Cox Homelife 4+

This app is a joke. I have the camera, sensor, and light. The light and door sensor work appropriately however sometimes when I open the door I receive a text alert minutes later instead of real time. I also have the camera set up to motion. The app and camera worked perfect before. Recording once someone opened the door and actually capturing the video and stills of when the door opened. Now the camera takes forever to load. I need to tap “retry or view camera” multiple times to see a live image or video feed. Also once a motion is detected or door is opened the recording has a lag. By the time it records whoever or whatever that passed by or opened the door is gone and the door is closed. Roughly a 10-15 sec lag by the time it actually records. I rebooted the system my router everything. Same thing. Useless. I also had a cox rep come to the house. He switched out the camera and we thought it worked. But of course when he left same problem happened. For being the leader in high speed internet this home security is far from it. One stars bc the light works when I want to turn it on from the app. But even then sometimes the light will turn off and I’ll have to turn the switch on and off for it to turn back on because the app says it’s on but not. Don’t waste your money on their Homelife. You can get a real security system for $40 a month with free equipment.

For instance, the app no longer allows you to disarm specific sensors in order to ensure that interacting with them while the alarm is set won’t result in the alarm being set off. The app will ask if you want to ignore those sensors that are already open prior to arming, but does not give you the option to disarm those that aren’t open at the time of arming. This feature was available prior to the update, and made it easy to disable certain sensors prior to arming the system. For example, I used to be able to disable certain window sensors that were closed at the time of arming the alarm for the “night” mode, so that my family could freely open these windows throughout the night without having to worry about setting the alarm off. So please, fix this.
Furthermore, although the app allows for certain “routines” to be saved, I think it would be beneficial to have a way that would allow users to create “groups” to arm and/or disarm, making it easier to arm the alarm for night time usage or away usage, instead of having to go and disable every same sensor just like every other night.

First things first, the minute my contract is up, I’ll be leaving cox security for Ring or something else. The app works half the time and the alarm sound comes only from the Home Pad so depending on where it is, you could never hear it if there was a break in. Additionally, the app appears to have some serious latency issues so makes me question its effectiveness. Majority of the time when you’re in the app, it will say connectivity issues and will not load the camera so you can’t see anything (btw we have one of coxs highest internet speeds and a strong router).

As of the last 2 months out of nowhere, my wife and I no longer receive notices for the settings we added (email/texts alerts) for specific events like arm/disarm etc. I have gone into the configurations multiple times to add the “rule” back but that didn’t work so I went and deleted/added it back and still it doesn’t work. We went as far to delete the app and re-add it but still the same issues. Customer service is useless so at this point we just have to wait out our last 4 months before we can switch.

All in all, unless it’s free with your package, do not get this! It’s a headache and the app is garbage. We will 110% be leaving cox as a whole when our contract is up! As they say, buyer beware and this couldn’t be more true!!!