Fitbit Pay not working

[Diglett]

Have had my Charge 3 special edition for a week. Set up Fitbit pay with Starling account. First time I used it it worked fine. Since then, it has not worked at all - when I hold my Fitbit to a contactless reader with the card on the screen it does not buzz or react in anyway. I emailed support and got a really weird reply - they asked if I use a passcode to unlock my mobile phone. Why would that make any difference? Can anyone help?

[Arty_Marty]

Have you got a passcode set on your fitbit?
You have to enter that in once a day if you use fitbit pay (and also enter it after you take off/put watch back on.
It also doesn't seem to work for me in ALDI (Australia) but has worked everywhere else

[Diglett]

I've got a code set on my Fitbit and I have entered it. I can get Fitbit pay up on the Fitbit ok, it's just that the reader doesn't communicate with it. Support told me if will only work if I set a code on my mobile phone, which seems really weird (and inconvenient). I'm going to try it later but I can't see how it will make a difference.

[KannaK]

Have you solved what was going on? I had mine for almost a month now and have been using fitbit pay aswell. And suddenly yesterday night at asda it didnt work. Used the passcode and it didnt react. And today in the morning it didnt work for my train nore my breakfast purchase. Do you have any idea?

[Moxuz]

Doesnt work for me either. Worked for the first few days, now it says hold near reader then doesnt work. It's a tap terminal and I use tap to pay with my card after the Fitbit doesnt work.

[KannaK]

Do you think putting on a screenprotector had anything to do with in? Cause I realised I did do that inbetween it still working and then not working?

[MisterShark]

Mine worked the first time and then never again after that.

Going to call support and see what comes next.

[KannaK]

I had a live chat with them earlier today, as they couldn't figure out why that didn't work, they escalated my issue and said they'd send me an email and advised me not use fit bit pay atm until they figure it out. Haven't received an email yet.

[MisterShark]

I posted this yesterday, I thought in this discussion, but it seems to have disappeared.

Anyway to follow up on my situation...I did a chat with fitbit support rep Roivan on this and here's the transcript (with my email address masked):

 Roivan: Hi James, My name is Roivan. How can I help you?
Me: My Charge 3 fitbit pay worked the first time I tried it but then never again.
Me: The contactless payment terminal doesn't even detect any signal coming from my Charge 3
Roivan: I'm sorry to hear about the issue that you have experienced with your Fitbit Pay, James.
Roivan: But I’ll be more than happy to assist you with this.
Roivan: To make sure your privacy is protected, could you please confirm the email address on your account?
Me: When the Charge 3 failed to be detected, I used my phone's Google Pay and that went through without issue, so I know it wasn't the terminal
Me: (email address removed)
Roivan: Thank you.
Roivan: Thanks for that details, James.
Roivan: Please give me a minute to check your account.
Me: OK, thanks.
Roivan: You're welcome!
Roivan: Thanks for waiting.
Me: sure
Roivan: I've confirmed that your Fitbit Pay feature has been activated.
Me: Yes, I used it successfully in the morning the other day, and then later that day it failed to work.
Roivan: Do you mean that you were able to use it in the morning at the same store?
Me: Yes. Stop and Shop in the morning: success. Stop and Shop at lunchtime: fail.
Roivan: I see.
Me: Had to use my phone as my fallback option.
Roivan: Thanks for that information.
Me: Google Pay at that same Stop and Shop payment terminal worked flawlessly.
Me: I returned to that same supermarket today to give it another try with my Charge 3 but it failed to work again.
Roivan: I'm sorry to hear about that, James.
Me: Made sure to hold it close enough and made sure that it was strapped around my wrist securely.
Roivan: Thanks for confirming me with that details.
Me: I'm an IT support technician also, so I was thorough in my troubleshooting.
Roivan: That sounds great!
Roivan: Please stay on the line, James.
Me: OK
Roivan: I'll check this with my team real quick.
Me: OK, thanks.
Roivan: You're welcome.
Roivan: Thanks for waiting.
Roivan: In order to further evaluate your options, James. I will need to transfer this case to a higher tier of support.
Me: OK
Roivan: That being said, you will receive a response via email as soon as possible after this chat.
Me: Will the next tech have all of our conversation already available to him?
Roivan: That's correct, James.
Me: Hoping to not have to re-hash everything again.
Roivan: Everything has been documented properly.
Me: OK, thanks.
Roivan: You won't have to repeat yourself.
Roivan: You're welcome. I got your back on this.
Roivan:  And I'll make sure that you will provided with the right options to compensate the inconvenience this could have caused you.
Roivan: I appreciate your understanding and cooperation with this.
Me: OK, thank you.
Roivan: It's my pleasure to provide you this kind of service.
Roivan: Would this be your best email to contact (email address removed)
Me: yes sir
Roivan: Perfect!
Roivan: By the way, after our chat you will receive a brief survey. Any feedback you'd like to provide would be most appreciated, and will help us refine our Support processes.
Roivan: And before I let you go, is there anything else that I can assist you with?
Me: No, thanks for helping. Have a good day.
Roivan: Will do. You're welcome!
Roivan: To end this chat please go ahead and click "end chat".
Roivan: Have a great rest of the day!
Me: OK, bye.

I'm still waiting on that email.

[MisterShark]

***Update***

Support got back to me with steps to try, and another community member also suggested the same steps.

Remove the credit card in the Fitbit mobile app (Wallet section of the app) and then re-add it.

I did this and my following attempt to pay at the Wegman's supermarket near me was successful.

Going to try using it every chance I get: hopefully it keeps working.

[Arty_Marty]

The only way a screen protector would have any effect on the NFC / fitbit pay working is if the screen protector had some sort of metal film on it. And even if it did I doubt it would stop it working due to screen size etc 

There are some phone screen protectors that have a metal film in them but nothing like that for the fitbit  

The only thing I found that a screen protector does on a fit bit is make the screen touch sensitivity even worse . I had one on for about two weeks (fitbit pay still worked) but I found it made the touch screen almost unusable . 

It reduced sensitivity  and also made the screen more 'grippy' so I couldn't slide my finger across properly.

What phone do you have? Is it jailbroken / rooted?  If so the app might realise that and turn off fitbit pay because of security concerns  

[MisterShark]

---

@MisterShark wrote:

***Update***

Support got back to me with steps to try, and another community member also suggested the same steps.

Remove the credit card in the Fitbit mobile app (Wallet section of the app) and then re-add it.

I did this and my following attempt to pay at the Wegman's supermarket near me was successful.

Going to try using it every chance I get: hopefully it keeps working.

---

***final update***

Used Fitbit Pay two more subsequent times and it's still working like a charm.

[MisterShark]

Was hoping not to respond further on this topic but alas..

I believe Fitbit still has work to do to make Fitbit Pay reliable: it's been a 50/50 success rate using Fitbit Pay after about the 3rd or 4th time using it.

My wife's Versa's Fitbit Pay works intermittently and she's more apt to getting flustered about holding up the line at whatever store she's trying to pay for something at and looking like a tool, so she just stopped using it altogether.  A friend of mine also has the Charge 3 SE and he messaged me yesterday to tell me his Fitbit Pay just failed.

[MisterShark]

Out at lunch testing Fitbit Pay again: two consecutive successful transactions at two different merchants' pay terminals.

I don't get it.

Hopefully a subsequent software update addresses and resolves the inconsistency.

[LaineKat]

Where *exactly* is Fitbit Pay accepted? I have a sneaking suspicion that even though some place takes apple pay and android pay and google pay, it doesn't take Fitbit Pay. My Versa keeps beeping and buzzing and then coming up "Payment not accepted" or "Not authorized" and then I go on to use the same card I have linked without issue with the chip reader. What am I doing wrong?

[tobsan]

I've had the same experience so far. The first times I tried using it, it did react but the terminal said not supported or something similar. Then it stopped working altogether. After reading this thread, I tried removing and re-adding my card, and then it worked once yesterday. Today when I tried it I had the non-responsive issue again. No reaction, no buzz, no nothing.

Will try to re-add card again, but this is tedious and slow. I really hope there will be a fix for this, as it is obviously a software malfunction.

EDIT: After a few days, the problem seemed to go away (worked every time). However since yesterday, it is now working none of the times when I try it. I'm guessing re-add of card will fix this, but this really sucks 😕

[SunsetRunner]

I'm also having a similar problem: sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Last time the terminal bipped but neither the terminal or my watch said the transaction was successful. Is this some sort of software bug?

[tobsan]

I had removed my card since long, but after re-adding it recently it has worked flawlessly every time. It might be worth mentioning that I did get a firmware update a while back, so maybe that's what fixed the issues.

[RAMGarden]

Brand new Versa 2 I got last Saturday (4-25-2020), I set up my credit card with the Fitbit app, then I go to the wallet app on the watch, it asks me for my PIN I put it in, then it shows an image of my card with "hold near reader".  I do so and it vibrates and the reader beeps but says "Try again", then I move away, check the watch says "hold near reader" and then do it again.  Vibrates and beeps, then the reader now says "insert / swipe card".  So I have to get my card out and insert it into the chip reader.  This has happened yesterday and today at two different stores.  What could be going wrong?  Do I need to call the card bank?

[trabeth]

Same here until I removed my card ftom the app and reinstalled it. THEN I restarted my fitbit Versa 2 by holding the left button for 10 seconds until the Fitbit symbol comes up. It has worked perfectly ever since! I already had my pin set up before doing this.