Stay away from new app

[razrback99]

Unless forced, do not upgrade to the new app. It is so buggie, even a programmer like myself can’t tell what the heck it’s doing. Geo fencing seems to only work one way, if it works when you leave, it won’t work when you return or it won’t work when you leave but works when you return, which is stupid because it never armed to start with. You can’t tell who it thinks is still in geofence anymore.

 Hate to say it but after 7 years with it working very well, may be time for me to look at other providers. I can’t believe they implemented something like this. I would fire the whole damn bunch, revert everyone back to old app and start over.  

[BrookeN]

You will want to start under Routines and then modes. There is three mode options:

Arm Away

Arm Home

Standby

Start with the Arm Away mode ~ once you click on that you will see all your cameras listed. You will want to click on each individual camera and choose each option you are wanting for that individual camera.

Standby Active

Disarm your devices and keep specific ones armed.

Once each section is set up you can now manually change each mode from the dashboard. However, if you want them to change automatically that is when you set up automations and schedules.

You will now click on Automations on the top next to the modes option. Two options will pop up:

Add schedule

Add Arrive/Leave

You will click onto add schedule. From there you can customize a schedule. You can click on the day of the week you are wanting your schedule. and then you can either choose sunrise and sunset. Or you can add on the times you want.

For example: I am going to choose 6:00 pm as my time Monday-Friday. I am going to choose what mode I want it to change to and then the action you are wanting it to do. You can add as many actions that you want.

You will see your saved schedule and then you can add more as needed.

Now that you nave the modes set up as well as the scheduling you will now want to set up the Arrive/Leave.

Under this section of Anyone Arrives you can choose Everyone or You can Choose Specific People. Same as for Everyone Leaves.

You will want to add the Action for what you want to happen if someone arrives home or leaves the home. You can choose for it to either change the mode or Enable/Disable the Automation.

I hope this helps, if you have any questions let me know. 

[razrback99]

Thanks for your reply, but not the issue. The problem is, geofencing doesn’t work, it either doesn’t see  those allowed, or it just sets the system armed (rules are when everyone leaves to arm) when I’m sitting here. I can’t tell which users the system thinks is in or out geofence any longer, but it should see me, the owner of the system. 

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

The problem is, geofencing doesn’t work, it either doesn’t see  those allowed, or it just sets the system armed (rules are when everyone leaves to arm) when I’m sitting here. I can’t tell which users the system thinks is in or out geofence any longer, but it should see me, the owner of the system. 

---

First, you can check the available geofencing devices on your phone by 

• pressing your profile in upper left
• press Privacy Center
• select Available Geofence Devices

The phone you are using is first.  You can edit (or delete) devices using your account.  But if you shared the cameras with "friend" account, then the friend devices need to be edited/deleted using the "friend" accounts.

Sometimes there are dups, so it is useful to log into each device, and edit the name of that device in the list so they are all unique.  Then delete any dups.

As far as the reliability of geofencing triggers, I suggest the following:

• set up Arm Home and Arm Away so they are identical
• set up the Arrive automation so it is always enabled, and switches the mode to "Arm Home"
• similarly, set up Leave so it is always enabled, and switches the mode to "Arm Away".

You will then see the mode switches to "Arm Home" and "Arm Away" in your feed whenever the geofencing triggers.  That makes it pretty easy to see how reliable it is.

Note you can do this on each phone by selecting just that one device in the automations, instead of "anyone arrives" and "everyone leaves".

[razrback99]

Yes, I understand how to see my phone. I can no longer see the status of every phone I have granted access. In the old app, I could see everyone and if arlo thought they were in the zone. At times it would leave someone connected, I could turn their phone off and back on and it would reset. How do I do that now?

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

In the old app, I could see everyone and if arlo thought they were in the zone. At times it would leave someone connected, 

---

Not sure I understand what you are meaning by "leave someone connected".  Are you saying that the system thought they were home, when they were actually away?  Or something else???

[razrback99]

Sorry, yes when the app had someone at a location and they were not, i would uncheck their box save and then recheck and all was well. I believe you said that if the app thinks someone is within the geofence, their name(s) will no longer display grayed out. I haven't specifically seen this happen, may just haven't noticed. I will verify later.

Question - if someone is not grayed out, can i click on them and perform the above.

Other issue, the system does not see my phone, at least at location 1. When all others leave, system (location 1), will arm even though I'm here. As above, my phone displays as grayed out. Please note, I have 2 locations (accounts) and I share between the 2 so I can see both when in the app. One is free, other is pay (not by choice). 

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

Please note, I have 2 locations (accounts) and I share between the 2 so I can see both when in the app. One is free, other is pay (not by choice). 

---

Just to clarify - do you mean two locations in one account?  Or two accounts, which cameras in one being shared with the other?

---

@razrback99 wrote:

I believe you said that if the app thinks someone is within the geofence, their name(s) will no longer display grayed out.

No, I didn't say that.  I believe it is still supposed to do that.  But it's not something I've paid much attention to.  I'll take a look the next time I leave the zone.

[razrback99]

Two email accounts (one for each location) -  two arlo systems

1) Free - base and 5 cameras at one location

2) Pay - base and currently 6 cameras at another location 

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

Two email accounts (one for each location) -  two arlo systems

1) Free - base and 5 cameras at one location

2) Pay - base and currently 6 cameras at another location 

---

It seems likely that geofence triggering for the free account will fail when you are logged into the paid account (and vice versa). Do you think that going on now?

FWIW, with "Feed" you could consolidate to one account with two locations. You could still have a paid plan at one location, but not the other.

[razrback99]

To be honest with you, I'm not sure what it's doing. I am at the free location, logged into the app for free location and able to see pay location since it's being shared. So, it's not seeing me at the free location even though I'm logged into that account. Pay account was set to arm manually when i left several days ago.

Back before the pay account, it worked very well. Since then, I'd more trouble with it working as before, but still manageable. I don't know anything about the FEED option, but if it is the preferred method for multiple locations, pay and free accounts, then I can look into it.

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

I don't know anything about the FEED option,

---

Do you see "Feed" and "Dashboard" in your app menu?  Or do you instead see "Library" ?

[razrback99]

I see Dashboard and Feed

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

I see Dashboard and Feed

---

Then you do know about the "Feed" option...

The "Feed" interface has explicit support for multiple locations.  Each address requires its own subscription, but that doesn't apply in your case since only one of your addresses has a subscription anyway.

Not sure this is "preferred" or not.  But since there would be no switching between accounts on your phone, I think it is more likely to work correctly with geofencing.  Of course it is also possible to use the "Friend" account feature to minimize account switching.

[razrback99]

I was not aware this was possible with Feed. I’ll look into it. 

So, I’ve figured out, for whatever reason, it’s not seeing me at all in either account(regardless of location or login). How do I fix that?

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

So, I’ve figured out, for whatever reason, it’s not seeing me at all in either account(regardless of location or login). How do I fix that?

---

Does "not seeing you at all" mean that you are not seeing your phone in the "Available Geofence Devices" list? Or does it mean something else?

[razrback99]

Means the app does not recognize that I am in the zone to change the mode. Doesn't matter which physical location, nor which login. 

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

Means the app does not recognize that I am in the zone to change the mode. Doesn't matter which physical location, nor which login. 

---

Ok.  So your phone is in the geofence device list.

While normally I only set up Arrive to run in "Arm Away", I have found the following test to be useful:

1. disable the schedule automations
2. set up Arrive and Leave so they are always enabled
3. change both automations so they are only to detect when you arrive and leave

Then you should always see the mode changes listed in the feed when the automations trigger.  With the usual settings, if the system misses "Leave", then it won't enable "Arrive" - which gets in the way of troubleshooting.

There are a couple of phone settings that you might want to double-check - they are included here:

• https://kb.arlo.com/000062822/What-are-Arrive-Leave-Automations-and-how-do-I-set-it-up-for-my-Arlo-s...

With "Feed", Arlo started advising people to keep WiFi enabled on the phone.  If you generally don't do that, you might want to try keeping it that way.

[razrback99]

Made changes to Arrive and Leave. Only iPhone setting not enabled was precise location, it is now. I’ll check tomorrow to e see is anything changed. 

So, my question is, why after 7 years and the app upgrade, it quit detecting the location of my phone? Is this common with the new app? 

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

So, my question is, why after 7 years and the app upgrade, it quit detecting the location of my phone? Is this common with the new app? 

---

Several have reported unreliable triggering, but I haven't seen many posts saying it cannot detect the location at all.  My phone has always shown my location when I go into one of the geofence automations and then selected "Edit Geofence".

[razrback99]

Yeah, that’s what’s so weird, it shows me exactly where I am on the edit geofence map, but it will not trigger when I leave or return, at either location. Of the 4 phones (3 shared), 2 of those work fine, 2 do not. 

I hate to ask this, but should I delete/remove my account and start all over? 

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

I hate to ask this, but should I delete/remove my account and start all over? 

---

Do you have any local cameras that can be connected without a base?

If you do, you could remove just one camera, and add it to a test account (adding it to wifi, not the base).  Then see if the test account behaves differently.

---

@razrback99 wrote:

Yeah, that’s what’s so weird, it shows me exactly where I am on the edit geofence map, but it will not trigger when I leave or return, at either location.

---

Do you have any duplicate devices in your available geofence list?

[razrback99]

Not that I can tell anyway. On Active Device Sessions, I only have 1 showing, labeled iPhone (this device) and has option to Log Out to the right.

Under Available Geofence Devices there is me and other 3 people i have shared.

[StephenB]

---

@razrback99 wrote:

Not that I can tell anyway. On Active Device Sessions, I only have 1 showing, labeled iPhone (this device) and has option to Log Out to the right.

Under Available Geofence Devices there is me and other 3 people i have shared.

---

And you are testing with the automations only set to trigger when you arrive and leave ("specific people")?

Also, are the automations always enabled (just as a test)?

[razrback99]

OK, we have a small victory. For the first time on the new app, it recognized when i left zone and enabled Arm, which is correct. It also, went into Standby when I returned. So, hopefully that part is working. 

On my end yesterday -

• made the changes you suggested last night. I think the only one that i changed was precise location, not sure.
• I had changed the name of my phone. I went back to default - iPhone. 
• I logged out via the app and returned.
• I ensured all settings for both accounts were set the same.

So, 1 or more or happened and it worked. I'll be in and out more tomorrow, to see how it goes. 

May I ask about Routines? If not, I can start another thread.

I thought I could have settings by Mode and Camera. However, it seems to be the same camera settings, at least Arm Away and Arm Home. My use is I'm home but I want my outside camera to only alert if animal, and nothing else. But if I'm gone, I want that camera to be on full alert. Am I confused about functionality of the app or is this not possible?