Hello tjh,
Thank you for taking the time to share your experience with us. At Ring, our top priority is to ensure that our customers have the best possible experience with our products and services. We truly value our consumer’s feedback, simply because it helps us improve not only the product from a consumer standpoint, but also our standards of service. We understand that you are interested in a local storage option for your home security device and invite you to share your suggestion for this feature directly with our product team here: https://community.ring.com/c/products/feature-request-board/24.
A Ring Protect Plan is not necessary to view real time notifications on your Ring cameras. Without the Ring Protect Plan you can still use the live view and two-way audio feature, you are still able to see who is at your door and answer motion notifications. In order to see past recorded videos from your ring device, you will need the optional Ring Protect Plan, which starts at $3/month per device or $30/year per device. Please see the following link for more information regarding the Ring Protect Plan and the benefits it offers: https://ring.com/protect-plans?undefined.
Ring Community is our first peer-to-peer community forum, giving our customers the ability to help one another and share their feedback/experiences with Ring. We invite you to reach out at https://community.ring.com/ if any additional information is needed regarding your Ring Protect Plan concerns.
Thank you,
Jamila with Ring