Troubleshooting

Most snags come down to one of a few things: a feature is offline, a setting is hiding something, or a permission was never granted. This page walks through the common ones. Find your symptom, then check the things listed under it in order.

If something here doesn't fit what you're seeing, Giving feedback tells you how to reach us.

The smart features say they are offline

You see a badge like "CareHaven offline" on an answer, or the AI draft, the plain-language explainer, or a smart suggestion doesn't appear the way it usually does.

Available The smart help is designed to keep working with no connection by doing as much as it can right on your device. When it can't reach the next tier, it tells you honestly with a small source badge instead of failing silently.

What to check:

• Your connection. Some of the smart help works fully offline, but a few things need a connection the very first time. A plain-language medication or condition explainer, for example, needs a connection the first time you open it; after that it is saved on your device and opens instantly, even in airplane mode. If you're offline and haven't viewed one yet, it will be there next time you're online.
• Your device. The on-device smart help (Apple Intelligence) runs only on newer iPhones. On an older device, you'll still get the parts of CareHaven that read your own data directly, but the on-device drafting and answers may not be available. Everything that simply records and shows your own logs works on any supported iPhone with no connection at all.
• It may just be the honest badge. When you see "CareHaven offline" on an answer, that isn't a failure. It means CareHaven answered from what it could do locally and is telling you which tier handled it. The answer is still real.

For more on how the smart help is layered, see Smart help (Apple Intelligence).

Shared data is not showing up

You've shared a profile with another caregiver, or accepted a shared profile, but recent entries aren't appearing on the other phone.

Available Sync is optional and off by default. Turn it on and your care log syncs through Apple's iCloud (CloudKit) — encrypted by Apple in transit and at rest, reachable only by the people you specifically invite. Updates don't always arrive the instant they're made.

What to check:

• Give it a little time. Updates are sent in small batches rather than the moment you tap save, so a new entry can take a short while to reach the other phone. Open the app on the receiving phone to nudge it along.
• Both devices need sync turned on and a network. Each person needs sync turned on, and both devices need a working connection for updates to travel.
• Invite a co-caregiver — don't just share your own account. Invite a co-caregiver and they get access to just the person you're sharing, through Apple's private sharing. Using the same account on both phones only keeps your own devices in sync with each other, it doesn't share with someone else.
• Don't force-quit the receiving app. If you swipe the app fully closed on the receiving phone, it can't quietly catch up in the background until you open it again. Leave it in the background rather than killing it.
• Confirm the invite was accepted. The other person opens the invite link and accepts it; their CareHaven then fills in with the sections you shared. If they never accepted, nothing will arrive.

For the full picture of how sharing works and what each person can see, see Sharing care with others (sync).

You can't unlock (forgot your PIN)

You set a PIN to lock the app and now can't get past the lock screen.

Available CareHaven can lock with a 4-digit PIN, and unlock with Face ID once a PIN is set. The PIN screen appears when you open the app and after it's been in the background.

What to check:

• Try Face ID. If you set a PIN, Face ID can unlock the app. Make sure your face is in view and try again.
• After several wrong tries, there's a short cool-down. To protect your data if the device is lost or stolen, CareHaven pauses the PIN pad for a bit after repeated wrong entries, and the pause grows with each further miss. The lock screen shows how long to wait — let it pass and try again. Nothing is deleted, and it never says "account locked."
• Locked out for good? Recover with Face ID or your device passcode. After many wrong attempts the PIN pad turns off and CareHaven offers to unlock with Face ID or your iPhone's own passcode. Confirm it's you and you'll be asked to set a new PIN — your care data is untouched and there's no need to reinstall. Knowing your iPhone passcode is enough on its own, even if Face ID isn't set up.
• There is no remote reset. Your PIN is held only on your device, and we have no way to see it or reset it for you — that's deliberate, for your privacy. The Face ID / device-passcode recovery above is the in-app way back. If you genuinely can't use either, the last resort is to remove and reinstall the app, then restore from a backup you made earlier.
• This is why backups matter. A backup is separate from your PIN and is what lets you recover your data if you ever have to reinstall. If you keep regular encrypted backups, even a worst-case reset costs you only the time to reinstall and restore. See Back up & restore your data.

A note on a different password: the backup password is a separate thing from the app PIN. The backup password is the one you set to encrypt your backup file, and you'll need it every time you create or restore a backup. Keep both somewhere safe — neither is stored anywhere we can reach.

Demo data is still showing

You see sample people and a couple of weeks of activity that aren't yours, and you want your own profiles back.

Available CareHaven can load sample profiles so you can explore a fully set-up app before you've entered anything. The richest sample is a profile named Zoe.

What to check:

• Turn the demo toggle off. Tap the menu icon (top left), then Settings, then find the Demo section and tap Load Demo Profile to switch it off. Your real data is preserved while demo mode is on, and it comes right back when you turn demo off — nothing of yours is lost.
• You can switch it on and off freely. Loading the demo doesn't touch your own profiles, so it's safe to explore and then return to your data whenever you like.

For more on exploring safely, see Exploring with demo data.

A feature seems to be missing

A tool you expected — or one a guide here mentions — isn't where you thought it would be.

CareHaven shapes itself to each person and to your preferences, so a few things are intentionally hidden in some setups. Check these in order.

What to check:

• It may be hidden for this person on purpose. Each hub fits the profile it belongs to, based on the person's age, diagnoses, and sex. A 9-year-old's profile won't show some surfaces an older adult's will, and a profile with no related condition won't show that condition's tools. You can override this per person: tap the menu icon (top left), go to Settings → Menus → Hub sub-sections, pick the person at the top, and tap any row to cycle it through Auto, Show, or Hide. Set it to Show to force a section visible even when the defaults wouldn't suggest it. Available
• General Caregiver Mode may be hiding the special-needs tools. Available If you turned on General Caregiver Mode, the special-needs-specific surfaces are tucked away. Turn it off at menu icon (top left) -> Settings -> General Caregiver Mode if you want those tools back.
• A menu item may be hidden. Available Tap the menu icon (top left), go to Settings → Menus — you can show or hide individual items from the menus and the quick-log grid. If something's gone from a menu, check whether it was hidden there. The same area lets you pick which hubs appear in the Main Menu.
• Try Search. Tap the Search pill (top right, "Search or ask...") and type the feature name. Search will route you straight to it, which often answers "where did it go" faster than hunting through menus. See Search & Ask CareHaven.
• Some things live inside other screens, not on their own. A few tools — the document scanner, for one — appear wherever you'd use them rather than as a separate destination, so there's nothing to navigate to on its own.

If a feature is genuinely not in this build yet, Known limitations & what's coming lists what's on the way.

Reminders aren't appearing

You set a medication dose time, a care nudge, or a refill alert, but the notifications aren't arriving.

Available CareHaven can send reminders for medication doses, low medication supply, and a few gentle care nudges. These all rely on a permission you grant once.

What to check:

• Allow notifications. The first time a feature needs to remind you — when you set a dose time, set up a break plan, or add a sibling, for example — CareHaven asks for notification permission. If you said no, the reminders can't fire. You can grant it the next time you're prompted, or turn notifications on for CareHaven in your iPhone's own Settings app (outside CareHaven).
• Check the master switch. Tap the menu icon (top left) and go to Settings → Local Notifications — there is a Local Notifications master switch. The gentle care nudges sit just under it. If the master switch is off, no nudges fire at all.
• Care nudges respect your snooze. If you dismissed one of the Home at-a-glance cards with its small x, the matching nudge stays quiet for that one person until the situation clears. Medical flags come back the next day; the gentler nudges rest a few days. Snoozing one person's card never quiets a real flag on another person.
• These reminders are local to your device. That's a good thing — care nudges still fire even in airplane mode, because they don't depend on a connection.

For setting dose reminders step by step, see Set medication reminders.

Still stuck?

If none of these fit, you can reach us directly. In the current beta, the best ways to report something are through TestFlight's built-in feedback or by email to shawn@carehaven.org. See Giving feedback for the details.