No longer supporting Text Messages - Getting Worse and Worse

[TheMayor207]

I have been using the same email address for a few years. 5pm yesterday my email alerts stopped. Push alerts are still working fine. I have verified my email address, cycled email alerts on and off, restarted my base station etc. 

nothing is working 

[JamesC]

The Email alerts feature is at end of life and will no longer be supported.

You can read more about the Arlo end of life policy here: https://kb.arlo.com/000063018/Arlo-Legacy-Cameras-End-of-Life

JamesC

[Hallelujah]

I'm afraid the writing has been on the wall for a while.  Incompetent revision process, documented features not working and pitiful response times for security notifications alerts show a lack of operating performance at all levels.  Their model now is that a subscription plan is essential for the system to work as promoted.  Thats why older products are being dumped as the support fabric has been removed and for example geofencing and alerts don't work.  Its appalling and the support/technical teams can't resolve what is a product and legacy customer management disaster.

[666ArloUser666]

I'm amazed Arlo is letting us complain on its website.  That is about the only thing that impresses me about Arlo now.

I'm guessing the company is not going to reverse course on its stupid decision and hopes that, with time, the complaints will simply die down. 

One would think sending out notification emails is not that costly but evidentially it is.    

[Film]

That's what happened when they EOL'ed a bunch of hardware around Januaryish.  Everybody was up in arms and the communities were on fire and then it slowly died down and went away.  This too shall pass..  🙂

I know nothing about Arlo's backend architecture, but I think I read somewhere that all their servers are hosted on AWS.  If that's the case, I think AWS charges for sending emails according to some volumetric tier system or something.  TL;DR - it probably saves Arlo a bunch of money to not send customers emails when push notifications are free.

[Hckyguy1]

Yes.  It will pass, but so will I as a customer.  Cancelled my subscription, and will not spend another dime on Arlo or Netgear ever.  

[Tinman4now]

Yes it will probably die down, but so will it's customer base! As I see the way this company handles it's business and the folks supporting (with their money). I've been using Arlo equipment/services almost 10 years. At one time they had a good product with battery operated cameras. Now there is alot of competion, so its time to look around to a company who is upfront, reliable and trustworthy of my business!

[Tinman4now]

I agree! I'm done spending money on a losing company.

[Hckyguy1]

Agreed.   If the email storage cost with AWS (Amazon Web Services) is the issue, both Ring and Blink are owned by Amazon, so maybe it will be safer to switch to one of those.   Any thoughts?

[Fascinatingfee]

There’s a really simple answer just make the alert option customisable or provide a range of alerts that are very loud and very long and capable of getting your attention in the middle of the night. You wouldn’t think it would be that hard

[lostit]

Without e-mail alerts my Arlo security cameras are useless for me. I've tried to set up web push notifications following various guides, but nothing comes through.

I've enabled push notifications on MS Edge, and Firefox, I've enabled push notifications on my Windows 10 system, but still nothing. Sending notifications to my Android phone would be a real nuisance. Please return e-mail notifications.

Arlo security used to fill all my security requirements, now it is so much junk.

Are you trying to drive existing users to your rivals?

Please reverse this decision.

[StephenB]

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@lostit wrote:

I've enabled push notifications on MS Edge, and Firefox, I've enabled push notifications on my Windows 10 system, but still nothing. Sending notifications to my Android phone would be a real nuisance. 

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It would be good if push notifications worked on PCs.

If you are ok with upgrading the PC to run Windows 11, then you can use the phone link feature in Windows.  Then your all your phone notifications would show up on the PC.  But of course they would also show up on the phone.

This uses Bluetooth, so it would still require the phone to be nearby.

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@lostit wrote:

Please return e-mail notifications.

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FWIW, I hope they do, as I think removing this feature was a mistake.

[lostit]

Unfortunately my computer won't run Windows 11, the specs aren't good enough.

I shall have to look at the TP-Link Tapo system instead. It's a shame as Arlo was good.

You've lost another customer, and I can't in all honesty recommend Arlo to my friends and neighbours.

[BGOSNZ]

Mine runs Windows 11. Desktop notifications do not work. 

[onetuff_z]

The real kick in the nuts with all this is that each time there is a reply to this thread about not getting email notifications.......I get an email notification telling me someone replied.  It's like they are just screwing with us. 

[HMishkoff]

Phone Link also runs on Windows 10.

[lostit]

The point of e-mail notifications  is that I don't have to rely on my phone.

[Film]

I suspect using Phone Link to convert push notifications to desktop notifications might work for some use cases (e.g. people sitting in front of a computer all day that don't have their phones with them), but I think a lot of people used the email alerts the way I did - as an easy check to see what happened while away from the home or overnight.  It was super easy to redirect them to a Gmail folder and then every morning just glance in there real quick and see what happened overnight (animal, person, etc.), view the clips I wanted to see and then delete them.  Yes, I can still accomplish that now but it's less convenient since I have to launch the app or log into the Arlo portal, navigate to the library tab and then either scroll around until I find what I am looking for or click a few times to create a filter.

[lostit]

This post sums up exactly the frustration and inconvenience of removing e-mail notifications. I had a working security solution that was simple and easy to use, until Arlo broke it.

[Tinman4now]

I'm done complaining about email notifications. I can live with that. What I can't live with is the deception, lack of transparency and lack of customer respect. And the new Arlo IOS Secure sucks! It's glitchy and unreliable. I had cameras going off yesterday with "Audio" even thou my settings were turned off. I even recorded movement on a camera I had turned off?

I'm still angry on 11-15-23 Arlo gave my base hub, my previous Arlo IOS app and my previous smart premier plan (I have 10 cameras) EOL forcing me a buy another multi camera plan.

Not sure about about Blink, but now I will research other products that will replace Arlo.

[FRANCK71]

@JamesC

@ShayneS

I have a problem with email notification for some time (not receiving) and changed several times my email address to be used. Now, none of them work...

I red in a post "Pro 2 - no longer receiving email alerts", that the issue may come from my emails being blacklisted.

Could you please white list them again, please?

[StephenB]

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@BGOSNZ wrote:

Mine runs Windows 11. Desktop notifications do not work. 

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Are you using Phone Link?

[CD02118]

Your app update recently eliminated a key feature that some of us relied upon to keep us SAFE and ALERT.  The Arlo app used to allow us to set a text alert via email, which we could then set as a contact in our phones and assign a custom ringtone such as ALARM which would wake us up in the middle of the night when someone was trying to break in.  This was a feature your engineers could not figure out because it took you how long to incorporate custom notifications?  Yet, you still clearly don't understand this feature's value because our new audio notification options are: Default OS Tone, Vibrant, and Marimba.  I didn't buy a security camera to enjoy smooth jazz, I bought a security camera to be alerted from a dead sleep when someone was trying to rob or kill me.  Please fix ASAP.

[RandyQUATTRO]

To think I almost purchased a new Ultra 4 camera dual base station system to replace my aging Pro’s. Wow!!!

And I most certainly didn’t receive any EOL email on this. So shady. Guess I need to start looking too. Darn. 

[DannyBearAgain]

Ditto for me also. My cameras are not even EOL. What was arlo thinking, I still have send email options within my app but it still doesn’t work anymore.

[fdj92592]

Used to have choice between "Push" notifications or "email".  Now I only have the option to check or not check the box to receive "Push" notifications that I don't wish to receive. but would really like to have the email messages again as I've received for the past many years since I installed my system.

Thank you.

[hilscher2017]

I have been with Arlo for a number of years and have been very pleased. But now that you have removed email alerts I am shocked. I see no way of staying with arlo if you are not going to be able to send me alerts via email.    Why did you do this without tell me? I just bought a new camera for my house and also installed 4 new cameras at my cottage. I now receive no alerts.  What is the point of having a security system that doesn't send email alerts? Are you going to reinstate email alerts? thanks I await to hear from you.