The Ideal Touch Connect is Now Compatible with Alexa!

With the Ideal Touch Connect now being compatible with Alexa, Jamie Hickman from our Product Management team has been testing things out to see what he thinks of the developments.

I already have the Ideal Touch Connect installed in my house and my wife and I use the app regularly to update the temperature (she mainly turns it up when I leave for work). Or to change a schedule setting, most recently when I left the heating on before going on holiday.

Connecting Alexa with my Touch Connect was a very simple process, I enabled the skills through the Alexa app, granted access by entering my Touch Connect password, the two apps paired and that was it. The whole process was probably about 30-40 seconds.

After everything had paired, as I do with any new technology, I then threw every command I had been given at Alexa. I had the Touch app open at the same time and each command was reflected in the app within seconds. The Touch unit takes a minute or two to update but the whole idea of using Alexa is so I don’t have to get up and go to the unit so it’s never been an issue. After 10mins of trying to make the whole thing fall over I gave up and let my central heating return to its original state.

Since then the weather has been up and down, some nights being sub-zero and some still holding on to summer in double figures. You could say the reverse for the days, some have struggled to reach 6° others haven’t dropped below 16°.  Having the Touch controlled by Alexa has been great, a quick command to either turn the heating off on the warmer days or down when the heat is still left from the day. Or a going to another level of being lazy, turning the heating up before even getting out of bed on a weekend (really lazy I know but try it you’ll never go back).

Now, thanks to the Alexa compatibility update the house is always at the right temperature regardless of what’s going on and I don’t even have to lift a finger.