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Contributor III
March 16, 2018
Answered

Some TuneIn radio stations do not play with Alexa (KPCC)

  • March 16, 2018
  • 5 replies
  • 8066 views
For roughly the past week, I have been having trouble streaming KPCC (Los Angeles) with Alexa on TuneIn through my Sonos One. Previously, it was working fine. Other stations seem to work okay, but importantly, KPCC works fine when I try this on my Echo Dot. So the problem has something to do with Sonos.

When I say, "Alexa, play KPCC" OR "Alexa, play KPCC on TuneIn", Alexa either remains silent or says "KPCC on TuneIn Live is currently not available." But if I say "Play KPCC on iHeartRadio" it works fine. It also works fine playing other radio stations on TuneIn.

As I mentioned, the station plays fine through my Echo Dot, but if I say to my Dot, "Alexa, play KPCC in Living Room," the Sonos is silent. So, again, it seems like a Sonos issue.

Anyone else having similar problems on TuneIn with this or other stations? Is this type of problem something Sonos is aware of? Thanks.
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      Best answer by CommunityChat
      Nice to hear you followed up with Amazon. I reported my experience to KPCC streaming support, and they said they have had other reports of similar problems with TuneIn and Alexa. They are looking into it.

      5 replies

      Rob R
      Lyricist II
      March 17, 2018
      I have the exact same problem. A few data points on my experience:

      - When I tell Amazon Echo "play KPCC on Kitchen", it correctly recognizes that "Kitchen" is a reference to a Sonos device, says that it's going to play it, but comes back in 15-20 seconds saying "KPCC on TuneIn live is not available right now". And if I go to my Sonos, it is displaying error, "Unable to play '89.3 KPCC Oxnard-Ventura, CA' - the file cannot be found."

      - The thing is, if I play KPCC via TuneIn directly on the Sonos, the station plays fine, but it's description is different (e.g., "89.3 | KPCC (National News)".

      - Interestingly, if I tell Echo to "play KPCC", it correctly plays correctly (but on the tiny Echo Dot speaker).

      So, Sonos can play KPCC directly, the Echo can play KPCC directly, but if I tell Echo to play KPCC on Sonos device, it fails. Also, if I tell Echo to play other terrestrial radio stations on Sonos, it works fine: It looks like some subtle discrepancy between how Sonos and Echo recognize this particular station, KPCC, on TuneIn. Looks like the indexes or lookup tables on the two systems are not in sync.

      I sent email inquiry to TuneIn support. I also Alexa app's log and left a "voice feedback" description that outlined the above. And when I came to Sonos to report the problem here, I see you already reported it, so I wanted to let you know that you're not alone. Hopefully someone in tech support can respond to your comment and, if nothing else, acknowledge that they that have received our bug report and will look into it.
        Rob R
        Lyricist II
        March 18, 2018
        For what it's worth, I went into the Alexa app and when looking at the history of one's interaction, there's a button for reporting errors. So, I reported the problem and (impressively) got an actual email from Amazon tech support within an hour or so with some reset instructions, suggesting that I phone tech support if that didn't solve the problem. Needless to say, I followed the instructions and it didn't solve the problem, so I called tech support. After, literally, an hour and a half with a tech support person, he concluded that we were right, that there is a problem. So he's escalated the issue to the development team and I was told that they'd get back to me in 72 hours. I'll keep you posted here if we find some resolution.
        CommunityChatAuthorAnswer
        Contributor III
        March 18, 2018
        Nice to hear you followed up with Amazon. I reported my experience to KPCC streaming support, and they said they have had other reports of similar problems with TuneIn and Alexa. They are looking into it.
        David_78
        Contributor I
        March 20, 2018
        I have the same problem and it has been present for only a few days. Echo tech support was unable to help.
        David_78
        Contributor I
        March 22, 2018
        As noted above, if I say Alexa play KPCC on iHeartRadio radio on Kitchen(or Master Bedroom) my main Sonos speakers, it does work. If I don’t specify radio site, it defaults to Tunein and doesn’t work
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