Versa counting too many floors.

[Acharpia]

Ever since I got my Versa it seems to be grossly over exaggerating my stair count. I had the Charge 2 before the Versa and it was fairly accurate with my stair count, but now it’s more than doubling the number of floors I climb in a day.

Is this a known issue? Has the way in which the Versa calculates stairs climbed change significantly over the Charge 2? I’ve now gone from averaging 15 floors a day to 34. 

Moderator Edit: Clarified Subject.

[cBitFit]

Thanks for the post on accuracy testing @MarcoGFitbit.  I found that the Versa was accurately tracking stair based floors, meaning if I walked up two floors of stairs, I got credit for two floors. 

For general activities however, the floors counted have been far more 'accentuated' or 'exaggerated' than my Blaze.  For example, with my Blaze, the most ever 'extra' floors I got was when walking outside for two hours in 40 mph wind gusts.  I estimated I got about 20 extra floors.  With the Versa however I got 200 'extra' floors while mowing my grass in calm weather.

I've had a fitbit so long that I am used to 'extra' floors.  I think fitbit should tweak the Versa to make it consistent with floor tracking on other models, but should acknowledge that there will always be some 'extra' floors and give us the capability of viewing our floors, during a manual tracked exercise.

If I remember correctly, the charge HR originally could display floors while in a button activated tracking session.  After a firmware update, that capability disappeared.  With my Blaze, I constantly had to sync and use my phone to view floors, while in a button activated tracking session.  I was hoping the Versa would fix this, but laps were added to walk and run tracking sessions, but not floors.  Seeing floors stats while in a button activated tracking session would help a user to know how many 'extra' floors to ignore 🙂

Maybe this idea could be considered for a new feature if someone has not already posted it.  Please vote if you agree 🙂

[lauchard]

The very least they could do is update so we could manually add/remove floors like with water! By not even acknowledging the issue makes me wonder if all they are interested in are quarterlies and investors!

[abissinian]

@lauchard based on what I read here, they're not. 

I took it back and walked away, bought somethingelse from a brand  who cares and with a community that helps and not bashes. 

No more headache.

Can't keep 200$ of devices hoping that sooner or later they may be fixing it. And for what I read here, they still have to aknowledge problems from the previous devices... 

[SallyB605]

Post-reset:

It actually tracked my sleep accurately last night. However, it gave me several floors as I drove 3 miles to work. In town, smooth roads, and I do not have a stiff transmission.

I will let y'all know how the rest of the day goes. Sigh.

[SallyB605]

I'm cautiously happy to tell you all that I heard back again on my support ticket. They are going to replace my Versa. Although I have to pay shipping, I'm hoping that it will be worth it. Perhaps just some of the Versas are faulty this way, maybe some mysterious batch got botched.

I will let you all know whether the replacement solves the problems, but I imagine the exchange will take 1-2 weeks. I have to send them mine, then when they receive it they send me a new one.

We shall see.

[Gjjen]

Will be interested in your experience! I could exchange mine at Best Buy.

I do a lot of mountain hiking and the vertical feet are a big deal to me. Thanks for keeping up the fight!

Sent from my iPad

[ShaunMcGill]

Woke up, drove to work, got a lift up 2 floors. Versa says 9 floors so far? Charge 2 or Ionic never did this. Not windy here either. 

[SallyB605]

While I wait for my replacement Versa, I’m using my Charge 2. I have to say I miss everything about the Versa (except the accuracy problems). I really enjoyed the smartwatch capabilities and some of the apps had already become indispensable to me. It was nice to have the color screen and choices of clockface. 

I’ll post back back when I get the replacement. 

[Gjjen]

I feel the same way! I hope a replacement is the answer.

Sent from my iPad

[LadyCassandra]

I hope somebody that's been having issues sees some kind of resolution. I exchanged my Versa twice though and had the same issues with all three.

[tallgeoff]

From what I received from the company and their articles the altimeter in Versa is more sensitive than previous models - it must add or improve other features. As a result it records smaller changes in barometric pressure from other conditions than climbing stairs. If this is the case I don't expect replacing your Versa is the answer. Unless they improve the algorithms with a firmware update, we may be stuck.

Support has asked me to track the occurrences and environment which I'm trying to do. I recommend everyone log their issues with Support rather than simply describing their issues in the forum. Only in this way will the company understand the scope of the issue and act. Forums are only broadly tracked, Support complaints are heavily tracked, recorded and reported to key business units such as marketing, management and operations.

I believe Fitbit is attempting to resolve their issues in good faith without a full recall (likely financially unaffordable). As a reputable and long time fitness watch player, the failure of their flagship watch would be disastrous. Management knows this and will act to find an affordable solution if it exists.

Record your issues formally with Support with as many facts as possible and hope in time they will find a remedy and distribute it. If it's a new altimeter we will be out of luck.

Personally I can live with a bad stair count. I'm more concerned about my possible over stated step count. I'm suspicious but how do I test this? I suppose by loading in my measured step and then completing a known distance walk. A lot of work.

Geoff

Moderator edit: personal info removed

[SallyB605]

Before I bought the Versa, I considered the Apple Watch. I decided to stay with Fitbit because I’ve relied on their trackers for years. Staying with Fitbit also gives me more latitude to switch to an Android phone in the future, should I ever want to.

I hope the Versa procblems can be solved with an exchange or OS update or both. I really lIke the Versa, and if the company could tell us that they are aware of the issues and are working on a fix, I could be patient. Someone posted on some thread that most of us early adopters are fairly tech savvy and understand that there can be some bumpy rollouts of new products. We “get it” and can usually roll with it until things get ironed out. 

[ShaunMcGill]

OK, I wore my Versa on my left wrist (synced to my iPhone as non-dominant wrist) and a Charge 2 on my right wrist (synced to my wife's iPhone as dominant wrist)

22 floors on Versa / 8 on Charge 2

12.356 steps on Versa / 11,866 on Charge 2

I then swapped wrists the next day-

16 floors on Versa / 5 on Charge 2

9,328 steps on Versa / 9,112 on Charge 2

I then used my wife's Versa instead of mine to see what would happen-

14 floors on Versa / 5 on Charge 2

So, my wife's Versa is broken and needs returning and presumably so is mine? 

Or maybe my Charge 2 is faulty. Although when I wake up and drive to work it will show 0 floors whereas the Versa can show quite a few at times when I have been driving or walked on flat surfaces.

I believe that the Versa is 'broken' at floor tracking and with steps at times as well. When I have the time I will post all of the results with screenshots to prove what is happening, but some of the excuses being made don't make for a tracker that is accurate.

The obvious answer is that Fitbit needs to fix the Versa, and possibly the Ionic as well because that also over-counted floors for me.

[tallgeoff]

I encourage you to pass this good  data onto customer support who will log these issues are part of their issue data base. Only this way will they see the scope of the problem and the accuracy of the complaint reports. Then we can expect some action if it's widespread. 

Support has asked me to track my steps and stairs issues so they can better understand the problem. You have data that highlights the scope of these issues. Hope you provide this to Support. 

[hilljogger]

I was able to manually remover the stair option. 

[SallyB605]

It would be awesome if you told us how you did that.

[hilljogger]

I went into the app on my phone and lightly held down the "floors" icon. It gave me the option to remove it. I have the iPhone. 

So it worked the same way as removing/moving apps on the actual iPhone screen. 

[SallyB605]

Ah, I see. Just the display option. Thanks. I was hoping you’d found a way to remove counted stairs.

[AlejandraFitbit]

Hello all, I hope you are doing fine.

I am sorry to hear about the floors accuracy issue you are all experiencing and would like to know if you have test your watches by following the instructions provided in this post? If you haven't, please take a look at it and do the test.

Also, I was wondering how many of you have contacted our support team, have they offer you a solution for this? Keep in mind that your watches may give you credit for extra floors for a variety of reasons. Occasionally your Versa 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. We recommend that your devices be worn loosely during exercise. Also, it's not possible to delete extra floors, but you can achieve the same result by negating them:

1. Log into your fitbit.com dashboard.
2. At the top of the screen click Log.
3. Click the Activities tab.
4. Under Log Activities, type in Driving and enter the date, duration, and start time.
5. Click Log. Your steps, floors, and calories burned will decrease for the time period you specified.

I hope this helps, catch you later. 

[Gjjen]

I think most of the driving concerns are extra steps, which I have experienced fewer problems. The causes of the too many floors at varied and multiple. I climb mountains so this is an important feature for me. I have not notified support.

Sent from my iPad