"Buyer Beware" rules! bureaucracy triumps over customer care
I have never changed my wireless provider. I started with Altel. Verizon bought them. Altogether, I have been with the same wireless provider for over 25 years without ever the need for complaining.
One year ago, I made the jump to my first smartphone, a Droid Maxx2. I was going out of town for a month of cancer treatment and my wife wanted me to step up from a Motorola flip phone to a smartphone. I did. I chose a more budget priced phone over the flashier ones. The Droid Maxx 2 from Motorola, the supplier of all the phones I had had over the past 30 years, since the beginning. All have worked flawlessly...until now.
Verizon, Motorola, and all the Droid Maxx 2 users that have had problems with this phone and the SD card know NOW that the problem exists. Verizon and Motorola NOW know that my Droid Maxx 2 was defective out of the box. I do not know if Motorola has acknowledged it, but technicians and employees know it. I am not concerned at all that a device had a flaw or was defective. That happens.
I am concerned at how long it took Verizon and Motorola to even discuss the fact that these phones (or some of them) would not interface with the micro SD card. Many of us have collectively have spent lots of money trying different cards and have invested hundreds, even thousands of hours (together) looking for a fix, a workaround.
The real problem is that Verizon (and, I suppose all these government regulated wireless providers) have carefully constructed policies regarding warranties and customer care that restricts them from doing the RIGHT THING for people while quoting their policies as excuses like corrupt priests in some dark world video game in a galaxy far far away a long long time ago. It should not happen today.
I still owe, as of now, 54% of the cost of this new phone to Verizon. Yet my phone, the phone Verizon sold me as new was defective out of the box. Really, I sympathize with everyone involved. No one really enters into this "wanting" to harm another or to take advantage. Certainly, I have not done so. I am sure that every dollar I have paid to Verizon for over 15 years (or however long they have owned it) was good. They still take my payment every month. I am absolutely certain that if Verizon discovered they had billed me wrongly over the last 5 years and I owed them an additional 3 dollars a month, they would collect it. There would be no expiration date on their pursuit of their money for services rendered.
The only one that is harmed here are the users of Droid Maxx 2 phones that have this defect like me. I understand that I was offered, at additional cost, a warranty that would have covered everything including even intentional drowning in the toilette which I declined. But, there is a little factoid here that should be considered when it comes to the time span over which a customer may discover a problem.
I think Verizon should consider this fact. For most of us, the micro SD card is not even needed for quite a while until the internal memory is filled. For me, it was long after the warranty was expired before I knew this problem existed. As the internal memory filled, I tried to use the external memory and as a fair minded person, I assumed it was my fault and that it would be "fixed" somehow when I discovered what I was doing wrong.
.However, it was not my fault. The phone is defective. And, Verizon is apparently, at this time, happy to continue to collect full price over time while I am reminded every day that I bought a defective phone. And, in spite of living in the 21st century and with all the clichés about enlightenment and customer care, it is still "caveat emptor" in the new world of big business.
I know those words sound very accusatory, maybe even more so than necessary because I know that, in every company, there are managers and people with the authority to make wrong situations right when it is brought to their attention.
That is what I wish would happen in this case. That would be ideal. But, it may not. I suppose I could switch companies and let them bought out my defective phone balance. Or, maybe there are other avenues of complaint. BTW. My phone, after the reset is working quite well without the microSd card. I will simply have to make it a point to not use many of its capabilites and keep the internal memory low.
Thank you. Sincerely,
Chuck - long time Verizon customer.
PS. I pay over 130 a month for phones for two senior citizens. That is almost 1600 a year. If a company wanted to do the right thing, you would think they could find a way. I believe that way exists.
Someone needs to speak up for all the people who bought defective Droid Maxx 2s.
