Samsung Galaxy S4 - bulging battery issue - appalling O2 response to the problem

[Anonymous]

My Galaxy S4 has the bulging battery problem.  It's well documented, and both Samsung and O2 accept that there was a problem with these batteries.  My guess is that it's a fire risk just waiting to happen.

One phone came from Amazon, who dealt with the problem superbly, more than a year after the purchase.  An immediate and helpful response - problem solved with a new battery.

O2, however, provided the other phone and they couldn't be less helpful.  They expect me to hand them back the phone (with its user-replaceable battery) so that they can send it back to Samsung.

Are they serious?  Hand over my phone, along with all the personal data on it?  Do without it until it gets sent back again?  And this for a £400+ phone, for the sake of a £10 battery?

Comet used to provide customer service like this, and look where it got them!

Mobile phone companies have managed to get an appalling reputation with the general public, and behaviour like this from O2 just makes it worse.  Why would anyone buy a phone from O2 when they behave like this?

[viridis]

That's crazy 😮
However, it is also within warranty scope as this is a service offered beyond normal battery warranty (6 months)
If I was the op, and was reluctant to send in the whole unit, I would just get a new official battery off amazon.
It may be about principal, and the op is right regarding the lunacy of this, but that principal, to me, would not be worth the £6 odd a genuine battery now costs.

[Anonymous]

Totally agree but that is how they are dealing with it. I would have thought a known issue like that paid for by Samsung would be simple to resolve.

But hey that's why the mobile operators snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:
Totally agree but that is how they are dealing with it. I would have thought a known issue like that paid for by Samsung would be simple to resolve.

But hey that's why the mobile operators snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

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It is indeed.  And given the entirely different and customer-focused way that Amazon have dealt with an identical problem on our other S4, it's also why O2 will be getting no more business from this particular family.  No great loss to them in the overall scheme of things, but it's yet more business going to Amazon purely because they know how to keep their customers, and O2 clearly don't.

[Anonymous]

Wikipedia has an interesting piece on these Samsung Galaxy S4 battery problems:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samsung_Galaxy_S4#Battery_problems_and_safety_issues

With a couple of interesting Youtube links, too, showing how serious the problem could be.

You'd think O2 would be quite keen to help their customers resolve the problem quickly, by just giving them a replacement battery (which Samsung will in any event reimburse them for), wouldn't you?   Rather than making their customers jump through hoops and trying to put them off.

If my phone catches fire or explodes in the interim, I wonder how O2 are going to react to a negligence claim for the fire damage.

[MI5]

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@Anonymous wrote:

If my phone catches fire or explodes in the interim, I wonder how O2 are going to react to a negligence claim for the fire damage.

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You know they won't be interested as it is you that has refused their offer of warranty service.....

and yes, I know why, understand and sympathise, but any further faults caused by this issue will be at your cost, I fear.

[Anonymous]

It may be worth speaking to Cs again on 202 and or escalating this via http://www.o2.co.uk/how-to-complain/complain to see if they will change their stance.

It's been known to.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:
It may be worth speaking to Cs again on 202 and or escalating this via http://www.o2.co.uk/how-to-complain/complain to see if they will change their stance.

It's been known to.

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Thanks - already done.  I'll be very surprised if they don't change their minds, given the publicity I'm 'arranging' for them in various places, including the Consumers' Association, who log these things for later use.  O2's CEO, Ronan Dunne, is next on the list.

Companies like O2 deserve all the bad publicity hacked off customers like me can give them, and when they adopt a more reasonable approach, as they certainly will, they might reflect on how much cheaper it would have been for them just to replace the faulty battery. 

[Anonymous]

Let us know how this goes please.

[Anonymous]

Hi @Anonymous

Have sent you a PM with the email address you may need.

[Anonymous]

Today I find one of my S4 handset's has a bulging battery! Explains why the battery was draining within an hour.

Rang o2. Got to send the whole phone off.
Rang CPW. Got to send the whole phone off.

It's a bloody battery for gods sake. It is user replaceable. Why on earth, given it is a known issue, can they not just send a replacement?