Navien Pbcm-As-001 Navi Link Wi-Fi Remote Control

I just installed a Navien 240A with added Navilink in order to make best use of my gas and water-- as advertised in the Navien literature. However, the app and controls are designed to self-sabotage. The Navilink app will allow you to program the times the recirculating pump goes on and off for every day of the week, which I programmed to operate in the mornings. However, if you want to take that occasional shower in the afternoon or evening you cannot activate the recirculating pump from the app (an neither from the tank itself), so you'll have to watch gallons of water go to waste before your shower gets hot. You can activate manually the recirculating pump by installing an additional "Hot Button" device (which I am told can be activated through the app as well). But the Hot Button will override the Navilink programmed scheduling of the pump and will no longer operate on schedule. Really?!!!! Are the people who design these products stupid, evil or both?????!!!! I give two stars because the thing works, but it doesn't do all it is advertised to do. The Navilink app has to be updated to include seamless manual control of the recirculating pump...Update one month later: After weeks of trying to figure out why the scheduling of the recirculating pump was not engaged--it was on 24hrs despite being programmed to go on at 7am and off at 11am daily--I finally figured that the scheduling control button in the app is actually inverse: If you press "enable" the scheduling will be off, if you press "disable" the scheduling is on. Whoever designed the app simply forgot to add a "d" at the end of the instruction. The button should read "Enabled/Disabled".... I can't believe these sort of mistakes get through!!!!ANOTHER UPDATE: I just figured that if you want to turn on the recirculating pump manually you can disengage the Weekly Scheduler-- Press ENABLE (which disables the timer) and the recirc pump goes on. If you want to turn the pump back to off press DISABLE (which enables the timer). It sounds and is confusing (because of the badly and misleadingly designed controls), but in the end I am able to get the Navilink app do most of what I need. It only took me a month to figure it out!!!!!

Our contractor installed it with the Navien tankless water heater. The connection process itself drove me insane. User interface is stuck in 1990s. I would have picked a different tankless heater system if the remote access is so bad with Navien. Stay away from it. There are better options in the market. It’s too late for me, save yourself.

For the modern era where wi-fi control of our appliances is critical, especially with frequent change in routine, we wished we hadn’t installed the Navien. The Navien Navilink enables wifi control, but is 20-years behind. Surprising for a company that has been doing tankless for so long. We wish we bought the Rennai which has rich wi-fi accessories (app, motion detector, remote buttons, remote temp, etc). Hard to believe that Navien can’t compete with Rannai. When contacted, they indicated they have no plans to fix their wireless capability nor move into the 21st century. I wonder if there is a buyers remorse period.

First the good news: You don’t need to buy the optional “hot button” accessory for my new Navien NPE-240A tankless water heater if you buy the WIFI NaviLink. The way I have been using the water heater is by setting the schedule to 0:00 hrs to 23:50hrs and keep the heater turned off. Whenever I want hot water, I just use the Navilink app to turn the heater on and the heater will automatically circulate the water until the return line is with ~10 degrees of the set temperature. Once I don’t need hot water anymore, I turn the unit off until the next time.Unfortunately, a very clunky app with rudimentary features makes my experience with my new Navien heater much less rewarding than it should be. Also, the pamphlet that came with the wifi receiver isn’t telling you that you had to reprogram a few parameters at the heater and that you have to change one of the dip switches at the unit. All that was fixed with a call to customer support which had a 50 minute wait time. But once all that is done, the wifi setup was quick and easy.

pros: when it does work but only was able to verify ON/OFF function; not able yet to see any error message since the network connection is broken again which requires a person to get to the attic to press the network buttoncons: - required replacement boards are not documented, takes a couple of phone calls to find out - very hard to find competent tech to install - server bug fixes seem slow and frequent (coming from Korea) and the installed unit could not be used for 2 months due to the server issues. And the fixes are not clearly announced to the users only thru sporadic app updates - network connection would break at random which requires pressing a button on the unit to reconnect (this is my major gripe because the main reason of getting this unit is to avoid having to climb into the attic to monitor the unit due to physical handicaps) - cost does not justify the means; parts plus installation is around 700/800;; now I have to get extra Navien cable and having a new outlet put in around $200+ to work around the above issue, and the verdict is yet to be seen.In hindsight I wish I had either installed the tankless where I can easily access, or install a wall mount remote unit instead because if you turn off the tankless before vacation departure, there would be very slim chance that you would need to control the unit remotely thus grant the NaviLink worthless.Navien needs to do a better job in their field support, user communication, and general training before they market a pricy quasi solution. The brief marketing blurb sounds better than it is.