topic Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode in Nest Thermostats

Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

Dawdie — Thu, 17 Mar 2022 20:14:33 GMT

So I have 2 nest thermostats which are controlled with Home/Away. Whenever I go out the thermostat goes into eco as expected. Whenever I return home the app shows "Home" and so does the log so it defintatly knows I have returned, but the thermostat however is still stuck in "Eco" mode till I manually turn it off.

I have all the "learning" stuff off (Auto Schedule/True Radiant) so I have no idea what I need to do to fix this aside from just turning home/away off and putting the old thermostats back in.

Potential fix (using google home not the nest app) https://www.googlenestcommunity.com/t5/Nest-Thermostats/Home-Away-Assist-returning-home-always-stuck-in-eco-mode/m-p/124991/highlight/true#M27093

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

DavidE — Thu, 04 Nov 2021 17:30:16 GMT

I have the exact same issue. Sometimes I come home, the Home/Away Assist registers that I am home, but the thermostat stays in Eco mode, so the heating doesn't come on. (I have Home/Away Assist set to use phone location only, not the motion sensor, and I have the Nest app running OK and active.)

Here are screen shots showing that. Home/Away Assist registered that I got home at 16:47, but at 17:19 it is still set to "Eco", so no heat. Makes no sense. It knows I am home, and it is within the scheduled heating time, so should be on. I can manually take it out of Eco mode by pressing the controls on the thermostat or in the app, but this should be automatic.

https://imgur.com/a/OCODIb7

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

NestUser2 — Thu, 04 Nov 2021 18:25:33 GMT

Exactly the same issue here...

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

Treemonkey83 — Tue, 09 Nov 2021 19:38:08 GMT

Same here, strange that it use to work just fine but not any more.

For the price of the unit and the status of the brand this is really not good enough!

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

ColnagoJules — Mon, 15 Nov 2021 18:05:25 GMT

Same problem for me. It used to work OK, but now doesn't. (It seems to fail when I've been out of the house for a few hours.) I really wish I hadn't bought this lousy product. My old Honeywell Lyric worked beautifully and you could also set the radius for the (very reliable) geofencing feature.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

Windymiller — Mon, 15 Nov 2021 18:58:18 GMT

Same issue here, contacted support and was told to do a factory reset. That made no difference. Did an update break something?

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

dmack4242 — Mon, 15 Nov 2021 23:49:14 GMT

Mine has been doing the same thing. Phone app knows we are home, but Nest doesn't come out of ECO Mode. This has started pretty recently, I am guessing they broke something.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

NestPenguin — Mon, 22 Nov 2021 02:01:19 GMT

Exact same issue recently. Stuck in eco mode when coming home. I manually set it, to test, it didn't respond to home/away at all.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

Dawdie — Mon, 22 Nov 2021 13:15:59 GMT

So I found out (by mistake) if I come home and leave everything alone for like 15 - 30 minutes the heating will eventually turn itself out of eco mode. Its almost like there is an internal timer before "eco" switches off returning from home. Obviously I don't want to freeze so most time I just end up manually taking it out of eco

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

Badgerbuchanan — Mon, 22 Nov 2021 20:56:57 GMT

I’ve literally got the same issue and it’s driving me crazy! Been researching everywhere for answers but found nothing and then stumbled on this thread. Glad it’s not me on one hand but still very frustrated it’s not working as it used to. Used to work perfect. Did notice on the nest unit the last software update date was from couple of weeks ago so I’m hoping it’s a software glitch which will be fixed soon.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

NestPenguin — Tue, 23 Nov 2021 06:40:48 GMT

I just let it run, without touching it, and mine is also turning on with a few minutes delay, so it looks like it's definitely a software bug. Weirdly, it's only just been happening to me, and I noticed that there was a software update a few days ago, so maybe mine updated late, and they have screwed it up.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

ColnagoJules — Tue, 23 Nov 2021 18:04:02 GMT

It's really annoying, isn't it?

In any case the Home/Away assist function has a basic design flaw: the geofencing radius is so small that, even when it works and the heating comes on when the app says you're 'home', the house hasn't really warmed up when you walk in through the door. What's needed is a system that will switch on the heating when, say, you're within a couple of kilometres from home. Ho hum.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

DavidE — Wed, 24 Nov 2021 08:49:52 GMT

Yes, I must admit I thought when I bought the product that it did something like that!

But I can see reasons why that would be difficult ... if you went out to the shops or park about 1km from home, and were moving around, it might not be obvious whether you were moving away from or towards home, and you wouldn't want the heating constantly switching on and off!

Instead what I've done after being out on a winter evening is to remotely set the unit to "Home" before catching the train home, so the house was warm when I got home. That worked pretty well, but less well now if it just puts the unit into "Eco" mode and doesn't actually bring on the heating.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

Noggie — Thu, 25 Nov 2021 18:51:47 GMT

Same issue for me too, grrrrrr

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

Badgerbuchanan — Thu, 25 Nov 2021 19:01:26 GMT

Surely google / best must be aware of the issue and must be trying to fix it? It would be nice if they could acknowledge the issue and say they are working on a fix as opposed to no communication and the helpline being no help and suggesting it’s my phone that’s the problem

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

NestPenguin — Thu, 25 Nov 2021 19:30:00 GMT

This tends to be the worst thing about these products. Google randomly breaks so many things, and there is no way of knowing if it is my fault or their fault. They give generic troubleshooting tips, but you may end up trying to fix something that you were never able to fix because it is their issue.

It's like when there were issues with the WiFi connectivity on 5 GHz bands, and they would only work on my BT router if I forced 2.5 GHz only. They gave everyone troubleshooting tips, etc., but I went on the live chat, and the guy told me that the development team are aware of the issue, which they eventually fixed months later. Well, it would be nice if they had a list of every single issue they are aware of, instead of giving us the run around, and gave us some kind of indication that it is currently being fixed or has been fixed.

95% of the time Google's programming is the issue. It's hardly ever the user, lol.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

ArchStanton — Fri, 26 Nov 2021 22:07:39 GMT

This is my third year of using nest Thermostat and worked well until heating season started 2 months ago. Same problem as everyone else here. Now not coming out of eco mode when I return home despite Thermostat recognising that I am home from phone location. Very occasionally it might switch out of eco mode after a few minutes but mostly doesn't. I assume this must be a result of a bad software upgrade as all was well until recently.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

DavidE — Sun, 28 Nov 2021 17:39:55 GMT

As others have said my system does eventually switch out of Eco mode. Monitored the other day and it took around 35 minutes. Monitored again today, and it took an hour and 40 minutes; got home and the system switched immediately to "Home" at 15:40, but did not switch out of "Eco" mode and bring the heating on until 17:20. I don't think that delay should be there, or used to be there - so it just seems like a software fault.

Does anyone from Google / Nest monitor these forums?

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

ArchStanton — Sun, 28 Nov 2021 21:32:42 GMT

Sometimes it does come on after a while but there is no set time for time for this and it is very rare. A few days ago I came home and the nest switched to home as expected. I then sat in the cold for 3 hours before I gave up and finally switched it out of eco mode so it can't always be trusted to come on itself. I have contacted support on twitter and sent them screen shots of my nest app stuck in eco mode and the setting. I am awaiting a reply. It is frustrating as I paid a bit for the nest as it has this ability that its cheaper competitors do not have. If this is a permanent issue then I see no point in paying more for the nest.

Re: Home/Away Assist, returning home always stuck in eco mode

Lingers91 — Tue, 30 Nov 2021 15:33:10 GMT

Yep I've been having the exact same problem and complained to two different agents nd did a full reset and uninstall the app. Neither were willing to escalate the issue further, or maybe they couldn't? Not sure how to make Google aware that their software is broken. No heating for more than an hour after returning and geofencing is defo broken. Wish there was a way of feeding back that there's a problem.