Apple HomeKit stuck at "Discovering your device. Please wait."

[PR-UK]

Hi,

I made the mistake of removing my Arlo base station from HomeKit and am now stuck trying to reconnect it to HomeKit, could you reset the token for me to?

Thanks,

[Malcot2002]

Could I get a reset as well, maybe that is what's keeping mine from being added to Homekit!!

[8r1an]

Guess I’m going to add my comment here for a token reset, to get on the list for a possible fix whenever Arlo’s engineer’s can figure it out.  

[Jriner]

I have the same issue. Not sure if a token rest works or not, but these cameras and base station are expensive paperweights without it. Any help here from support?

[Davood]

I'm also getting stuck on the "Requesting Homekit info..." screen. Is a token reset going to work or should I wait for a fix?

[Montfleur77]

Token resets doesn’t work for this issue in my own personal experience in addition to statements in multiple threads.

What annoys me more than the issue itself is the lack of response and updates in the matter from Arlo.

[Viorelmail]

Please send a reset token, I want to add again my cameras to HomeKit.

[HardernTim]

Im trying to add my base station to HomeKit and I can’t seem to get past the “Discovering your device. Please wait.” screen

The base station had been added to HomeKit before but I had removed it and can’t seem to get it back on.

[cantona]

@JamesC  We have been waiting this issue to be resolved by the engineers. However, after few weeks later there is no information or update from your team.  Like @MGEllis said your customer service is terrible.  I am totally disappointed to Arlo. 

[Montfleur77]

Maybe we need to start reaching out to other channels to get som attention from Arlo concerning this. Tech review sites, Reddit forums etc might be a way to aim the spotlight at Arlo. In my opinion, it shouldn’t take weeks to sort this out if you actually cared.

[notasausage]

Bought the Arlo Pro 2 setup a while back but recently wanted to get it connected to my HomeKit setup and just ran into the dreaded "Requesting HomeKit info..." screen. I just figured it was something I was doing wrong, but after a bit of Google searching I ended up here.

For the record, I have never added my Arlo base station or cameras to HomeKit previous. And I have a fresh Home setup after running into issues with the Logitech Circle View Doorbell (that's another story altogether).

How is this not communicated to customers who may not be tech savvy enough to track down this issue on a message board?

Arlo team, what's your timeline for resolving this?

[joshuanoakes1]

I assume it would be pointless asking for a reset token given what everyone else is saying but would it be possible for any Arlo Staff / Mods to send my system a reset token, thanks.

[dsquared1]

It's unbelievable how poorly handled this is.  Actual Arlo Support is DOA, no correspondence to the community for days.  Nothing on the Arlo Status page letting your "customers" know that something is amiss.  As someone who works in the industry, this kind of prolonged downtime COMBINED with complete breakdown in communication should be treated as a resume generating event - did you have one dev running the show who quit?

Customers should start emailing the VP of Engineering directly.

[cax852]

Just tried reset token and there is no luck for me, so far I ordered two sets of VMB5000 + Arlo Ultra I thought it is the hardware issue at the beginning. Both fail to add devices to Homekit. As the another thread mention I found later on, now can definitely confirm its not related to hardware but server issue alone. I am really disappointed for a security camera at this premium price tag and such a irresponsible react to their customer for a feature related bug. Returned it both at the end and will blacklist this brand... So sad there are not much brand that is not made in China nor owned by Chinese company.

[KnightRyder]

The token request will not fix the issue.  Pretty sure we are all going to have to wait for an app update to get HomeKit to work with the Arlo cameras again.  I suspect it should be coming soon? Not sure why Arlo can’t just re-release an older version of the app where it worked… unless they have a bigger issue to figure out.  

[cantona]

I bought this a half month ago because of homekit support and found it is not working on homekit,  it is so poor support of Arlo!!!! it has been a half month more without any news or announcement!! all people just waiting for this to be fixed!  

This is totally disappointed that i am consider to blacklist this company if it still cannot be resolved. 

[cantona]

@JessicaP @JamesC  I think you guys should come out and speak something here.

[kritch83]

I'm also getting stuck on the "Requesting Homekit info..." screen... try a token reset? 

[KnightRyder]

I’ve had this product for almost 2 years now. It’s a good product for the cost and is pretty much the only system which offers free 7 day recordings. This has worked well with HomeKit for
me in the past. I know it’s frustrating and I’m not making excuses for Arlo, I’m also a bit annoyed, but am confident we will have a fix soon. This does still work with the Arlo app in the meantime… although I really miss the automation choices I had set-up which worked through HomeKit with other devices.

[Terrychhk]

I have smae problem too! How it's fix?

[Montfleur77]

It’s seems we just have to wait for Arlo to fix this and we have now clue when it will be since the only info from Arlo for the last weeks has been that they are working on it. I’m considering jumping ship and switch to EufyCam instead.

[dsquared1]

No excuses for lack of communication. One can only hope the delay in fixing is because the devs are adding reset token functionality (which is probably less than a day of work if you're not clueless). It's pathetic that people have to come here, figure out they need a token reset, and ask for said "token reset" on a forum.. What a burden on the customer. The user is already authenticated in the app, just add a button to "reset my homekit token" with a warning that HomeKit will need to be re-connected.

[cantona]

It is not about reset token, reset token won't help anything this time - this is already stated by arlo forum moderator here previously. I think it is something very serious problem with apple so that arlo cannot disclose it and no a quick solution yet so there is no anything update for a long period from arlo officially. 

[Montfleur77]

Well, this is it for me, after many years of owning Arlo products, upgrading to Pro 3 a week ago to get the HomeKit support I’ve now returned the Pro 3’s and ordered EufyCams instead. Expecting delivery on Sunday. I wish you all good luck and a thanks for nothing goes to Arlo.

[dsquared1]

I understand it's not about the reset token, I was merely mentioning it as an example of the priorities of this company - if the fix is so slow in coming, it would be more forgivable if it is a systematic fix for multiple HomeKit issues, with 'reset token' being an example, as opposed to "let's just hack something together to get us by" and we'll have a similar issue again in the future.

Consider:

1) There are multi-page threads where people request some token reset from my customer support team.

2) Support people have to go to some internal portal and reset a token, or run a script, or perhaps even ping a dev to go monkey in some database.

How it works in a successful company:

Support team brings up an issue such as this to Product ("We spend 10 hours per week performing token resets, can this be automated?")

Product team asks Dev team: "How long would it take for you to implement something that would reduce this workload on Support?")

Dev team sees that Support is doing a routine action on behalf of the customer (hopefully authenticating the customer in the process (guessing our community accounts are the same as in the app)), and realizes that:

    1) the dev team already has an interface where the customer is authenticated (the app) where it would be trivial to

    2) add a button to perform said routine action for the customer, on behalf of the customer.

Instead we get pop-up ads when logging into the app...

It's not actually a failure of the dev team, or the support team, it is a management failure.

[adammiarka]

Pinged the Matthew McRae directly on Twitter.  He responded that this issue will be addressed in the 3.5.1 update for the Arlo app.  It's currently pending approval in the App store.  

Was pulling my hair out trying to get this fixed, even after multiple reset tokens.  Hopefully app will roll out soon.