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The App doesn’t work and OSP doesn’t care $$$

45K views 281 replies 113 participants last post by  asully503 
#1 ·
Before I headed out today I made sure that the app and tags both worked while online and offline. Big surprise the app would not let me tag a fish on my catch card on the app while offline.

I called OSP and talked to 3 different people. The 1st was a receptionist at the tip line. She had a game warden call me. His response was he was aware of the changes but would write a ticket even if a fish was not tagged properly. I questioned it but he didn’t change his stance.

Next I called the Salem office and talked to a very helpful gentleman. He tried to open the tagging portion of the app while on the phone with me and couldn’t either. He then called the OSP warden that I talked to for his story. He came back with “there was a misunderstanding....in this instance I would need to stop fishing and drive to cellular coverage and tag my fish. After this I could continue to fish. I told him I may be 25 miles from cell coverage and miles from my truck. The response was the still the same.

Tomorrow I am going to go talk to someone at the clackamas office of ODFW.
 
#5 ·
When I printed mine I used OpenOffice Draw to reduce the license and the tag to 4.25 inches by 5.5 inches. Then, I printed the license on one side of the paper and the tag on the other side and trimmed to size. Everything on one 4.25x5.5 inch paper. Perfectly legible and plenty of room in the squares to tag fish--about the same size as the squares on the old tag, maybe a bit larger.

And, I used photo paper (waterproof) and a laser printer (waterproof ink). I'm good to go.

And I agree, ODFW has created a giant problem--more than one, in fact.
 
#6 ·
I'm having some trouble as well. If I have no cell / internet / wifi service, and I try to tag a fish, the app says "You are in offline mode" in an orange box at the bottom. If I try to tag a fish while in offline mode, it just says "an error has occurred" and I am unable to tag a fish.

Hopefully they get this figured out. I thought that the intention was that you would be able to tag fish in offline mode and then it would sync as soon as you got back into cell / data service.

If you go out in the field and run into this problem, take a screenshot of your phone showing the date, time, error, and the fact that you have no service. These screenshots could save you a ticket in court, but I doubt any reasonable judge wouldnt dismiss the charge if you made your best effort and showed evidence to back it up (OSP too for that matter... you might get a written warning so that it is recorded and strike two would get the ticket).

The ODFW ELS FAQ does clearly state at the bottom of page two that:

"... anglers will be required to have and display a license and tag upon contact by ODFW or OSP. It will be the hunter or angler’s responsibility to ensure they always have enough battery or an external battery source to power their phone so they can validate their harvest and show their license or tag. Note that even when they are in the field and without cell reception, ODFW and OSP will also be able to see information about licenses/tags/validations you purchased and to check your confirmation number..."

source:
https://www.dfw.state.or.us/online_license_sales/docs/ELS FAQ.pdf

Probably a good idea to invest in an auxiliary battery to keep the cell phone charged too.
 
#7 ·
I'm having some trouble as well. If I have no cell / internet / wifi service, and I try to tag a fish, the app says "You are in offline mode" in an orange box at the bottom. If I try to tag a fish while in offline mode, it just says "an error has occurred" and I am unable to tag a fish.



Hopefully they get this figured out. I thought that the intention was that you would be able to tag fish in offline mode and then it would sync as soon as you got back into cell / data service.



If you go out in the field and run into this problem, take a screenshot of your phone showing the date, time, error, and the fact that you have no service. These screenshots could save you a ticket in court, but I doubt any reasonable judge wouldnt dismiss the charge if you made your best effort and showed evidence to back it up (OSP too for that matter... you might get a written warning so that it is recorded and strike two would get the ticket).



The ODFW ELS FAQ does clearly state at the bottom of page two that:



"... anglers will be required to have and display a license and tag upon contact by ODFW or OSP. It will be the hunter or angler’s responsibility to ensure they always have enough battery or an external battery source to power their phone so they can validate their harvest and show their license or tag. Note that even when they are in the field and without cell reception, ODFW and OSP will also be able to see information about licenses/tags/validations you purchased and to check your confirmation number..."



source:

https://www.dfw.state.or.us/online_license_sales/docs/ELS FAQ.pdf



Probably a good idea to invest in an auxiliary battery to keep the cell phone charged too.


Are you putting your phone in airplane mode?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
#11 ·
Gotta start asking questions about the contractor that is responsible for this app. Supposedly, they have experience with licensing systems in other states, but I'm beginning to suspect that those states don't have the tagging systems that we have. Ain't no tags for bass and crappie...........
 
#17 ·
I have quite a bit of software development experience. This app is an absolute mess and I would have been embarassed to even submit this for a school project back when I was getting my software development degree. All service issues aside... Just the design choices like having to scroll through every single catch area/code in a list form with no search function is terrible design. I haven't gone much further than that.... But there's so much basic stuff they could do to make it better. Clearly a bean counter picked the lowest bid to hire their contractor.
 
#24 ·
Well I've been going through ODFW web page looking for those hidden "gotcha"indemnifier words that will hold the angler accountable. Every page I've read states that the app "WILL" work even if you are offline. Now if it were to say somewhere...you "MAY" be able to record your harvest. Can you just imagine the encounter where you are walking out with a fish and LEO asks you to see harvest record? Then you say "the app doesn't work but I'm going to run down the road until I have reception??? I have no plans of walking out, getting out of waders, wasting gas and then come back after you have forfeited your fishing hole. Nope. They said it would work. So they had better patch the app quick
 
#26 ·
And what I just discovered is that you will need to have the app opened on your phone before you lose service. I closed all apps then went into airplane mode and tried to open it and got the same error message. Open it first and then go to airplane mode and you can at least read that I have an Annual Combination, Shellfish, Buck deer tag, Columbia endorsement, Combined angling tag, Hatchery harvest card...and upland game bird validation. Yeah $185 dollars. :doh::doh: No doubt, as we all know, not all LEO's are created the same...Its going to get interesting:lurk:
 
#27 ·
Yikes! Sounds like a train wreck! I do lots of fishing outside of cell service, they need to fix this quickly, or accept I will tag my fish when done fishing and back in cell service.

I would have no issues fighting that in court with being misled and tricked... their problems, not ours
 
#33 ·
I submitted a bug to them for the offline mode recording. Hopefully they will push a hot fix quickly.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
#40 ·
I submitted a bug to them for the offline mode recording. Hopefully they will push a hot fix quickly.
Got an email back from ODFW about the recording a harvest when in offline mode. They've escalated this to their developers and hope to have it fixed soon. I'll post and update when I hear back from them that it's been fixed.

-shane
 
#35 ·
Folks, I don't think it's anything to stress about, it's their problem, not ours... they mislead us, and got most of us to trust them and try this new system, now it doesn't work like they told us it would...

NOT OUR PROBLEM

I will do as good as I can, but will not go way out of my way... THEY CAN
 
#37 ·
I think it would be a good idea an harvest tag card be mailed to all who have purchased the electronic app, or made available to purchase while the bugs are being worked out of the system.

if unable to record a catch on my phone due to some glitch, is a written record on the back of a fast food package a viable record.
 
#38 · (Edited)
As a US President once said, “Trust, but verify”. The verification is a bit rocky.

Sounds like this new system could be a nice money maker for the State if OSP fires up the ticket machine and then a waster of money in courts processes.

I’ll be sticking with paper for hunting license and tags.
 
#42 ·
Here's what should have been the solution:

Keep the nice, quality printed tags/licenses we've been using the past several years. Then create an app/online portal we can log in to and report our catches. That way, we have a physical, paper record we're carrying with us to be compliant throughout the fishing trip, then we can go home and submit the catch that night, OR wait until the end of the year and report it all at once.

Do that for a few years, work out the kinks, then give an option to use a phone app (after a year or two of beta testing). Still, I think our old catch cards were something they should have kept.
 
#46 · (Edited)
I see a lot of wasted court time and Leo time on the expense of us taxpayers. I questioned this from the beginning of how to tag a fish while out of service. Some people fish an hour from service!!! And the sad part is once you choose the app, you can’t go back to paper until Jan 2020. At least that’s what the lady at Fishermans’s told me when I got my paper lic monday.
I’d go fish if I had the app. They can go fly a kite!! Not our problem they screwed up. It’ll just get dropped in court anyway. And they would reimburse for my time off work to attend court also.
 
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