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dbedich's profile

Thursday, July 13th, 2023 7:10 AM

Alarm went off in middle of the night and stopped by itself

In the middle of the night the alarm went off for a few seconds. It was in ‘Home’ mode. The alarm then stopped by itself, and the base station said it synchronized the settings.

There isn’t any even in the timeline of the alarm going off or any of the sensors being tripped. I did not see any signs of entry or attempted entry.

What happened with the alarm? Why did it go on and off by itself?

Captain

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6.1K Messages

1 year ago

@dbedich Suggest you call SS support and ask. Please post their reply and explanation to you here if you get a chance.

4 Messages

1 year ago

@@captain11 I called SS support. They said it was a Test Signal that they sent at 1:39am.

Here's a summary of what I asked and their answers:
Q: Why did my alarm randomly go off in the middle of the night and my base station say "Synchronized Settings"?

A: It was a Test Signal.

Q: Why would you send a Test Signal at 1:39am?

A: That is when my system always has Test Signals sent.

Q: Why did the alarm go off for this Test Signal?

A: I didn't really get an answer for this. Test Signal make the alarm go off for 4 seconds. Support made it sound like this is normal functionality.

Q: Can I change the time I get a Test Signal so the alarm doesn't go off in the middle of the night
again?

A: Yes, it can be changed. They changed it to a better time for me.


Q: How often will this Test Signal happen and make the alarm go off? It hasn't happen for the 5+ years I've had SimpliSafe.

A: It will happen ever 24 hours at my new Test Signal time.

Q: Will the alarm sound every 24 hours when the Test Signal is sent?

A: Yes. It will sound for 4 seconds.

Q: Why would the alarm start going off every 24 hours when it never has done that in the past?

A: That is how the system works. It is only for 4 seconds.

Q: There is no way the system works like that. It hasn't ever done that before. Why would the alarm go off ever 24 hours? Why would I want that to happen?

A: That is how the system works with the Test Signal. It is only for 4 seconds. It's to make sure your SimpliSafe system works.

Q: Why would I want the alarm to sound every 24 hours?

A: That is how the system works. It will only go off for 4 seconds. They can make it not go off, which I told then to change.

Q: Why was I not notified that there was a Test Signal?

A: It is in your event Timeline in the app.

Q: Why don't I see it in my Timeline in the app or on the website?

A: Delete the app and re-download it. If you still don't see the Test Signal in the Timeline, call back so they can troubleshoot the app. I did this an still don't see the Test Signal event.

This was very unhelpful.
A Test Signal being sent in the middle of the night (or any time of the day) that makes the alarm sounds is absurd. It has never done this before. SS support saying it will happened every 24 hours is insane. No one would buy SS if that was the case.

I guess I will see what happens at my new Test Signal time.
If I can't get this resolved I will be getting rid of SS. 

Community Admin

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3.4K Messages

Hi @dbedich​, 

An Automatic Test Signal is the system's way of checking in with our monitoring center to ensure it is connected. When your system sends a test signal, it should not prompt any audio from your Base Station. I've gone ahead and forwarded your case to our escalated support team - a specialist will reach out to you soon to get to the bottom of this.

4 Messages

@emily_s​ Thank you. It was pretty scary to be woken up in the middle of the night by the alarm, then to have it stop by itself and hear the base station announce settings were synchronized. It was then infuriating to find out it was due to a test signal.

Hopefully the specialist can find out the real issue. Thanks again.

Captain

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6.1K Messages

@dbedich​ As I started reading your post I began feeling my blood pressure rise as this was clearly a situation where a new agent (hopefully new) had no idea what they were talking about. The good news is emily from SS was on top of it very quickly and escalted this to a level that can address it.

In the interim, if I can offer you an alternative configuration for your base, and not how Simplisafe advertises it.

I have been a customer of SS for going on 12 years and, across two generations, I have never, ever configured my base to normally annouce anything, verbally, via lights etc. Borrowning the phrase from a old war movie, "run silent, run deep", the base is ony heard from for an alarm or alert for water leak, temp, smoke co etc.  I use push alerts from the app, SMS texts and emails for all of the configuration I need, tweaked as needed over time.

My base sits quietely in a back bedroom behind a 8x10 picture frame with family photo no drawing any attention, just the way I like it.

Please, if you get a chance, let us all know how this turns out for you here if you get a chance. Thank you!

2 Messages

8 months ago

This very thing happened to me last night!  Very frightening....was there ever any answer?

4 Messages

@JustJ​ I had the old version of the base station and other hardware. My case was forwarded to the support team by @emily_s . They called me a couple of days later, and they sent me new versions of the base station and all the sensors I had.

2 Messages

This just happened to our home system, it’s the second time in over two years this has happened. This is a terrible defect.

(edited)

Community Admin

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3.4K Messages

@jorhimmel​ I see that you have already gotten in touch with our Support team and they are sending your a new Keypad. If you continue to experience this issue again, please let me know and we can troubleshoot further!

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