GizmoHub

We’ve used a gizmo watch (replaced it once when my son forgot to take off before swimming) for about 4 years. PROS: Aside from the cost to purchase, it’s only $5/month for basic services AND gps (huge “bang for the buck”); the gps is more accurate than iPhone location services, it calls 10 people, location alerts let me know when he leaves school, I can put it on “quiet mode” if he forgets, holds a charge for 2 days (depending on how long his calls are). CONS: It takes at least 3 minutes to locate the watch using gps (this can be nerve wracking in an emergency), it doesn’t allow a 911 call (although I think you can make 911 one of your contacts), if I put it in quiet mode, he can’t take it off, sometimes the text messages are delayed (even though the notifications are on time), there are limited quick response texts (yes, he can use audio snippet but sometimes he is unable to talk), the watch band isn’t too durable (we’ve replaced or repaired ours at least once a year). All that aside, I’d highly recommend it for safety. He finally got a phone but the compromise was that he continue to wear his watch as backup. The watch gps is way more accurate and his phone inevitably dies or he forgets it at home. Eventually he’ll “age out” of this watch but it’s done it’s job for 4 years now. 👍🏽

The Gizmo has been a very good ‘in-between’ device for my daughters too young for a phone. Aside from being able to call them — I really, REALLY like the ability to be able to see where they are at any given time, straight from my phone with the press of a button. The ability to set up time-based alerts sending me their location at specific times is an excellent feature.. I always know if my 5th grader arrives at school by 8:15 every day or not, and I rely on those daily notifications. I also appreciate that I can set up ‘location alerts’ (versus time-based alerts) which let me watch for her to arrive/leave a specified place during certain hours. I set up alerts and delete them on a regular basis for temporary use (Example: Last night my daughter went out of town to a haunted house and I was able to get her location, set up an alert notifying me when she left the haunted house... and using that notification, I was able to estimate her home arrival and have dinner ready when she got home.) It would be good if the texts I send the Gizmo could be longer than 30 characters, but that’s not a big deal as we’re used to it. Also wanted to mention that I appreciate that the developers extended the location alerts to 8 hours versus 2 hours (yay!) Thanks.

We got this for our daughter last year when she started riding the school bus. The bus is often late, or has a substitute driver. They’ve gotten lost and been stuck down a one-way alley downtown before. Basically the bus could drop off anytime between 3:50 and 5:30 (that’s a crazy large window of time). I don’t like her walking down the street alone; we live in a big city! Now, we can track the bus and see exactly where she’s at and when she’s about to be at the stop so we can meet her there (rather than sitting at the stop for over an hour waiting). I also love that she can call me or text me, anytime, from anywhere. She has called me from school when she’s just having a tough day and needs some support and encouraging words. This watch has been a huge lifesaver! We love it so much we’re getting a second one this Christmas for our 8 yo son! Love, love the GizmoPal watch!

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We’ve only had our Gizmo for a couple weeks. So far it works great for phone calls and, though it takes a while to show the location, it does bring up where my son is. The issue is with the text function. This is preferable for us since I work in an office and he is at daycare and we can keep in touch this way. Unfortunately, my son sends me texts and I get an alert on my phone and a badge on the app, but when I open the app there are no messages. When I check his Gizmo watch later, I see that he did send me some messages that I never received. Occasionally they will come through later - sometimes after a day or 2. But usually they never come through. I have tried uninstalling and reinstalling the app, closing out of the app, and have done a hard reset on my phone, but this has not fixed the problem. We have the Gizmo watch to stay in touch, so not being able to receive texts from my son is a huge issue. I appreciate you looking into this or offering suggestions on how I can fix this on my end.

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We bought this watch yesterday from a Verizon store. We tried to pair it to my phone as well as my husbands no luck. Went back to the Verizon store where they tried on both of our phones, factory reset the watch, gave us a new watch, called tech support...still no luck. Tech support says this is a known issue and they will contact us once it’s been resolved. So until then thanks for taking my $200 bucks, charging me a monthly service fee, and leaving me to try to explain to a 9 year old why her cool new watch that she has been begging for months now has to sit on the shelf and in all actually will likely be returned...sigh, EPIC FAIL!!! Update: I have been on hold with customer support for 1 hour and 6 minutes...no one seems to know what is wrong BUT that it is a known issue and they have other tickets open for this same problem...meanwhile my 9 year is crossing her fingers that her watch will work...the saga continues!! Update: Bye bye gizmo, returning it today. It never would pair despite multiple attempts with Verizon customer service and emails to app support. This would be a great product IF it actually worked.