- Some Tado clients received a notification about a new subscription
- The message said that the tado application will soon cost £ 1 per month
- Tado says that it was part of a marketing study and that no users have been charged
Some owners of Tado smart thermostats feel hot under the necklace after the company directed a marketing study that suggests that its application will soon require a subscription. A handful of potential users and customers who buy from the Tado web store recently saw a message that said that there would soon be a monthly rate to use the tado application, although those who clicks on a verification box to confirm that they understood were informed that it was only a test.
The emerging message, which has been shared in Reddit and the company's support forums, says that the users of the application will soon be charged £ 1 (around $ 1.20 / Au $ 2) per house per month “to continue offering innovative features and first level service” and to compensate for augmented commercial costs.
According to the alert, the rate would go into force as of May 1, but the use of tado devices through Amazon Alexa, Google Home and Apple Homekit The devices would remain free.
Tado application monthly R/tado
When Techradar contacted Tado to obtain a comment, a spokesman said: “As is typical in the industry, tado routinely does marketing and research studies, and analyzes the comments of the clients every day. Those involved in this study on paid applications retained total access to the tado application without charge and the tests are now complete.”
Free or rate?
So, will you really start charging a rate? We don't know. It certainly seems like a possibility, but at this point it could go anyway.
Tado already has a subscription service called Auto Assist, which allows users to completely automate their heating and cooling of their home and unlocks additional characteristics. For example, instead of just sending a notification if a window is left open, automatic assistance will automatically adjust heating to avoid wasting energy. You can also use geofencing to turn off your heating automatically when no one is at home, and turning it on when the first person returns.
Some Tado owners have said that they do not care about the idea of paying a fee to use the application if it comes with automatic assistance to sweeten the treatment.
R/tado comment
The problem is that other clients bought tado hardware in the belief that the basic application would remain subscription free, and many users in the company's support forums and in Reddit are not happy with the idea and the way in which Tado hid the fact that he was doing a marketing study until the users click.
We will have to wait and see what the company decides to do with the information that is collected, and if it follows a subscription or maintains the free model with automatic assistance as an optional paid complement.
Do you have an intelligent thermostat tado, and would you be willing to pay to use the application to control it? Let us know in the comments.
