Troubleshooting Your Alert Station

Troubleshooting Your Alert Station

The Alert Station is designed for resilience — with cellular failover and internal battery backup — but when something looks off, this article will help you diagnose and resolve it quickly.


Alert Station shows Offline in the dashboard

This is almost always a local network issue, not a hardware failure. Work through these in order:

  1. Power — confirm the Ethernet cable is connected to a port actively supplying 30 Watts of PoE. Standard Ethernet without PoE will not power the device. If the LED is dark, power is the issue.
  2. DHCP — ask your IT team to confirm the Alert Station has a DHCP reservation for a consistent IP address.
  3. Port 443 — confirm network traffic is allowed over Port 443 via TLS 1.2.
  4. Domain whitelist — confirm these domains are whitelisted: punchrescue.com, and particle.io.

If the above requirements are confirmed and the Base Station is still offline, use the following steps to isolate whether the issue is with your internal network or the device itself.

Try a different Ethernet port

Connect the Base Station to a different Ethernet port you know to be active and PoE-capable at 30W. If the Base Station comes online on the new port, the original port is the issue — contact your IT team to investigate it.

Move it outdoors temporarily

Unplug the Base Station and bring it outside the building. This removes your internal network from the equation entirely. If the Base Station comes online outdoors, the issue is with your internal network configuration — a firewall rule, a blocked domain, or a port restriction — rather than the device itself. Bring your IT team back to the network requirements above.

Power cycle the device

If moving the device outdoors is not practical, perform a full power cycle. Unplug the Ethernet cable and allow the device to fully power down — this can take up to 8 hours as the internal battery drains completely. Once the device is fully off, plug it back in and give it a few minutes to reconnect. A full power cycle clears any temporary state that may be preventing the device from coming online.


Alert Station alarm won't stop after an emergency

The Alert Station likely lost its network connection at the moment of resolution and missed the reset signal. Go to Devices, click the gear icon on the Alert Station row, scroll to the red Test Alert section, and click Reset Alert. This manually returns it to Ready Mode.

If the Alert Station is not reachable in the dashboard, confirm it is back online first — check the LED and your network connection — then attempt the reset.


Alert Station alarm won't activate during a test

Go to Devices, click the gear icon on the Alert Station, and confirm it shows Online. Check the alert volume setting — it may be set very low. If the device is online and volume is correct but the alarm still does not sound, contact support@punchrescue.com.


Half the Alert Station LEDs are flashing with no active emergency

This means the Alert Station is running on internal backup battery and is not receiving PoE power from its Ethernet connection. Check that the Ethernet cable is firmly connected at both ends and that the switch port is actively supplying PoE. If the connection looks correct but the device is still on battery power, contact your IT team to verify the port's PoE status.


Cards or Rafts not reaching the Alert Station

If devices are showing poor signal or offline status — particularly in large facilities or areas with thick walls — the device may be at the edge of or outside the Alert Station's direct signal range.

For Raft-only deployments: adding Rescue Repeaters can significantly extend coverage. Contact support@punchrescue.com to discuss whether Repeaters would help your facility.

For Card deployments: check whether the nearest Repeater is online. If a Repeater is offline, Cards in that area lose their relay path to the Alert Station. Restore the Repeater first, then check Card status.


Still need help? Email support@punchrescue.com with the device name, a description of the LED behavior, and any error messages visible in the dashboard.

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