I purchased a Nest smart thermostat largely based on reviews like this, and after setting it up I found a major feature was missing which makes me intensely regret the decision. Nest is missing a Hold Temperature feature.
In general the smart scheduling, app-based home-away location detection, and other energy-saving features are great. But sometimes it is important for a user to be able to easily override the smart/automated scheduling and lock in their own temperature setting for a while. Many of Nest's customers have told them about the problems we've encountered due to the lack of a Hold feature. Nest could add a simple indefinite hold that users could turn on and off, or an interface similar to the fan setting, where there would be options for 1, 2, 6, 12, 24, or 48-hour temperature hold that would be automatically deactivated once the time had elapsed. Either of these would be technically simple, and their technical support representatives confirmed that they would not be difficult to implement. However, Nest refuses to fix this deficiency. The ecobee--and just about every other smart and programmable thermostat--has a Hold Temp feature. Nest does not.
Nest will occasionally respond to their customers with convoluted "workarounds" that allow users to set and hold a temperature. But the workarounds require the user to disable most of the smart features. That isn't a valid solution, and defeats the purpose of buying the Nest in the first place. They are at best neglectful, and at worst actively dismissive of their customers who are caught in a situation where we find their product lacking and are requesting a change that would genuinely improve their thermostats.
I am posting here to ask you to reconsider your recommendation for the Nest thermostats, and that you please contact Nest to explain that as a highly-trusted and valued source of reviews, you are relaying the request of users like me to add a Hold feature. The lack of a Hold Temp feature is incredibly frustrating, and often makes it impossible to retain the smart features of the thermostat while also keeping the temperatures in my home comfortable.
I understand that sometimes a hold temperature setting could temporarily override some energy-saving features -- however, other times the hold setting would end up saving energy. But the biggest issue is that this is a simple feature that is glaringly missing from their thermostat, which makes it work poorly. And Nest has so far ignored their customers when we reach out to them to try to get this issue fixed. I am hoping that if you would also talk to them, they might move forward with this crucial improvement.
Here are a couple threads in Nest's community forum that go into the issue, and include some of the "workarounds" that users have had to resort to:
https
/www.nest-community.com/s/question/0D51W00005IgN8QSAV/hold-temperature?t=1538532255910
https/www.nest-community.com/s/question/0D51W000064RtHySAK/please-add-a-hold-temperature-function-its-a-major-shortcoming-that-nest-doesnt-already-allow-this
Thank you for considering this, and for all your excellent reviews. I'm hoping that if you could speak to Nest they would finally fix this problem.
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