Common Issues of Smart Sockets
As technology advances, smart home appliances are now becoming more popular. In modern life, smart home appliances are used by many people and it’s a market that many manufacturers want to get into. These smart products can improve the quality and convenience of people’s daily lives and improve their everyday living experiences. There are many types of smart home appliances, but the ones that consumers love to use are smart sockets.
Smart sockets can allow the user to control the power going through it remotely and also control the duration and functions of the appliance that’s connected to it. It’s a very practical product that solves a lot of issues. However, we still often hear many different types of complaints about the diversification of home appliances and the mobile app that controls the socket.
With Allion’s decades of testing experience, we have listed the common issues with users below in this article. More detailed explanations and analyses are shown from the perspective of the user.
Common Customer Complaints:
1. Installation Issues
Smart home appliances utilize smartphones to control them, usually through your home wireless network. It was found that the user manuals of these products were not well written. For example, the user manual would not state the smart socket only supported 2.4GHz wireless networks or it only supports iPhones. The installation procedure would not match the descriptions in the user manuals. This can cause trouble for the users when they want to install this product, leading to a bad impression of this product and its manufacturers.
2. Software Compatibility and Configuration Issues
Some users are used to using voice assistants to control their devices at home, such as Alexa or Google Home. Although some products can be connected to smart sockets, voice assistants may not be able to control them.
Another software issue is related to the calendar within its app. The smart socket has been scheduled to switch on and off at certain times, but when the time came, it did not perform the task it was given.
3. Network Connection Issues
Currently, the biggest issue for smart socket users is when the wireless network is functioning normally, but the connection is unstable. This type of issue often occurs between voice assistants and the smart socket’s app, or the wireless network and the smart socket. Issues such as sudden disconnections, automatic restarts, difficulty controlling the smart socket, and others often occur after the smart socket has been installed for a few months. These issues can sometimes deem the smart sockets unusable.
4. Durability Issues
Issues with smart sockets often occur a few months after installation and setup. Common issues include the power light flashing for no reason, the power switch turning on by itself, and the app functioning normally but the socket is unresponsive.
5. Other Issues
Some smart socket manufacturers do not consider the size of the product during the development phase. This can lead to blocking other empty sockets when you plug it in. Smart sockets may also overheat after using them for long periods. When users encounter these problems, they might turn to customer service at first. However, if there is poor communication or the problem cannot be solved, it will ultimately affect the user experience negatively.
Even though most of the issues above can be solved by restarting the smart socket or re-establishing the connection, the mere occurrence of these issues can cause consumers to dislike the product. At the end of the day, it will affect the brand image of the company and consumers will hesitate to purchase other products.
Matter is the latest IoT standard that integrates various smart home devices and Thread is a mesh network designed for low-power and low-latency devices like sensors. Technologies like these do not rely on the Internet or Wi-Fi, but they pass through a private network to connect all the devices in your home. This means that product compatibility issues will greatly increase.
In response to the issues mentioned above, product quality and the rate of customer complaints can be effectively improved if the above-mentioned tests can be conducted during the development phase. Product sales can also be increased by improving the user experience. Allion has been deeply involved in the testing and verification field for decades where we provide verification and consulting services. We can effectively assist manufacturers to optimize product quality, improve user experience, and provide reliable consulting solutions.
For more information or to discuss consulting needs, please contact Allion.