Connected Switchgear I-TOUCH Gateway

Absolute rubbish - save yourself the pain and expense – Where do I start. This is a review on the itouch range of switches as sold and serviced by connected switchgear. I have had these switches for 3 to 4 years now, and during that time they have only worked correctly for a month or 2 in total. Firstly this product line is an expensive set of networked light switches and power sockets in various configurations. When operating correctly they allow you to set automatic timings for the connected lights/appliances using the itouch app on your smart phone. These switches replace the ordinary switches and sockets in your home. As such they require an electrician to install and if there is an issue, an electrician will need to uninstall it then reinstall it again once fixed (this is expensive and you will not be reimbursed for this). The hub (gateway) of this system is a Raspberry Pi, this is a small hobby computer interface that can be bought from electronics stores. This gateway comes preprogrammed with the software to manage the switches. It must be physically connected to your internet router, and it is assigned a static ip address from the shop. It will not allow your router to assign it it’s IP address like most networked devices do now, which unfortunately increases the risk of multiple devices using the same ip address causing conflict in the network. In order to have remote access to your lights, you need to have an account with a third party provider some of these are free, but most require a monthly fee for access, and reliability is a real issue. I was under the impression that a paid service would be more reliable, but this was not the case. It worked sometimes. I have numerous other networked devices including tap timers, a security camera and a robot vacuum which operate without connection issues and don’t require a third party “host”, but these companies are larger and can likely afford the infrastructure to host and manage remote connections, maybe connected switchgear can’t do that. From day one I have had countless problems with this very poorly integrated system. Initially I thought the problem was me, although from the shop, 2 of the light switches had the same network address so wouldn’t work properly, and I was given the wrong admin username for the gateway. As I said earlier replacing a switch requires an electrician, and if there is a problem with the gateway it has to go back to the retailer for reset/reconfiguring. The App that you use to manage the system and change settings is terrible, if you use the wrong password, you have to delete the app from your phone then reinstall again. It frequently crashes while logging in, and doesn’t give you any feed back like “wrong password”. So if it doesn’t respond you have no idea why until it just times out. A very frustrating experience. I have just received the gateway back again from the retailer with the username and password reset, reconnected it and hooray successfully logged in. Alas I am not able to see any of the installed switches, so I give it some time to hopefully connect to the switches. In the meantime I set a guest user name and password as recommended by the supplier. When I try to log back in with the new guest login and password, nothing. I try the admin username and password, nothing again. So I uninstall the app, reboot phone, gateway, etc, still nothing. Unbelievable!!! This product has been such a pain in the butt. If you want a plug-and-play solution this is not it. If you want a networked or smart home solution to control your lights, this is not it. There is also no integration with any 3rd party controllers like apple home that might allow you to get around the glitchy app that rarely works. Essentially this is a product that is stuck in a beta phase of development. I have notified the seller and recommend they stop selling the product, as in its current form it is unworkable and a waste of money. I hope this saves someone from the heartache and frustration. At $250 to 400 dollars a switch, plus electrician, you can imagine that this is a very expensive investment, and once it is in, you are stuck with it. Something I wish I had known at the start.