Rain Bird

I use thus App for several customers. It has easy to use features and many of my elderly clients can use it more conveniently than the actual controller on the wall. My favorite feature is the rain delay I am not sure why it was moved in the recent update not that’s ok. Regarding set up, If you are having problems it is easier to buy a20-50 WiFi booster and set to 2Ghz to get it to link. Sometimes if you have a high end security system with complicated fire walks, then all bets are off and you need the customers tech to assist in set up. I would give this app 5 stars except for the poor attitude of the customer service. ALL other issue I have called RainBird about I have been treated with professionals but for some reason the folks that work the App customer service A. sound like they are reading from a script and have no clue what they are doing. B. 2x I have explained the problem and because they take sooo long (and I am standing in a hat garage in Houston Tx) I have asked them to email suggestions or call me back they say “No I need you to wait”. I would like it them to either come stand in the garage with me while they continue knowing nothing or realize they need to figure it out later and call back. Once it was a bad door another time it was the clients WiFi had been changed and she did not know it.

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The app works ok. In that it connects most of the time, while sometimes it needs a few reboots to finally connect. Really wish it had an easily accessible log feature, because I am never sure what ran and for how long. Notifications should be much richer. Instead of just saying “controller irrigation event complete” how about it gives zone and time, for example “zone 1 complete: 20 min run time”. Automatic seasonal adjust has consistently failed me and my grass starts to go brown and die. So I’ve had to turn it off. Rachio has something like auto seasonal adjust but it seemed to do a better job as my grass never died using it. One of my biggest wishes Is that it would connect to IFTTT or SmartThings and or Siri Shortcuts. Alexa connectivity is a bit gimmicky to me because everything is scheduled. I don’t really have to much of a functional use case to ask Alexa to turn on the sprinklers (which in and of itself is not the most intuitive IMO). All in all the app works, but leaves much to be desired. I had Rachio at my old house and I felt app was much richer and integrated much more with other smartphone platforms. If rainbird can add some of the above it would be wonderful.

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Automatic seasonal adjustment doesn’t work on one of my controllers, the other one sends a notification that it has changed but when you go on the app, it is still the old setting. I called support 4 times they go through their checklist, that confirms everything is setup correctly again and then put you on hold for minutes, come back want the same info that you have already given them and tell you that they are sending this off to the product manager and they will get back to you. This is not a new product, this problem has to have happened before. I have it on 2 controllers and 2 different zip codes. You think they would at least give you some information that is useful, no they just leave you hanging. I now have upset customers and have no idea if this will be resolved or not. The reason the clients bought this upgrade, was to save on water use, not use more. I may lose these clients and I am sure they will tell their friends. Thanks Rain Bird! Propose solutions, in a timely fashion, not will get back to you. What does that even mean, one day, one week, one month or one year??? I also believe that when they put you on hold, they are taking other calls, because it happens several times during the call and then and the end it is the same answer.

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Most of the time notifications do not come through, even though I have every single option checked. Also, it would be nice to see a runtime log to verify which stations ran at which time, especially since the notifications do not come through most of the time. Would also love to see some sort of calculator interface to assist with setting up station runtime as well. *edit* notifications appear to have been corrected with the latest update, thanks! Raised rating to 4 stars, couple of small added features would make it a solid 5. *edit 2* dropping my rating back down, automatic seasonal adjust has not worked for weeks/months now, weather is nowhere close to accurate, connecting to the timer takes minutes most of the time from the app, notifications are extremely delayed most of the time, the app shows upcoming events that occurred many hours ago, and the clock doesn’t hold time well causing delays in scheduling. None of these should be an issue with an internet connected device, and do not appear to be an issue with cheaper internet connected irrigation controllers. Take my advice, do not waste your time with Rain Bird unless you want a 100% manual controller. Rachel and Orbit make much better devices at lower price points with better support.

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Not sure why I fell for it again. For starters app always forces you to give up your location to use it for anything. Must want to always track you. Second it’s a very primitive app. You need to have really strong WiFi near your outdoor controller or forget about it. It just uses a tiny chip in the controller with no antenna. I had to return my WiFi chip before. They cost about $200. I ended up adding with a commercial outdoor access point for other reasons so bought one again. WiFi now connects. It would not before even 30’ away from inside my house. App is still disappointing. Not enough allowed characters to even put in my areas in each zone name and I do not have that many sections in each zone that I want to note. Someone should be able to design a better app in short order. Only good now is it works but will not use it much as the WiFi location grab annoys me and probably really need to close out app and do reset to stop it from sniffing.