Google Analytics: Tracking not installed, Last checked Dec 31 1969

Posted June 11th, 2011 in Miscellaneous Postings

Google recently released a new interface to Analytics and it's naturally labelled "beta". I've only just started using it recently and the only issue I've found so far is with adding a new site and tracking status. After adding the new site, the tracking status shows "tracking not installed - last checked Dec 31, 1969 4:00:00 PM PST". 10 hours after setting up a new site it was still showing this status so I flicked through to the old interface, checked the status there and that fixed it.

Tracking code screenshot from the new interface

The screenshot below shows the tracking code section in the new interface for Google Analytics. The green and red boxes have been added to the screenshot to highlight points below.

Adding a new site through the new interface

To add a new website (known as a web property in the new interface) click the account name in the breadcrumb trail; this is shown highlighted with the green box in the screenshot above. In this example the account name is "iSavvy".

Once in the account list you can either click into an existing web property or add a new one by clicking the "New web property" button which appears just above the list of web properties.

Then it's just a matter of entering values for all the fields and clicking the "Create Property" button. After creating the property, the interface returns to the list of properties so you'll need to click through to the new property to get the tracking code.

Checking the tracking code

After clicking through, select the "Tracking Code" option and you'll see a screen like the one in the screenshot above.

Currently, the tracking status will say "tracking not installed - last checked Dec 31, 1969 4:00:00 PM PST" but it never actually appears to check the site to see if data is coming. I set up a new property last night and when I checked back 10 hours later it was still showing this status.

Checking the status using the old interface

There doesn't currently appear to be a way in the new interface to get it to check the status again and apparantly it never updates. At the top of the screen is a link titled "Old version"; click that to get back to the old interface to check the tracking status.

You'll need to click back into the appropriate account and then the "Edit" link next to the web property (called Web Profile in the old interface). At the top of the screen you'll see the tracking status as shown in the screenshot below.

It says that tracking is not installed. In my case, I'd installed it on my site and checked the page a few times and it was 10 hours later. I simply clicked "Check Status" and got the following:

This shows that GA is now working and waiting for data.

What about existing websites that were already tracking OK?

If you look at the tracking status for a website that's already receiving data, it will also tell you that tracking is not installed, and has some past date as showing when it was last checked. It would appear this is simply a display bug and that data is being tracked just fine; in my case I know data for all my existing websites in Google Analytics is tracking just fine.

Conclusion

If I hadn't manually gone through this process maybe GA would have started tracking, but maybe it wouldn't; it certainly didn't appear to have started tracking 10 hours later.

For the time being at least, I would recommend that after setting up a new web property through the new Google Analytics interface, to check whether it's receiving data via the old interface.