • Use your preferred account to add the linking account as a member of just the one home Location that you want to be available on Alexa.
  • Use the linking account to connect to Alexa instead of your preferred account, giving you just the one Location on Alexa.
  • Continue using your preferred account to access all three Locations on your phone and just leave the linking account alone.

The only time you need to actually access the linking account is to accept access to the Location and to connect it to Alexa. After that you only need to touch it if there is a problem with the connection to Alexa, or if you think of somewhere else that you want to add just the one Location too.

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Ah, that makes a lot of sense - I like that approach.

Let me give that a try (I’ll report back!).

Thanks for clarifying - that helps a lot.

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That worked perfectly. I had to manually delete 70+ devices from Alexa because the Alexa app devs decided not to allow bulk delete (what a pain). But… it’s all working as it should now. Thanks again for the direction - much appreciated!

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