Fitbit Ionic is losing steps

[zoebanyard]

Had fitbit ionic 4 days. Today i was at 7000 steps or there about. Next time i looked it was on 5000 or there abouts. There was a minus sign next to steps calories flights of stairs etc and each step i took minused 1 off the step count etc. Each flight of stairs took 1 of that. Then. An hour or so later, it converted back to counting upwards again. I did nothing to trigger it and nothing to trigger it going back to normal. HELP!!!

Moderator edit: updated subject for clarity

[MarreFitbit]

Welcome to the Fitbit Community @zoebanyard, hope you're doing great! Hmmm... this is very strange my friend. Have you been losing steps since the first day using your Ionic? 

While reading your post I was wondering if by any chance you haven't manually logged activities? Typically, your steps will be recalculated if you manually log an activity as the manually logged activity takes precedence over the steps you tracked while wearing your tracker at that point in time. For example, if I am wearing my tracker and walking and I reach 10,000 steps, then I go to the computer and manually log an activity that starts and ends at that point in time for say 1 hour, Fitbit will calculate how many steps you took and it may bring my step count to something below 10,000 steps. To clarify, activities should only be manually logged when you forget to wear your Fitbit.

In the meantime, I'd recommend restarting your tracker by following these steps. 

On the other hand, as you may know my friend, Fitbit trackers that count floors have an altimeter sensor that can detect when you're going up or down in elevation. Your tracker registers one floor when you climb about ten feet at one time. It does not register floors when you go down. So I would like to take that into consideration at the moment to verify the amount of floors that your Fitbit has tracked. 

10 feet is an average between residential and commercial floor heights. If the floors you're climbing are shorter than 10 feet, you may find that the Fitbit tracker's floor count doesn't exactly match how many floors you've gone up. For example, if you climb 3 floors that are 8 feet tall (for a total gain of 24 feet), then the Fitbit tracker might only tell you 2 floors because it assumes that each floor is 10 feet tall and this is what happens to my at my granny's home. 

Another cause of inaccurate floors is moisture. Have you checked that already? For example, the pathway to the altimeter on the back of your tracker can become clogged temporarily with sweat. 

And keep in mind that Fitbit trackers do not count elevation gains on a StairMaster, inclined treadmill, or other stationary exercise equipment because your body does not change in elevation by 10 feet. Plus, make sure your're not holding onto the handrail with your Fitbit arm. If the tracker doesn't see that your walking, no stairs will be rewarded.

On the other hand, if your tracker is counting too many floors, here are some of the possible causes for the inaccuracy:

• The tracker may track floors while driving, on an elevator or in an escalator
• Due to the Ionic is a wristband tracker, it may track floors while opening doors, from a weather change, or from a gust of wind (i.e.  pressure changes)

Occasionally your tracker may detect pressure changes unrelated to elevation gains, such as a gust of wind, weather change, or opening a door. Exposure to excess moisture can also result in extra floors being counted. This happens if the pathway to the altimeter on the back of your tracker becomes temporarily blocked with sweat or water. I recommend that your tracker be worn loosely during exercise. 

I haven't experienced this before, I'd recommend checking what I posted above to see if something listed there is causing the discrepancy.

Looking forward to your response!