Refurbished phones and VZW store personnel
I'm not trashing VZW as a company; overall, they're very good. Excellent phone-based customer service, to take one example. BUT... I've had bad luck with salespeople in my local VZW store: unfriendly, apathetic, slo-o-o-o-w service and poor knowledge of their products and technologies.
Also, I dislike VZW's return policy once you get past the initial (15-day?) "grace period". Even if your phone is brand new, you can only get a refurbished replacement phone in this circumstance. Which would be fine if the refurbished ones were "like new" - but they aren't. On one occasion the refurb...
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since you decided to make duplicate threads...there is my answer to your post.
crazyeaglefan236 said:
https://www.phonescoop.com/carriers/forum.php?fm=m&f ... »
since you decided to make duplicate threads...there is my answer to your post.
There is not one national carrier that makes you deal direct with the manufacturer to solve a phone issue. They all have warranty departments. As well they should as long as they are locking the phones to that particular carrier. IMHO, the carriers should provide warranty support for all equipment that comes locked to them with their name on the package. When the day comes that we buy a phone and just setup service with the carrier, then and only then is when we should deal with the manufacturer.
IMHO, the carriers should provide warranty support for all equipment that comes locked to them with their name on the package.
I agree. Well stated!
Because that is the only way they would have given the customer a brand new phone.
VZWTechChick said:
Had he had the phone for under 30 days?
Because that is the only way they would have given the customer a brand new phone.
Unless they were replacing his original model with a new model.
I understand crazyeaglefan236's point about VZW being notches above other carriers with regard to equipment upgrades and replacements. I just find it annoying that the setup with warranties in the wireless industry is as it is compared with sales of other categories of products.
For example, I doubt if there are many other name-brand electronics or appliance products you can't get a full refund or replacem...
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You and all other customers are lucky that the carriers do not just give you some generic loaner phone while they send off your fancy phone to the people who are actually responsible for its defects (the manufacturer).
Its amazing how some people are never satisfied with what they get. They always want more, better, faster and lets not forget FREE ! !
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Also, the store I bought it from doesn't necessarily figure I'm just being a whiny, spoiled pain-in-the-**s - who's trying to get something for nothing - just because I don't want my practically new piece of pricey electronics equipment to malfunction.
cshlafer said:
I'd MUCH rather pay full retail - and I do mean full retail - and be able to get the kind of guarantees I get for my other electronics items. ...
I too would be willing to pay retail -- IF it were an honest retail price, not the fake "retail" prices quoted by all the wireless carriers.
The "retail" price of a cell phone is like the full billing rate for medical care -- less than 1% of retail customers ever pay that price, it exists only as leverage for the real pricing.
Check phone prices in countries where there are no 'subsidies' and no inflated 'early termination' charges -- the phones cost significantly less that the so-called "retail" price of the same phone in the North America.
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Were it not for the exemplary service I received from calling 611 and talking to knowledgeable people for my CS issues, I would have left Verizon at the end of my contract and go to Sprint or T-Mobile.
I remember one time all I had to do was return a memory card because I bought the wrong one by mistake. Tell me why I had to wait on line 45 minutes and then be told that there wasn't enough cash in the register to complete my return. Words cannot describe the frustration!!
Everytime you speak to someone in a store you get a different answer. When I was trying to find a phone I liked within those first 15 days of my contract after using my NE2, I wou...
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I personally being a tech feel bad giving a FRU (field replacement unit) To a customer who has only have ther phone for a month and a half however that's policy. And how the manufacturer wanted.
Also, not ALL fru's are refurbs. Some are brand new.
If a customer returns their phone before their 15 days because they didn't like it, VZW is unable to put it back on the self. So it is sent to be buffed up and sent back as a replacement.
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One last thing, I'm not condoning the actions or attitudes of anybody who gives bad customer service. If I had a rep in my store who did not take the "We never stop working for you" to heart, I would fire them, no doubt about it. BUT... spe...
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I would have had to fight the laughter if the person wasn't serious.
You must be there. The rest of the country has solectron employees.
Being a tech can be hard work. 😛
When I get a rude customer the last thing I want to do for them if swap out their phone. I would rather just send them on their way with a broken phone.
When someone is nice to me I will go to the ends of the earth to try and make that customer happy. I want to make sure they walk of the store thinking, "This is great, I am glad I am a VZW customer"
The others, I just want to say "Go to cingular" 😲
I am just not happy about it! 😛
Or if it's liquid damaged I send them to insurance. (even though sometimes the manager will make exceptions) I think dealing with the insurance company is punishment enough! 😛
xIsamuTM said:...
I apologize if you've had bad luck with some of the FRU's (field replacement units). I for one will make sure a phone is 1> needing to be swapped, 2> working before I let it leave the store 3> showing no physical probs. I've redone exchanges before because I noticed a crack in the hinge, or a display problem before handing it off to the customer. It's less work for me to *spend* an hour in the back testing/inspecting handsets than to having to *waste* both my time and the customers time to re-swap a phone because noone bothered to check that it worked before letting out the store. I guess it's kind of an efficiancy born from lazyness. I like not having to do much, honestly. On the tech side, the less I see
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HAve you ever wondered if someone renamed down the line, just seems like that would be
Fru (factory refurbished unit)
I'll be honest with you, I always thought if you don't buy BB's protection plan - they don't exchange your phone for a new one... 😕
I know for sure that RadioShack never replaced a phone, they were always sending it for repairs...
kvazzz said:
"Oh, I've just purchased a new Mini Cooper, and it's broken. I'm within a warranty period, can I get a new one? "
That was highly disrespectful to me. I do not appreciate this or the numerous other implied comparisons on this thread between my comments and the inevitable obnoxious customers who may give personnel in VZW stores headaches.
Name one industry where there aren't unreasonable people making idiotic demands - as if that is some kind of excuse for what I was criticizing. (Which was: poor and unfriendly service in MY local Verizon store, and certain company policies that in MY opinion are not user-friendly.)
There's an expression for this line of argument: Blame the Victim. I.e....
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Why blame the carriers. They are not the ones that built the product. They are not the ones that HAVE to honor the warranty. They do it as fast as possible. I have never had a problem regarding appearance and condition with a referb. As stated before, the turn around time is pretty decent compared to sending them to the factory for repair.
I do feel the time should be extended from 15 days to 30 days.
The problem with today is that due to frivilous law suits, we have become a " Not my fa...
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I completely agree with you and your situation. When my floppy drive in dell laptop went out I had only had it for 3 months. I wanted them to give me a new computer but they refused saying that it was only the floppy drive that was bad not the laptop itself.
It was terrible that they sent a tech to my house to replace the floppy free of charge. I was so disgusted. You would think they OWED ME MORE THAN THAT DAMNIT ! ! Hmmmmm - Owe me - OWE Me.....OWE ME - No body owes you anything !
cshlafer, I am not a VZ employee. I am an indepedent agent that doesnt even sell VZ. But I have to tell you, you are a complete idiot. If VZ is willing to swap out your handset without you having to waite the 6 weeks it takes to send it off and ...
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Criticizing Verizon seems to really ruffle the hackles of the "regulars" on this board. Clearly many of them are involved with promotion and/or sales of the company's products or services, while others are probably just loyal apologists expressing their corporate zeal.
I would never have raised these issues (or joined the board at all) if I'd realized this. Silly me, I thought this was a place ordinary people could come and talk about cell phones and their problems with them. Shows you what I know.
I really wouldn't have minded as much if they could have just kept their language and tone civil. A number of them have been aggressive, and a...
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gadgethead said:
Don't get me wrong, I am a satisfied Verizon wireless customer.
Me too. And I said so at the beginning of my original post.
People that read these forums probably form a fairly low opinion of sales reps based on the comments made here.
This has certainly happened to me. I figured my problems were limited to attitudes and incompetency at my local VZW store. Now I'm not so sure.
My only 2 complaints with Verizon are no non-PDA smart phones and sales people that are laregely uneducated about the equipment and services that they are trying to sell you.
Just be careful saying that out loud here!
The only reason I bu...
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We get tired of customers coming into the stores claiming "I dont know what happened, it just stopped working and I want a new phone!" Now we take it back to the tech and in 10 minutes he comes back with the phone and tells the customer it has water damage. 9 out of 10 times the customer gets mad at us because they think we should still replace the phone.
Or a better one, the customer brings in the phone with a broken LCD or cracked housing and feel that should be fixed under warranty or get a FREE phone with swap out of their old broken phone. Broken LCD or housing is no...
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All warranties cover defects in the product. Warranties do not ever cover abuse or physical damage.
Insurance on the other hand does cover loss, theft, and physical damage. But you pay extra for that insurance.
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I have read many of your theads in the past and always respected your thoughts, but on this particular subject matter you have not a clue what you are speaking of. You are an "engineer" you are not in the cell phone business, you do not deal in customer service. Your only knowledge of this business is what you have read in these forums. Therefore your opinion is just that, an opinion. It has no merit of fact. It would be like me telling you how to your job. I am sure you are an expert in your field as I am in mine and therefore I will acknowledge you know more about your industry than I do. I on the other hand know more about my industry than you do. My point is simple, your opinion and input is always welcome because that is what ...
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The fact is that there are many cellular companies for customers to choose from so verizon does not hold any type of monopoly on cellular service. All carriers offer their product at a number of different retail settings. You can get a cell phone anywhere from a corporate owned location, radio shack, independently own agent loactions and also at big box stores like bestbuy, curcuit city, walmart, sams and a number of other places. All o...
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Those of us that you say are drinking Corporate Coolaid (I dont work for any Carrier)feel that a customer who bought a New phone in January and starts having trouble with it in March should go back to the place they got the phone, get a FREE loaner phone while the place they got the phone send it off to be repaired by the manufacturer. What is actually happening is the place they got the phone is swapping the handset out for the customer, but for the customer t...
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gadgethead said:
...they do owe the customer a bit more consideration than in more conventional retail industries. I personally think that it's time for the carriers to allow customers to decide what phones they want.
Sounds like whining to me. Total sense of entitlement in your attitude. You don't get that Verizon doesn't owe you a da*n thing once you sign the contract. If you don't like it, don't sign!
How'd I do, C.Dude?
I work in computer support, we have a very specific set of hardware that can be deployed in our environment. This reduces the number of OS images we need to keep on hand, also reduces the types of parts we need to keep on hand. This also allows the business we support (the stand...
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The warranty likely says (I suspect it's like every other warranty) "Repair or replace at manufacturer's discretion. Replacement may be a refurbished model". VZW just follows this guideline.
I'm sorry that you've got a bad replacement, but, trust me, having a working phone the same day is pretty good service, if you ask me. Just out of curiosity, ask anyone who have purchased and fixed his or her phone in RadioShack.
I didn't mean to offend you in any way, I'm just pointing that mankind by nature is n...
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Ive had Complete Idiots and Rude Reps on Both Telesales and in the stores and Ive had the most helpful and wonderful employees at both
it would be nice if Verizon made it easy to contact a regional manager
when in the stores Ive asked for a Manager and the "tech" said there is no manager on the weekeneds then when I watch a manager come out and go to another customer and say Im the Manager it Pi$$es me off
when I ask that manager questions and they wont speak to me directly about my problem but send a minion to take care of the problem (back to square one) it makes me angry I ask employees for their names they wont tel...
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I stopped at 3 stores that day Name Tags Were present on all employees this Corporate sotre however No none
The last store I went to was great and helpful and I told them the incident and they said let me guess the "^^^" store and I was like yeah thats where I was employee just smirked and said Im not surprised
Sorry but the last thing a rep wants to do is help someone like that.
Try being nice, and considerate of the employee. And understand that we are just "employees" we don't make the rules, we just enforce them.
Ever heard the saying "Don't shoot the messenger"?
Making personal attacks only brings you down to their level, and calls into question any legitimacy your arguments may otherwise have had.
"I just find it annoying that the setup with warranties in the wireless industry is as it is compared with sales of other categories of products. For example, I doubt if there are many other name-brand electronics or appliance products you can't get a full refund or replacement for (i.e., a brand-new replacement) if they break after only having owned the item for two weeks! Think digital cameras, TVs, stereo equipment, small appliances, computer hardware, etc. All I can figure is that this is a t...
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I wish the customers had to deal with the manufacturers to get them replaced or repaired. This would also eliminate alot of problems. Trust us, we will give you the number to the manufacturer if you want to argue with them why you should get a brand new phone to replace one that is months old. We know our replacement guidelines. We have to stick by it. This was a guideline that most of its input came from the manufacturers. If you have concerns, address them. You are beating a dead horse here.
I wish the new replace...
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I sell in a small store Not Corporate I have to GO to corporate stores for Firmware Upgrades for my phone
If I ever treated a customer the way Corporate stores do I would EXPECT to get fired
Thank god there are 3 or 4 corporate stores within a 15 mile radius
but when a person has to drive 95 miles just to GET in the same city as the corporate stores
it does suck
gadgethead said:
I would have to agree with all of your points. as a cell customer I would welcome the day when I could buy any CDMA phone that I wanted and use it on the Verizon Wireless network. Remember when DVD players first came out and you have to pay around $1000.00 to $1500.00 for one, you can get one now with more features for $50.00. This is what a free market economy is supposed to work out on it's own.
This is how it is in Europe, and sorry to tell ya, there's no $19.99 phones for sale over there. When you consider the amount of technology that are in handsets nowadays, and the amount of money the manufacturers are putting into R&D on new products, the retail price on phones is already rock-bott...
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Thank you for expressing to some of these guys, (not all) how well they have it now. It seems that someone always finds something to complain about, no matter how good they have it, there is always someone that finds fault in everything.
http://news.com.com/Is+a+20+cell+phone+on+the+horizo ... »