How Not to Tech Support – A Lesson from Life360

An example of what NOT to do in tech support.

I tend to update my phone at least once a year, sometimes more. I’ve gone through all the Pixels except the 4, the Oneplus 7 and 8, Note 3 and 10, all the Google Nexus family, a couple of different HTC ones, the Droid Incredible and Incredible 2, couple of different blackberries, couple of Windows phones. One thing has been consistent across most of the Androids. I’m an avid Rom flasher (it’s like getting a new phone 10+ times a year).

The problem with that is that I must back everything up and restore it. I have gotten fairly good at it but it still takes several hours each time.

One app has been a major headache every time I load a new Rom or get a new phone. Life360. I have one of their premium memberships and I use it with my home automation stuff as well, so it’s important. Any time I have to set it back up, it’s always been a bear to log back in. Usually, I can finally get it to log back in after 20-30 attempts though.

This time, I have tried to log back in 200+ times since March 31st and have been unsuccessful. I contacted Life360 through a DM on Twitter on April 2nd:

So, I went ahead and opened the ticket. I described my issue of not being able to log in, told them I had followed their FAQ. I tried over Wi-Fi and mobile. I tried in multiple locations. I uninstalled and reinstalled. I cleared the cache and storage. I disabled the ad blockers on my home network as well as on my Pixel 7 Pro. I reset my password twice. At two different points in the process I even got a text message from Life360 telling me welcome back, etc. You get that when you’ve made a successful connection, which obviously I had not.

Anyway, I get this initial email

Hey there,

It looks like you forgot your password. Let’s get you a new one.

If you didn’t receive the email to reset your password, please check your spam folder to see if the message is there.
If you didn’t receive the SMS text, make sure your carrier plan is set to allow SMS text messages.

To reset your password, please follow this link- https://www.life360.com/forgot-password

*Watch this short video on How to Reset Your Password: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tckK_sWbFLg

If you still need help, please respond with the email and phone number on your account and we will be happy to help.

Let us know if you tried, but did not receive the password code through SMS text or email.

Thank you,
Life360 Customer Care

So, I immediately emailed back “This has nothing to do with having forgotten my password.
Email is [REDACTED], phone is [REDACTED]”

No response after that until I sent them a DM on Twitter again.

Next email from Life360:

Hi Richard,

Thank you for reaching to Life360 about new device log in. I appreciate your patience and understanding on this matter. I’d be glad to help you with this.

To effectively assist, may I know what device are you using now?

Your swift reply is highly appreciated.

Have a safe day,

So of course, I email them back immediately
“I am using the Pixel 7 Pro

Thanks

Richard Miles “

I got a response quickly the same afternoon

WTF. Okay, so I reset my password yet again for the 4th time. And yes, my internet connection is great here. Not only that but I had tried it on multiple connections and networks. I shot them back two emails:

“I have reset my password again using the link you provided. This is the 4th password reset I’ve done.

Restarted wifi connection. Internet connection in my area is fine. I have done this on two different wifi networks as well as connected only to mobile data in three different locations.

Same results, unknown error.”

“Also, it’s obvious it’s making a connection because if I enter the WRONG password it immediately tells me I have the wrong password.”

I didn’t get a response after that, DM’ed them again on Twitter:

Ok cool. Higher level of support. Squeaky wheel gets the grease and all that. It usually only takes a time or two or public tweeting once and they get someone with intelligence on the job. I was pretty wrong on that. Next email I got from them:

Hi Richard,

I appreciate your patience on this matter. Let me further help you with this.

For the password reset link that was previously provided to you, have you already tried the link on different browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Explorer, or Safari) on your computer? If not yet, can you please try to access the link and try it on different browsers to see if the issue still persists?

Please let me know if this works.

Have a safe day,

What in the cracker jack box do they think this is about? Obviously not reading any of the prior tickets or emails. I let them know (on April 6th:

“The link worked and reset my password. What does that have to do with getting a network error in the life360 app?”

On April 7th, I sent them another email:

“Any sort of updates on this ticket? Been a week since I was able to log in.”

They finally responded 14 hours later (this was Friday I believe):

Hello Richard,

Thank you for your patience in regards to this matter.

I am glad that you’ve able to login by resetting your password through a web browser.

There are some time that resetting the password will not work in the app but it is a rare case scenario. That is why we provided an alternative through the website.

Please let me know if everything is fine now.

Have a safe day,

I was starting to get pretty pissed off now. This idiot has no friggin’ clue. Sent a couple of DMs to them again.

Received an email response a short time later:

Hello Richard,

Thank you for your patience in regards to this matter.

Upon checking with your phone settings, I can see that there is a VPN. Can you confirm if you are using a Virtual Private Network?

Looking forward for your response.

Have a safe day,

What? Number one, you can’t see my phone settings, and if you think I believe that you really are a fucking fool. Number 2, I am not behind a VPN. While I do occasionally use one to access my home network when I am away, I haven’t used it in months and certainly not on this ROM.

So again, I emailed them back lol:

“I’m not currently using a VPN. I do occasionally use one to access my home servers but not in general.

I do use Adaway (not VPN mode) to block ads but it is currently disabled while I troubleshoot this.”

and a second email a few minutes later with a snippet of my logcat in hopes that someone that knows something there will be able to help. I don’t know what most of it means unfortunately, just that it’s errors:

“Just tried logging in, all ad blocking disabled, connecting over 5g rather than wifi. This is the log recording:

—- Apr 8, 2023 5:10:32 PM —-

04-08 17:10:36.180 4187 4187 I GoogleInputMethodService: GoogleInputMethodService.onStartInput():1898 onStartInput(EditorInfo{inputType=0x0(NULL) imeOptions=0x0 privateImeOptions=null actionName=UNSPECIFIED actionLabel=null actionId=0 initialSelStart=-1 initialSelEnd=-1 initialCapsMode=0x0 hintText=null label=null packageName=com.life360.android.safetymapd fieldId=-1 fieldName=null extras=null hintLocales=[]}, false)

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: https://api-cloudfront.life360.com/v3/oauth2/token error

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: at com.life360.android.l360networkkit.internal.etag.ResponseETagInterceptor.intercept(SourceFile:2)

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: at com.life360.android.l360networkkit.OkHttpClientSingleton$special$$inlined$-addNetworkInterceptor$1.intercept(SourceFile:3)

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: at com.life360.android.l360networkkit.internal.NetworkManager$RetryStrategy.doStrategy(SourceFile:3)

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: at com.life360.android.l360networkkit.internal.NetworkManager$RetryInterceptor.intercept(SourceFile:5)

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: at com.life360.android.l360networkkit.internal.HeadersForV5ApiAndAboveInterceptor.intercept(SourceFile:19)

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: at com.life360.android.l360networkkit.internal.cache.CacheInterceptor.intercept(SourceFile:20)

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: at com.life360.android.l360networkkit.internal.Life360PlatformImpl$AuthInterceptorBase.intercept(Unknown Source:13)

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: at com.life360.android.l360networkkit.internal.DynamicBaseUrlInterceptor.intercept(SourceFile:11)

04-08 17:10:46.535 14180 29161 E NetworkManager: at com.life360.android.l360networkkit.NetworkCallInterceptor.intercept(SourceFile:12)

That was on April 8th. Three days ago. Still no response. So I DMed them again first thing this monring

They didn’t even bother to respond there. Probably getting tired of me. They did, however, respond via email a few hours ago:

Hi Richard,

I appreciate your patience on this. I’d like to make a follow up on this. Are you still not able to log in to your new phone?

Have a safe day,

Really? No shit I’m not able to log in. What the fuck do these guys do, send out generic emails and close the fucking trouble ticket so they can tell their supervisor they’ve fixed everything for the day?

And my response to them
“No, I am not. Have not been able to log in since prior to April.”

To their credit they responded pretty quickly, although it was not helpful in the fucking least:

Hi Richard,

Thank you for your response. Can you confirm what type of device are you using and also can you check it for me if you can log-in using other device?

Have a safe day,

So, we are back to the same initial questions again. I did respond again though,

Pixel 7 Pro.

I’m setting up an old phone now to see if I can log in there anymore, will take a few minutes before I can get it set up.”

and then again, a few minutes later after having tried to log in from an older phone (non-rooted, completely stock, no extra apps installed, no custom rom.

“I got the same result trying to log in on another device. OnePlus 8 pro.”

And they responded again. Third time in one day. Wow. This guy must be tired from all the typing he’s had to do:

Hi Richard,

Thank you for your response. Since you are still unable to log back in to any device you might need delete your account and recreate it?

Have a safe day,

That’s all you have? What the everloving fuck.

So, I sent out a tweetstorm rant over on Twitter for my two followers to see. Only thing I’m getting there is answers from bots and spammers.

I have had Owntracks set up on my phone for the last few days. While it doesn’t (currently) offer me all the bells and whistles that Life360 does, I am able to integrate it into both Home Assistant and Homeseer using MQTT and trigger my automations off that. The way it’s headed now I will be deleting my Life360 account and cancelling my subscription. Biggest issue with that is that my daughters and my mom are all on my account as well and don’t live with us so getting it on their phones and getting everything working properly is a pain in the ass.