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Alexa will not stop playing or pause

  • 3 August 2019
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I have a Sonos Beam in my living room in a group with two Gen 1 Sonos One speakers and a Sonos Sub. I have had Alexa enabled since I initially setup this system.

All had been working well but suddenly, Alexa will not stop or pause playing by voice command. I can say "Alexa, play NPR" and it will respond properly. I can say "Alex Louder" and "Alex Lower" and the volume will adjust. But when I say "Alexa Stop" (which is what I've been saying since day one) or "Alexa Pause" it will simply make the command chime and keep playing.

Also, the Beam is working properly but in the Sonos app, I don't specifically see the Beam listed as a speaker. I think it might simply be labeled "Living Room?" I'm not sure if I should see the Beam specifically?

I tried to remove Alexa and reactivate it but I got completely confused and I'm not sure what I accomplished.

I'm now back to square one, with the same symptoms as described above.

I have an Echo Dot in another room that responds normally to Stop and Pause commands.
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Best answer by UKMedia 4 August 2019, 10:10

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94 replies

I’m having the same issue with a twist. At first I thought Alexa wasn’t skipping songs at all, but then I realized it’s just when I use Google Play that anything besides stop and start does not work. 

Alexa voice commands work flawlessly with my Sonos playlists. But I primarily use google play and ever since I did the latest system update voice commands for play previous, repeat or skip a song no longer works for Google Play. 

I tried all of the troubleshooting suggested and the issue persists. I’ll submit a diagnostic, but I thought I would post it in hope of anyone else having and/or solving this particular issue

 

Hi!

 

My Sonos One does not respond to anything that belongs to stopping or pausing playback.

I have read the whole topic about that Problem and I tried everything, even resetting my One entirely.

Could someone please help me, Sonos devs?

I now Uploaded a diag -> 1329131319

Hi!

 

My Sonos One does not respond to anything that belongs to stopping or pausing playback.

I have read the whole topic about that Problem and I tried everything, even resetting my One entirely.

Could someone please help me, Sonos devs?

I now Uploaded a diag -> 1329131319


Ok i now completely disconnected my One from Alexa app and from Sonos.
I then uninstalled both apps and resetted my One.

 

I actually got two One’s. I then installed them both at the same step freshly in sonos app.

I connected amazon music and alexa in the Sonos app.

I installed alexa app and activated the sonos skill and let it discover my devices.

At first only one “One” was found but after a second search i found my second One.

 

Now Alexa works fine (Play, Stop, etc).

(Im from Ger, so my commands are in german lang)

 

Im scared of rebooting my One’s because im expecting that Stop-Problem to come back..

If i do not reply within the next couple hours, this can be considered solved! (at least for me)

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Got worse for me: Alexa won’t play music either now… this happened after I submitted my diagnostics.

Will Sonos get in touch on this forum?

Got worse for me: Alexa won’t play music either now… this happened after I submitted my diagnostics.

Will Sonos get in touch on this forum?

 

You have to post the reference number here for them to get back to you.

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I have, 2 days ago. How long does it usually take them to get back to customers?

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Got worse for me: Alexa won’t play music either now… this happened after I submitted my diagnostics.

Will Sonos get in touch on this forum?

 

Hi there,

 

I took a look at your diagnostic report but the reason for this issue is still unclear. I don’t see any obvious errors which would explain it. I think it would be best to troubleshoot this live with our phone team. Please call us up, our number’s here.

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Ok, will do

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@Trisse123, thank you so much for your advice!!

Here is what I did for 2 hours this morning:

  • Switched off all Sonos devices
  • Disconnected all devices from internet Router (wired and wireless)
  • Factory reset Bridge, Connect and one of my One’s
  • Forgot all Sonos devices from https://alexa.amazon.co.uk/
  • Deleted Alexa and Sonos apps on iPhone
  • Restarted Router
  • Restarted Bridge and connected it to Router via ethernet
  • Downloaded Sonos mobile app
  • From the mobile app:
    • Set up a new system
    • Added the Bridge first
    • Added the Connect second ... with difficulties !!!
    • Registered the two products to Sonos account
    • Added the One
    • Registered the One to Sonos account
    • Skipped true play tuning
    • Added Alexa service to One
    • Downloaded Alexa app
  • In Alexa app:
    • Signed in
    • Deregistered all Sonos devices
    • Disabled then enabled Sonos skill

… and it didn’t work … “I have trouble understanding right now” …

Made myself a cup of tea, took a deep breath, removed the Sonos skill from my One, disabled and enabled the Sonos skill again, and finally Alexa was added to my One again.

Then I added Spotify to Sonos and Alexa again.

“Alexa, play music in Dining”: worked

“Alexa, stop in Dining”: worked    -    HOORAY!!

“Alexa, play Crooked Rain” … “Playing Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain from Spotify”: worked

“Alexa, stop”: worked   -   HOORAY again!!

Factory reset all other devices, added them one by one to the Sonos system, grouped them as they were before… It all works.

Thank you Trisse123!!

Just got a Sonos one today and I have the exact same problem with Alexa. She will play NPR but will not stop with any combination of cancel, stop or pause. I have tried removing the skill, disconnecting Alexa in the Sonos app and restarting the speaker to no avail. Very annoying for a first time use of the product. I am glad I found this forum post via google search. I have uploaded diagnostics with id 776055293. I hope I can get some help and get this fixed. If not I will just return it and move on. 
 

 

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Stop, Pause, Cancel would not work this weekend for me either when playing from Amazon Music to a Sonos One (Gen I). Light flashed white but then music just continued playing. Pressing the Play/Pause button on the top did stop the music. In a different room on a different Sonos One the music did stop but when asking Alex to play or resume she stated that “resume is not supported on this device”. Two things seemed to work, firstly “Alex Stop in Livingroom” and secondly power cycling both the devices. Strange, but that’s software for you.

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Update: Resume only works if I say Alexa “Resume on <Room Name>” otherwise I get the message “resume is not supported”.

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The team is looking into this, but I don't have any specific details on a resolution. As Disco Stu suggested above, "Play NPR" isn't able to stop, but playing a specific NPR station will. Here's why, "Play NPR" loads up the NPR skill, which isn't responding to the stop command from Alexa on Sonos. Playing a specific station, is playing it from TuneIn or your preferred radio source, such as iHeartRadio.

I'll let you know if we have any news on this issue.

I’m having the same problem.  Any updates? 

Best option first is to Disable the Sonos Skill and then Enable it again in the Alexa App. If the problem persists, please power down the Beam for 5 secs and then power back on.

If the second option works, I suggest that you open the settings web page for your router and reserve the IP address for your Sonos devices. (I normally reserve the range 192.168.0.200 and above for my Sonos devices.)

This worked for me! Thanks / J

Same issue here wrt inability to stop/pause/cancel. Like everyone else this has worked flawlessly for 12-18 months and in the last 30-60 days completely flaked out. Extremely disappointing, I hope Sonos dev is treating this as a high priority issue and working on resolution, this is needless to say core functionality of the system.

Hey all,

I'm having the same issue but, for me, it seems to be specifically when listening to NPR. I've tried all of the "fixes" in the thread and the only one that seems to work is playing the specific station. I'm new to the Sonos world and am eager to build out my home system but these little, crazy annoying bugs make me pause at spending the money. The sound is great but the voice commands should f-ing work on a high-end device, amiright?

I'm having the same issue but, for me, it seems to be specifically when listening to NPR. I've tried all of the "fixes" in the thread and the only one that seems to work is playing the specific station. I'm new to the Sonos world and am eager to build out my home system but these little, crazy annoying bugs make me pause at spending the money. The sound is great but the voice commands should f-ing work on a high-end device, amiright?

 

I have the same issue. I am able to start NPR using “alex play the news”, but not able to stop it. The only way I can get the speaker to stop playback is to say “alexa play spotify” and then “alex stop spotify”.

Hello everyone. We are aware of this issue and are working with Amazon on implementing a fix. As a workaround, if you specify the radio station, in this case NPR, Alexa should complete the command. For example, saying “Alexa, Stop (Name of the NPR station)” should stop the music. Let me know how this works out. 

I listen to ABC RN. Alexa follows command play abc Rn, but will not stop when I say stop. 

Hello @gerrib. Welcome to the community. Have you tried asking Alexa to “Stop ABC RN” in your command? Is so, what does she say? 

 

Are you using Alexa on a Sonos device, such as a Beam or Sonos One; or are you using Alexa on an Echo device?

 

 

hi Alex, I am using 2 Sonos Play One speakers. I have disabled Alexa on one and uninstalled and installed Alexa on the other.

 Stop used to work. It works for timer still. I tried Stop ABC RN and Stop ABC Radio National but neither work. Alexa says playing ABC RN on Tunein Radio app when I give the command.

That is very odd. as I mentioned previously we are working with Amazon on this issue. We hope it can be resolved soon, but we cannot provide a time frame at this time. When we have more information to share, we will update this thread.

 

hi Alex, I am using 2 Sonos Play One speakers. I have disabled Alexa on one and uninstalled and installed Alexa on the other.

 Stop used to work. It works for timer still. I tried Stop ABC RN and Stop ABC Radio National but neither work. Alexa says playing ABC RN on Tunein Radio app when I give the command.

Just to clarify. I meant when I give the command to ‘play ABC RN’ or ABC Radio National Alexa responds saying ‘playing ABC Radio National On Tune In app'’ and the station is played but  Alexa will not respond to stop or stop abc rn or other similar commands . Alexa responds to stop when the timer goes off.

 

We are having this problem also. The wife listens to NPR, but when she tells it to stop, it does not. She’ll say “Stop NPR,” stop the station name, stop room, nothing works. I’ll say,  “ALEXA! Listen to your mother!!” But she is obstinate. 
 

I have submitted a diagnostic 1681780391

 

 

Can you please let us know if you have any success.