A recurring pass only opens the gate inside the weekly windows you set. “Not valid right now” means the pass is fine — it is just outside its window at this moment. Here is how the timing is judged, and the rules that surprise people.
Which clock is used
Windows are checked against your community's local time — never the server's clock and never your guest's phone. The pass page your guest opens also carries the community's time zone, so someone reading it from another state sees the window as it applies at the gate.
Rules that catch people out
- The end time is exclusive. A 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM window is over at 5:00 PM. A housekeeper arriving at exactly 5:00 will be refused.
- Overnight windows belong to the day they open. Friday 10:00 PM – 6:00 AM covers Friday night and the early hours of Saturday — not Saturday night. These windows are labelled “(next day)”.
- Same start and end means all day. If you set 9:00 to 9:00 on a day, the pass is valid at any time that day.
- Any window admits. A pass can carry up to 20 windows (Mondays 8–5 and Wednesdays 3–6, say), and matching any one of them is enough.
- The weekday is the community's weekday. Near midnight, the community's date — not your guest's — decides which day's windows apply.
What your guest sees
Outside the window, the pass page does not draw a QR code; it shows the status and the schedule instead, so your guest learns from the page rather than from a refusal at the gate. The gate's own refusal message is deliberately vague about when the window opens, so a forwarded link does not advertise your routine.
Where the pass shows up
An out-of-schedule pass still counts as active — it stays under Active in the app and on the web, and stays on the web's Present screen, because it will work again at the next window. Schedules are summarised as “weekdays”, “weekends”, “every day”, or the days you picked.
Good to know
- A recurring pass works only inside the windows you set, and one created without an end date does not expire on its own. If it has stopped working outside of them entirely, check its End date under Edit pass and switch on Never expires if you want it to run indefinitely. In the app a recurring pass starts with 365 entries, so a weekly visitor will not run out for years.
- To fix the window, edit the pass in the app (⋯ › Edit pass › Weekly schedule) rather than sending a new link.
Related
See “How do I give ongoing access to a housekeeper, nanny, dog walker, or contractor?” to set one up, and “What do the pass statuses mean: Valid now, Expired, Already used, Not valid right now, Inactive?” for the other badges.