Google Assistant timers

[ThatMatMik]

I have eight Google devices in my home. When my children attempt to use any of the speakers, which are a variety of shapes and sizes, to set timers, google assistant will say "sorry, im not sure what you mean". There are four users in this household. Myself, my wife and my two children. Both my wife and I can successfully set and stop timers. My children cannot. It's only the timer setting that doesn't work for them. They can start and stop music & ask questions, etc successfully.

Really REALLY annoying

[RamRod78]

The workaround is to go into the family app and remove voice match and personalised results from each kids account.

It takes a while for all the devices to catch-up, but you will get an email for each device saying each kids voice profile has been removed. 

Now they can set timers and turn on tuya devices again.  They can't ask "what's my name", but we can live with that. 

 I also think Google was mistaking my wife for one of our kids l, as she now has no problems and personal results work great again for her.

[LauriJT]

This actually works! Go to home->  nest settings and turn off voice match on device. I actually turned off also personal results. 

Now both kids can set timers, even though smaller one is still not that good at english. 

**bleep** that glitch was driving me mad

[Casaurus]

Thank you! That is super helpful.

Now I just have to decide if I'm ok with my daughter getting the unedited versions of her songs (when it plays from her spotify it won't play ones marked explicit). I'm weighing the options there (she is old enough she aready knows all the words, but I'm still hesitant).

[RamRod78]

What I have done is create a second Spotify account (with a different email than the one used to manage google) for me on our Spotify Family plan. 
My "main" Spotify account  is now the general account for Google Assistant and has explicit filtering turned on in Spotify. When the kids ask google for music, Spotify will do the filtering.
My "second" account is the one I use for Spotify on my phone... This is what I use for work, driving, etc.  I can cast to speakers, and use assistant on my phone or through Android Auto, and the kids requests at home no longer affect my generated playlists.... No more Bluey songs! lol.... 

[Casaurus]

Thank you! This would solve my problems. I had to reset the kitchen hub the other day for other reasons and it isn't recognizeing her anymore, so I might leave it that way in the kitchen where she usually uses timers, but this is a great work around if she starts playing explicit music in the kitchen (which is unlikely in her case)

[ThatMatMik]

I appreciate the work around... But we use voice-match with them as well... 

So they still need to fix this.  

[RamRod78]

That's why it is a work-around and not a fix.... 😆

[piroscavich]

Yeah, exactly.  I know that I can remove voice identification for kids, but the eliminates the whole reason we have accounts for them in the first place - personalized results and parental controls.  How about just fixing the actual problem, which is that setting timers is apparently not allowed for kids for no good reason.

[FrankMThompson]

I agree, but it has to be a big right? If kids couldn't set timers as a "rule" then why the "I don't understand" message. Seems odd.

Still... Google fix your crap!

[FrankMThompson]

Bug, not big

[pinkycrook]

Hey, Google...Fix this problem.

(both my kids can't set timers, or alarms for the current day, only alarms for tomorrow)

[Shambolic]

Same problem here

[AndreyP]

My kids have the same issue 😞

Google please fix the issue

[Nateg411]

I'm having the same issue, my 12 year old cannot set timers and I'm not willing to remove her profile as a workaround for a bug. Lose all personalization to set a timer, doesn't really work for me. Let's get this fixed Google.

[NicMau]

Same. It's incredibly annoying, Timers might be the most used feature in our home by the kids and now I have to set them for them. They could do it, and now suddenly a few weeks ago they can't 

[mva104]

Same here.  Just discovered this and glad to know I'm not the only one.  Neither of my kids can set timers.  Why?!?  Please fix

[De111]

Same in my house.  13 year old can request songs, etc, but not alarms or timers.  Didn't use to happen.  Started a few months back.

What is going on, google?  This is so obviously a widespread issue.  No fix?  Very frustrating.

[JustJoshin]

This thread just solidified my decision to move to Alexa. Google clearly doesn't care, but it's nice to see people sharing work-arounds. Google is making too many silly changes (e.g. cutting integrations with apps, removing speaker features, dropping third party device connections) for me to waste my time with them. 

[Amwebs]

We are also having this problem. My kids can't set their 2 minute timer to brush their teeth anymore. Works fine for the adults in the house.

[prengekp]

This is happening for our household as well. I reached out to Google through Google One support and their response was below.

---

"""

We are made aware of the issue [...] Our engineers are currently working on this issue and as of right now we do not have a specific troubleshooting assistance.

In the meantime, we have a workaround that you can use:

The workaround is to go into the family app> remove voice match and personalized results of the kids account.

(It takes a while for all the devices to catch-up, but you will get an email for the device saying that the kids voice profile has been removed.)

Now you can set timers again but you do not have personal results on.

"""

[De111]

That work around makes sense, but won't that also remove the ability for that person to play songs from their spotify account?

[prengekp]

Yeah, it sounds like the personalization is gone if you follow their workaround, which is less than ideal. I haven't actually done it yet at our house. We're just having the kids set alarms ("set alarm in 30 minutes" still works for our kids), which aren't as nice as timers.

[mva104]

I think it's an unacceptable work around.  Doesn't that remove any kind of restricted content on Spotify, Youtube, etc.?  My kids are under 10 years old.  

[Star123]

Same issue unfortunately. We've tried everything except for removing a kiddo from family link and re-adding. Has anyone tried that to see if it works?

[Jaime29253]

Same problem with our kids' accounts. 

[jpcams]

I’m here to report the same issue. Kids haven’t been able to set a timer since December

[jpcams]

With this many replies is Google even paying attention? Considering to start replacing my homes with home pods

[opb20]

Same issue, hugely annoying, kids can't set timers. Not going to remove voice match as that's what keeps their Spotify separate. Please fix this Google!

[coleh]

Same problem for my kids.