Australian COVIDsafe app conflicts with square reader

[barkersmith]

Hi this is more an FYI than a bug report as it's not technically Square's fault.

However if you're having trouble with your reader not connecting to your iphone, I found killing the Government's COVIDsafe app fixed the problem.

My reader was working perfectly before installing the COVIDsafe app, but it seems to interfere with the reader's connection.

Bit of a pain as that's kind of when you want the COVIDsafe app to be running, when you're in close proximity to people.

Unfortunately there's no real way to report BUG to the DTA about COVIDsafe, so I though I'd just post this as an FYI if you're in Australia and have found your square reader mysteriously stops working.

I'm using an iphone 7 running IOS 13.4.1 and the square contactless reader (0387).

Thanks!

[Alex_]

Hi @barkersmith,

Thanks for flagging this. To make sure I'm understanding, is this an app provided by the Australian government that is causing interferences with our Point of Sale app?

Please let me know by replying in this thread. I'll keep an eye out for your response.

[barkersmith]

Hi

I disabled the COVIDsafe app and was able to successfully re-pair the reader.

You can then re-enable the COVIDsafe app but it still causes intermittent conflicts/slow (10-15 sec) connection with the reader.

The COVIDsafe app is an Australian government provided app to help track coronavirus contacts.

It's here.. https://www.health.gov.au/resources/apps-and-tools/covidsafe-app/covidsafe-help

It's been the subject of quite a lot of "discussion" around it's usefulness...

Thanks

DS

[Seamus]

Hey @barkersmith,

Seamus from our Melbourne office here!

I had a chat with our support team about this and it appears this is the first case of its kind that we've heard of. I'd recommend filing a support ticket for this one if you'd like our team to look into it further. You can file a ticket with our Australian team via the contact form at https://squ.re/2Foou3G - make sure to include the all the info you've posted here!

My thoughts are that we'd likely have heard of more cases of this already, if it were a widespread issue. I'm wondering if there may be other factors at play here, such as how many devices you have connected to Bluetooth and how many open apps are using Bluetooth on the device? Both the COVIDsafe app and Square's Contactless + Chip reader are heavy users of Bluetooth on your phone - did you have any other devices connected such as a headset or speakers?

[barkersmith]

Hi

Yes I did consider that as I also have an apple watch paired to the phone at the same time (but nothing else).

But I've had the watch for over a year with no problems, that's why I went straight to the COVIDsafe app as it was the only thing that had changed on the phone WRT bluetooth.

Anyway I'll just keep an eye on it..

Thanks