This week on smart home nightmares… Petnet, the company behind a range of smart pet feeders, is apologising to customers after a lengthy system outage that caused cats and dogs to go hungry for days on end.
Earlier this month the company announced the outage was affecting the second-generation SmartFeeder, which is designed to spit out the perfect portion size and the time of your choosing, that made it seem as if the devices were offline.
However, at the time, the firm promised the food would till be dispensed at the desired time. However, many customers claimed the that the feeders weren’t coughing up the kibble on time or, worse still, not at all. One pet owner even tweeted the firm to say their “cat starved for over a week.”
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Considering Petnet’s tagline is “never miss a meal,” it’s not exactly a good look for the firm, which has secured major investment from the US retail giant PetCo, among major Silicon Valley venture capital firms (via TechCrunch).
@petnetiosupport @Petnetio @amazon @amazonlaunchpad All my boys wanted to do was have dinner but thanks to PetNet and never responding to 30+ emails and server outages and now jammed units for weeks and bounced customer Srvc emails crickets.#hungry pic.twitter.com/g8p6cYueGW
— Eric Fishon (@eman1061) February 15, 2020
Plenty of other users responded to the company complaining that continuing to use the feeder put their pets’ wellbeing at stake.
Another Twitter user wrote: “My cat starved while we were out of town, ended up having neighbors needing to save her. Cat was so starved she was acting an attack cat when they tried to come into the house. Glad (and rather surprised) that the feeder was up and running when we got home today.”
My cat starved for over a week. Tech support with your company stinks. So glad I returned mine. I have been so vocal, I thought you shut down. Talk to your customers don't hide or ignore. Terrible experience.
— Cul Blu (@mrculblu) February 21, 2020
After the initial tweet from the Petnet support account on February 14, it took until February 21 until the company acknowledged that the service was returning online. So far the company is yet to provide users with answers about the outage, many of whom are complaining about regular jamming issues with their so-called smart feeders.
If you’re interested in your cat or dog potentially not eating for days on end, the Petnet smart feeder is currently discounted on Amazon.
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Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.