GPS Device Offline

GPS Device Offline

A tracker that has not checked in recently is usually asleep, not dead. Here is the checklist, fastest first.

Step 1: Is It Just Sleeping?

PassTime trackers in battery-saver (Endurance) mode sleep between check-ins — about every 30 minutes when reporting normally. Open GPS Tracking and check the device's last reported time. Under an hour old? It is almost certainly fine — wait for the next check-in, or request one (step 3).

Step 2: Check the Battery

The device row and detail panel show the battery level from the last check-in. If it was low, the tracker may have shut down — charge or swap the unit. Low-battery alerts fire before this happens, so you usually get warning.

Step 3: Request a Locate

Hit Locate now on the device. A sleeping tracker will tell you it is in battery-saver mode and offer to switch to Active tracking — that wakes the device into frequent reporting (at roughly half the battery runtime). If the device responds, it was asleep, not offline.

Step 4: Think About Signal

A healthy tracker cannot get a GPS fix from a parking garage, a warehouse interior, or dense tree cover. If the last known position is a building or structure, the device will report again when it is back under open sky.

Step 5: Use the Last Known Location

Even if the device stays quiet, its last check-in and location history trail are on the map — position, timestamp, and speed. For a suspected theft, that trail plus the time of the last report is exactly what law enforcement needs to start.

Step 6: Physical Inspection

Offline for days with a healthy battery history? Inspect the unit in person — check the mounting, look for tamper damage (tamper events raise their own alerts when the device can still report), and confirm it is still on the trailer.

Getting Help

If a unit is confirmed dead, order a replacement through the TrailerBase order portal and pair it by serial number. For anything you cannot diagnose, email [email protected] with the device serial and we will dig in.