ms family account screen time limits not working

Anonymous
2019-11-03T16:29:00+00:00

Hi

Despite trying all the suggestions I can find online to fix it screen time limits have not been working for months. The limit is set correctly but Windows appears to ignore it. Family activity reporting shows that the activity duration is greater than the limit set.

Thanks

Mik

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Family and online safety

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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Anonymous
2020-09-26T00:35:11+00:00

I too had struggled to get this feature to stick properly to one of my three kids. Two were working fine, one not. All identical hardware, so it was highly irritating one was out of alignment to the others. 

Reinstalled the OS on his PC, still no joy. Removed him from family group, tried everything on the suggestions and they all were useless. 

What I noted was that the time limit that I setup was being ignored but there was still a time limit. Instead of 1.5 hours, it was 4 hours per day. No matter what I set it to, it remained. However, if I turned off limits on his account, instantly the setting on his PC was aware that the limits were removed. When I imposed them once more, the same 4 hour limit (rather than the 1.5 hour limit) was turned back on. 

I concluded that in my case, the time limits set on the website were being ignored or overruled by something on the PC. The feature was linked though, reporting functions worked, and clearly when I switched the time limits off, they applied so no issue with the account itself. 

I searched around a bit more, and saw this bit of advice:

Delete the Parental Control Settings in the following path:

  • On the Start screen, type C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Parental Controls and press Enter.

Delete the folder and files under this location. When the user logs in again, it will force a check with the settings stored online and redownload the settings. 

The reason this didn't get fixed when I did a reinstall of the OS was that I kept files/settings and it never got wiped in the OS re-install. 

As soon as I did this, the correct time limit and schedule was finally applied to my son on his PC. No idea why it got stuck, or why it would never overwrite, but it cleared it. Hopefully future adjustments to the time limits and schedule will work as normal from now on.

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  1. Anonymous
    2020-12-06T13:23:02+00:00

    I deleted the folder but the parental controls still cannot work.

    C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Parental Contols

    Any other suggestions?

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  2. Anonymous
    2020-11-30T15:13:49+00:00

    In less than a week, my kids found a way around the time limits I set in my Family Account. If my kids don't sign in to their Xbox account, can they play games and just not save their progress?

    That's what seems to be happening and it's annoying. I'd just like the device to let them play and when their time runs out, I'd like it to warn them, then turn off or not let them start another game.

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  3. Anonymous
    2020-08-30T08:26:00+00:00

    I noticed something change a couple weeks ago. I started seeing activity logs for my Lenovo miix630

    Confirmed my kids can't log in outside of active hours now!  That was my biggest concern with letting them use this computer, I couldn't track how much screen time and when.

    I do notice overall that I'm getting erroneous app usage times and computer activity, like way too much but can manage that.

    But with school coming, what's more important is proper screen times and trying to monitor online school materials

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  4. Anonymous
    2020-08-27T19:03:13+00:00

    It seems to work in some UWP apps, but not that well in others. I mainly base this assumption on Roblox. When the kids use the Microsoft Store installed Roblox, it seems to kick them out. When they use Roblox player installed via the website, it doesn't

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