Your accounting system

Docs Mobile Troubleshoot slow connections

Troubleshoot slow connections

Keep working on weak signal, and refresh a single list instead of everything.

Last updated 4 Oct 2026

Overview

Weak signal is often worse than none: the app keeps trying to talk to the office and waits. Most of your work is held on the phone either way, so keep working and let it catch up.

The Settings screen, Layout section open

Signs of a slow connection

  • Checking for updates… stays on a jobs list for a long time.
  • A screen that has to ask the office - a customer’s history, a file, a document - takes ages or gives up.
  • Photos take a long time to upload.

Keep working

You do not have to wait for the connection. Time, notes, forms, materials and photos are all kept on the phone and sent when the signal improves. See Working offline.

The one thing to avoid is saving the same thing twice because you are not sure the first one went. It will go; a second save makes a duplicate.

Refresh one list, not everything

If one list is out of date - say the products list - refresh just that one rather than restarting the app.

Step by step: refresh a single list
  1. Open Settings and expand Manage Cache.
  2. Each list has a button, coloured by how recently it was fetched.
  3. Tap the list you need. It is fetched again on its own.

Tapping the title of any screen opens the same lists as a Data Lists panel, with an Update button for each.

Photos on weak signal

Photos are the largest thing the app sends. Take them as normal; they are kept on the phone and uploaded as the signal allows. If you can, upload them when you next have Wi-Fi or a strong signal.

Is it the signal or the office?

  • Only you are affected, and other apps are slow too - it is your signal. Move to better coverage or wait.
  • Workmates on good signal have the same problem - tell the office; it may be at their end.

See also