Speakers' time zone/location not responding to "home" address

[OsakaWebbie]

In the Google Home app, I have two "homes": my real residence (Osaka, Japan) and another I named "Travel". We are now traveling (currently US east coast), so I switched the app's home to "Travel", edited the address to that of the Airbnb, and added the three Google Home Mini speakers we brought with us. (Only one shows as in "in your home"; the other two are listed under "local devices" - I don't know the difference.) But when we ask any of the speakers what time it is, weather, etc., it still thinks it is in Japan.

Google's help page about home address (https://support.google.com/googlenest/answer/7551002) says: "When you ask for local places, weather and time information, your home address is used as the default location..." Nope, not in my case. (I also can't figure out how to move the "local devices" to the home, but that might not matter, because even the speaker that is already in the home doesn't act like it is connected to that address.)

Searching the rest of the web for advice about the time zone (the aspect I most care about), all the pages seem to think there is a time zone setting in the app - descriptions vary, but something like "select the device, then the gear icon (which I don't have), scroll to Time Settings (also nonexistent anywhere in my app)," I think I have searched every layer of the app, but no such setting for either the home or the devices.

Clues?

[orellanaortiz]

Hi OsakaWebbie,

Thanks for posting, I am sorry for this situation with the time zone of your Google Speakers. Help’s here.

It sounds like your Google Home Minis are still providing information based on Japan when you're on the East Coast of the USA. In this case that you already changed the speakers location, here are a couple of things that might be causing this:

• Voice Match: If you have Voice Match enabled, it might be using your past location information. You can check this and adjust Voice Match settings within the Google Home app as well: Manage your voice & Voice Match settings.
• Temporary Glitch: In rare cases, there could be temporary location service issues. Try restarting your speaker by unplugging it for a minute and plugging it back in.

If you've tried these steps and your speakers are still giving you the wrong information, let us know and we can look into troubleshooting further!

Kindly,

Angel

[OsakaWebbie]

Thanks for the response. I did have Voice Match enabled (sort of, apparently), so I did some experimentation and have partial success.

For clarity, I'll include names I have assigned. My two homes are "Osaka" and "Travel". The three speakers we have with us are "Charcoal A", "Charcoal B", and "White". As I said before, only one of the speakers ("Charcoal A") says it's "in your home"; the other two ("White" and "Charcoal B") are just "local devices". They stay in that category - I can't figure out how to add them to the "Travel" home. This is relevant.

When I tap on "Charcoal A", then the gear icon, then "Recognition & sharing", then "Voice Match", it says at the top, "Voice Match at Travel" as I would expect. Below that heading was a suggestion to enable voice recognition at the home level (I forget the wording now) - apparently we had never done that for "Travel". I decided to go ahead and do that, and then check the checkbox for "Charcoal A" as well as enable "Devices you add later". After that, it now tells me the correct time but still gives my husband the time in Osaka. Half-right?

The other two act completely differently. When I tap on either of them and navigate to Voice Match, it says "Voice Match at Osaka" and has checkboxes for all the speakers we own except Charcoal A (including speakers we did not take with us on this trip), listed as being in the rooms of our house they are normally in. I unchecked the Voice Match checkboxes for Charcoal B and White, and after doing that, it suggests at the top of Settings pages, "Activate Voice Match on this device...", so the app thinks Voice Match has been disabled. But the speakers themselves still recognize our separate voices, so they apparently didn't get the memo. And of course the location is still wrong.

I noticed that under the option "Remove Voice Match from this home" it says, "Some older devices may need Voice Match removed another way." That prompts a thought: I do know that White and one Charcoal (not sure which one) were bought longer ago than the other Charcoal. Could that have something to do with the inability to put them in a secondary home? None of them are particularly new. Also, I know we bought some of our speakers in the US and others in Japan, although I don't remember which, and I'm told that wouldn't matter.

As for it being a glitch, you might want to know that since I first wrote, we have continued our travels, currently in Texas. I once again added the speakers when we got here, so a "glitch" seems unlikely. In a few days we will go to Missouri where we will be for six weeks, so I really want to get this fixed.

[orellanaortiz · Accepted solution]

Hi OsakaWebbie,

Thanks for the details and your efforts towards troubleshooting with us. Let's try some options to get your speakers working correctly while you travel:

Make sure the address in Assistant settings is accurate:

1. Open the Google Home app.
2. Tap your profile picture or initials in the top right corner.
3. Verify the Google Account shown is linked to your speaker or display.
4. Go to "Assistant settings" > "You" > "Your Places" > "Home."
5. Ensure the address is accurate. Tap it to edit if necessary.

Another option:  If the above doesn't work, a factory reset might be needed. While the Google Home app allows moving devices between homes, a factory reset can sometimes help ensure location updates are applied correctly. You can refer to the next article:

Factory reset Google Nest or Home speakers or displays

Let me know how it goes.

Regards,

Angel
 

[OsakaWebbie]

My app is apparently somewhat different from yours (settings are no longer in the profile picture area, and "Assistant Settings" are a little hard to find), but I eventually found what I think you're talking about. In "Your places", I only see the places I have configured for Google Maps, which are called "Home" and "Work". That doesn't seem to have anything to do with the Home app, in which the homes I have are called "Osaka" and "Travel". So that doesn't seem relevant.

But factory reset solved the problem, at least for now and for me personally. All three speakers (including the two that were previously just "local devices") are now assigned to different rooms in the "Travel" home, and they tell me the correct time and such. But my husband is away for a few days, so I won't know if the speakers will respond correctly to him until Tuesday (voice match and personalized results are enabled, which is how we want them). And when we go home to Osaka in a couple months, it's unknown whether we'll have to do factory reset again to get them assigned back to that home, but I guess that's not too difficult if necessary.

Thanks for your help!