Broken Charger

[MikeS1971]

At just under two weeks, the charger has stopped working. Never been dropped or mishandeled and has been sitting in the same place since the first day. Hopefully FitBit will send me a replacement. I'm not paying $20 for something that breaks after two weeks.

[SunsetRunner]

What broke on it? The pins or door hinge

[MikeS1971]

The ability to charge. Seems like there is a broken connection where the cable meets the base. If I move the cable and gold it at a certain angle, it will begin to charge, bit as soon as I put it down it stops.

Now that I think of it, it may of been bad since the beginning. At first I thought I wasn't getting the tracker properly seated in the charger, but I bet the cable had been bad all along.

Instead of having the cable integrated with the base, the base should have a micro USB port. Then the user can use any standard micro USB cable or any length.

[EmersonFitbit · Accepted solution]

That's a bummer, @MikeS1971, but I'm confident we can help. If you haven't already, please write into our Support Team and let them know about the physical damage to your cable. Shoot me your email case number as well, so I can ensure everything goes smoothly.

Thanks for letting us know!

[MikeS1971]

Thank you. I just emailed customer support. I'll let you know my case number when I receive it.

[MikeS1971]

Well.....

They got back to me pretty quickly and said they wouldsend out a complimentary charger and would let me know as soon as it was shipping. The next day, 3/15 (Tuesday), I received a shipping confirmation that it was being shipped overnight along with a tracking number. 

Its now Friday and there's been no movement with the tracking number. I can understand it not being picked up Tuesday. But Wednesday and Thursday are business days that FedEx does pick-ups and deliveries. I guess its been sitting in FiBits shipping docks for the past couple days. 

Last night I got the warning that the battery was low and I should charge my Blaze. This morning it died. Nice. And the day before a group of us were going to do a weekend challenge. I think I may of found a way to rig something up to charge it, I just have to figure out which two of the four contact points on the back are ground and 5 volts.

[MikeS1971]

Awesome, theres been package movement! Scheduled delivery is Monday. Yes, Monday. One week to receive a package that was being shipped overnight.

I guess I'll have an extra charger now. Last night I went back to Best Buy to do an exchange because of the charger. I really didn't want to do this because I didnt want to go through the setup process agian. After the problems I had the first time, I really didn't want to go through that all over again. Luckily I was able to speak with a nice and understanding manager there that gave me a charger from a Blaze they had in stock. He then took my broken charger, put itn the now opened Blaze's box and said its going back to FitBit. 

He also told me a lot of people are returning Blaze's for other fitness trackers. Mainly for the method of charging, confusion on what "Connected GPS" means, low vibration of the silent alarm and lack of user configuration.

[MikeS1971]

Update:

I've had three bad/defective Blaze chargers.

First one seemed to have a bad connection inside the charger or a break in the cable. While waiting a week for my overnight shipment of the second one, I was able to get a free replacement at Best Buy. We'll call the one week to ship the overnight charger #2 and the Best Buy one #3. I started to use #3 while waiting for #2. When #2 arrived, I just left it in its box. When packing up to take a small vacation, I decided to take #2 with me and leave #3 at home. I figured #2 could be my travel charger. The first night while on vacation, I removed the charger from its original packaging, mounted the Blaze to it and.... nothing. Wouldn't charge.

When I got home, I tested #2 with a multimeter to see if it was indeed an issue with the charger or the Blaze. No voltage on any of the contacts inside the charger. Then this morning I put my Blaze into #3 and just as the clasp snapped shut, the little tab that locks the top to the bottom broke off.

Now I'm debating weather to go back to Best Buy and see if I can talk to the same manager, or contact FitBit and wait a week of an overnight shipment again. 

[Palta]

for my alta, called Fitbit customer service and told tell them my charger broke and they overnight shipped me a brand new one. No issues! 

[68]

My Fitbit charger doesnot stay engaged in the my Fitbit when charging. Best Buy tested it and said they could not do anything and I needed to contact Fitbit for a replacement.

[FerdinandFitbit]

Hi there guys @Palta @68, Good to see you around! 🙂

@Palta, I'm happy to hear that you were able to get your Alta replaced and hope you're now back on track!

@68, the best thing to do in your case would be to get in touch  with the Support Team for them to take a look into your case and I'm pretty sure they will be happy to help you out with this for you to be back on track as well.

Let me know if you need more help with this!