Troubleshooting

Symptom, check, fix.

Grouped by part. Open an entry for what to check and what to do. If nothing here fits, email contactus@sophiaxt.com with the symptom, the browser and the time it happened. Don't send screenshots of client data.

Reading the setup checks

Two places tell you whether setup worked.

The connect page

desk.sophiaxt.com/connect checks every few seconds while it is open and you are signed in. Each check is about the account you are signed in with, so sign in as the staff member you are setting up, in their own browser.

Check	Green means	Waiting means
Signed in as	This browser has a Safe-Desk session. The name and firm are shown.	Not signed in; the page links to sign-in and checks nothing else.
The extension is connected	At least one browser holds a live Safe-Desk credential for this account. It counts browsers that were signed in and not since disconnected; it is not a live "online now" signal.	No browser has been signed in for this person yet, or every one was disconnected.
Your AI app is connected	At least one AI app (Claude, ChatGPT, or an app on this computer) was allowed through the connector and the connection is still open.	Nobody chose Allow yet, or the connection was revoked or expired.
Chat is ready	The firm's chat inside Safe-Desk has an AI behind it, hosted or the firm's own key.	The owner hasn't chosen models or added a key. Only matters if staff chat inside Safe-Desk.

Available after launch With the heartbeat in place, the owner's view will also show when each browser last reported in and which sites it covers, so a machine that stopped reporting stands out.

The owner's Setup tab

Owner view, Setup, lists the first-run steps and ticks them from what the firm has actually done: Connect your AI (an AI app, a browser with the extension, or a model for the chat), Confirm your industry template, Set names, places and dates and add your client list, Get alerts on your phone, Add your staff, and the optional Gate API key. The owner can tick a step by hand.

Browser extension

The extension isn't there after setting the policy

Check: Open chrome://policy or edge://policy on that machine and choose Reload policies. Is ExtensionInstallForcelist listed, with status OK, and does the value read the 32-letter ID, a semicolon, then https://clients2.google.com/service/update2/crx?
Fix: Missing policy: the machine hasn't received it yet (Group Policy refresh, Intune sync or your RMM run). Error on the value: fix the ID or the address; no spaces. Edge on a PC not joined to a domain: Microsoft limits forced installs there to Edge Add-ons, so use Chrome or join the device to management. See Group Policy and the registry.

The icon shows OFF

Check: Hover the icon. "Not connected" means nobody signed in on this browser. "Not active for your firm" means the subscription isn't active.
Fix: Sign in from the popup. For an inactive firm, the owner restarts the subscription from Owner view, Account.

A paste or message is held back with a notice that Safe-Desk couldn't be reached

Check: Can this machine open https://desk.sophiaxt.com? A proxy or firewall that filters by host, or TLS inspection that breaks the connection, will cause this.
Fix: Allow desk.sophiaxt.com on port 443 and exclude it from TLS inspection. The extension holds text back rather than sending it unchecked, by design.

"That's too long to check at once"

Check: One paste or message over 20,000 characters.
Fix: Split it into smaller parts, or upload the document under Files and use the connector.

"Too many checks. Wait a moment."

Check: One person made more than 120 checks in a minute. (When the whole firm sends more than 4,000,000 characters through the gate in a minute, the message says the firm has sent a lot of text instead.)
Fix: Wait a minute. If it happens in normal use, email us.

The page shows "Safe-Desk is not checking messages on this page"

Check: Either the browser isn't signed in, the firm isn't active, or the AI site changed its page and the extension can't find the chat box.
Fix: Sign in, or check the subscription. If signed in and active, the site changed: tell us which site and when. Store installs update on their own once we ship a fix.

"Update the Safe-Desk extension"

Check: The copy was loaded by hand from the zip, and a newer version exists.
Fix: Download it again from Settings and reload it on the extensions page, or move to the force-installed store version, which updates itself.

A file upload on an AI site was stopped

Check: File uploads on protected sites are blocked by default. The extension reports the stop by file type and size range only, never by name or contents.
Fix: Upload the document under Files in Safe-Desk and let the AI read it through the connector. Available after launch The owner will be able to set uploads to warn or allow instead.

Answers show placeholders instead of real values

Check: Is the firm on strict mode? Was the browser restarted since the message was sent? Was this chat sent from another browser?
Fix: Strict mode never fills values back, on purpose. The swap table lives in the browser's session storage and is cleared when the browser closes, so older answers keep their placeholders; that is expected. Values come back only in the browser that sent them.

"That code has expired or was already used"

Check: Codes work once and last 10 minutes. Getting a new code cancels the person's previous one.
Fix: Get a new code in Settings and type it straight away. Spaces and dashes don't matter.

"Too many wrong codes from this network"

Check: Ten wrong or expired codes from one network address within an hour. An office behind one address shares the limit.
Fix: Wait an hour, then have people type codes carefully, or use Sign in with Safe-Desk.

A browser was signed out without anyone doing it

Check: The person changed their password, the owner disabled them, or the browser was disconnected in Settings. Each of these ends the browser's credential.
Fix: Sign in again. The Activity tab shows what happened.

AI connector

"This app isn't registered with Safe-Desk"

Check: The app's registration was removed. Registrations nobody finished connecting are removed after a day.
Fix: Remove the connector in the AI app, add it again, and sign in from there.

"This sign-in link doesn't match the address the app registered"

Check: The app asked to return to an address it didn't register, or to a host that isn't allowed.
Fix: Start again from the AI app. For an AI app on a host other than claude.ai, claude.com or chatgpt.com, email us.

"This approval page has expired"

Check: More than 10 minutes passed, or the page was opened by a different Safe-Desk account than the one that pressed Allow.
Fix: Close it and start the connection again from the AI app, signed in to Safe-Desk as the right person.

The AI app says it lost access or asks to connect again

Check: The connection was revoked in Settings, the password changed, a refresh token was used twice (which ends the connection on purpose), or it went unused for 30 days.
Fix: Connect again from the AI app. The Activity tab records each ending.

The AI can't find any files

Check: The connector sees only files this person uploaded under Files, and only for 7 days.
Fix: Upload the file again and turn the connector on in that chat's tools menu.

Gate API

401, 402, 413, 415 or 429 from the API

Check: The error.code in the answer. The full list is on Gate API.
Fix: 401: the key was revoked or mistyped; make a new one. 402: the subscription lapsed. 413: split the text or start a new vault. 415: send Content-Type: application/json. 429: wait for Retry-After.

400 bad_vault

Check: The vault came from a different account's key, was altered, or was issued before a change of Safe-Desk's own keys.
Fix: Start the conversation again without a vault.

Windows app

Available after launch Entries for the Windows app are on its own page and will grow once it ships.