Found a good Blaze, claimed a faulty one

[Otel]

Hi people,

I had found a working Fitbit Blaze and tried to locate it's owner. I have also contacted Fitbit support and they replied they can't help me and suggested I keep the blaze for my own use. Finally, after 6 weeks of fruitless search, i decided to claim the blaze. Bought the charger and to my dismay, the Blaze can't be charged. It will only work in the charger. But once off the charger, it's dead.

Again, I contact Fitbit support and the best suggestion from them is to trash the blaze. As my location does not have a Fitbit service centre, repair is not an option. The blaze is working perfectly except for the battery issue. It's really a waste just to trash it.  Perhaps someone can come up with a better suggestion?

I still wish to return the Blaze to its rightful owner. If you lose a Blaze in August, state where you lose it. I'm sorry, it's not in good working condition but I will throw in a charger for free.

And to all future finders of Fitbit, if you can't locate the owner within a week or two, you might as well buy a charger and claim it for yourself. Reuse is the next best option if return is not possible within the time frame. Otherwise it's recycle.

[Rich_Laue]

You say the found Blaze works perfectly, but won't stay on, that doesn't sound to perfect to me? Excess heat, or long periods leaving the battery in a dead state can destroy said battery. Returning an in working unit is probably not worth the postage. 

[jmattwood]

Really?

In my world, the correct course of action is to hand in found property at the nearest police station.

Theft by finding is dispicable; to condone it, nay suggest it is worse.

[Otel]

You live in a good world where the police are effective. I had visited my neighbourhood police post, they are close to no help.

[Bunnybear_05]

If I lost my Fitbit, the last place I'd go in hopes to find it is the police station. Thought would never cross my mind. Chances are, someone st the police station would just keep it themselves because no one really treats the station like the lost and found fit the neighborhood unless it's a lost dog.

[Bunnybear_05]

Also, if you found 20$ on the ground outside, you'd hand it over to the police station ?

[jmattwood]

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@Bunnybear_05 wrote:
Also, if you found 20$ on the ground outside, you'd hand it over to the police station ?

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Indeed, though it would more likely be £ than $.

I'm not intending taking the moral high ground but surely you can see that if you find something, it isn't OK to just keep it.

It's sad if you do.

[Bunnybear_05]

So, where do you draw the line ? A single dollar bill....a quarter, a dropped toddler sock ? They all belong to someone. Worth wasting the police stations time ? They are not a neighborhood lost and found.
He contacted Fitbit to try to find the owner.

Obviously something worth value, you try to find the owner, which he did. But the police station would've done squat.

What the OP did wasn't morally low. He did what he could do.

[jmattwood]

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@Bunnybear_05 wrote:
So, where do you draw the line ? A single dollar bill....a quarter, a dropped toddler sock ? They all belong to someone. Worth wasting the police stations time ? They are not a neighborhood lost and found.
He contacted Fitbit to try to find the owner.

Obviously something worth value, you try to find the owner, which he did. But the police station would've done squat.

What the OP did wasn't morally low. He did what he could do.

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I was saying that the respondents to the OP shouldn't suggest that it is the right thing to do to just keep something that one has found.

I draw the line very clearly & simply  - I would not keep anything I found. Not rocket science. I'm definitely not in the "finders keepers, losers weepers" camp.

The toddler's sock can stay where it is for the parents to retrace their steps. A coin I would leave for the scavengers.

[Rich_Laue]

Last time I lost my phone, was left on the trunk of the car, I asked Google where it was. 

Google showed a spot two blocks from me. I did not see it there, so I asked Google again, it showed that it was a the police station. 

[JockoT]

Maybe the original owner threw it away, because it was faulty!

[tedhowell]

OMG. My girlfriend lost a Blaze at the Seatle Airport in December. Called Fitbit and they told her that they can see that it has been paired with someone else's account. We asked Fitbit to inform that person that it reported as lost so they could have an opportunity to return it. Fitbit refuses. So Fitbit knows who lost it and know who has it. Aren't they condoning stealing?

[pierrotsc]

That is really strange. The blaze has a BT mac address that is registered in the fitbit server. If you give that to them, they should be able to find out who registered it. It may also work with the serial number. The world is a giant database now. Everything is logged. 
Fitbit may not be willing to do it as it may take time and they do not want to bother.

[tedhowell]

Fitbit said it is against their policy to contact the person who registered the Fitbit they found. According to the person who started this post they also tell people who find a Fitbit that there is no way to return it to the person who lost it and encourage them to just go ahead and use it. I agree, this is weird. They have the information, they just are not being helpful. This is something that is not right and should discourage people from using Fitbit.

[tedhowell]

It is becoming clear that there are many similar suggestions from an identifiable group of Fitbit owners who have lost their devices. In many cases, such as my own, Fitbit acknowledges that they know for certain who has the lost device but state that they cannot assist in it's recovery and cannnot even request it's voluntary return. These complaints and reasonable suggestions for policy & feature changes to alleviate this situation range over a period of years. Fitbit shows no intention of responding to these suggestions. 

I'm wondering if any of you community memebers are attorneys who might weigh in on the concept that we are an identifiable class of owners who have sufffered damages due to Fitbit's lask of taking appropirate actions to protect our asset? Is there some legal action that could be taken?

I have listed links to a few of the many similar threads of many people who have lost their Fitbit and suggestions for a tracking feature are . Many come to find out that their identifiable device has been paired to a new account. Yet Fitbit will not impletment the obviously technically possible tracking and prevention of activating a known lost device. At least one user was encouraged by Fitbit Customer Support to simpy keep and use the device they found!

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Blaze/Found-a-good-Blaze-claimed-a-faulty-one/m-p/1595262

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Flex/Lost/m-p/1829480?nobounce#M165317

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Flex/Lost/m-p/1612911

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/One/Lost/m-p/1375754

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Zip/Lost-Fitbit/m-p/1508470

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Blaze/Anti-lost/m-p/1566658

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Charge/Lost-Fitbit-Charge/td-p/1210008/page/2

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/One/Found-Fitbit/m-p/1078561

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Feature-Suggestions/Ability-to-locate-find-a-lost-Fitbit/idi-p/98069...

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Feature-Suggestions/Ability-to-locate-find-a-lost-Fitbit/idi-p/98069...

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Blaze/Blaze-Lost-Seattle-Airport-Who-Found/m-p/1829771

https://community.fitbit.com/t5/Feature-Suggestions/Brick-a-lost-device/idc-p/1831470#M96549

[SunriseRun391]

Even in an ideal world, taking the Fitbit to the police would do no good, because there is no serial number on the Fitbit and no way for them to reunite you with your device.

[MatthewFitbit]

@tedhowell We encourage anyone who finds a lost Fitbit tracker to reach out to our Support Team via https://contact.fitbit.com. We have a team that works to reunite lost trackers with their proper owners whenever possible.

[tedhowell]

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@MatthewFitbit wrote:

@tedhowell We encourage anyone who finds a lost Fitbit tracker to reach out to our Support Team via https://contact.fitbit.com. We have a team that works to reunite lost trackers with their proper owners whenever possible.

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I 100% acknowledge your statement. Don't disagree at all. Yes, that is what Fitbit does. I am sorry, but I will politely say that this is not the point being made. The comment & feedback that users are trying to suggest to Fitibit is that if a device is lost there is nothing to prevent the finder from simply using it. Or maybe selling it. This part of the policy is not well accepted by many users and many of us feel that it could be changed without violating any rights of privacy.

[MatthewFitbit]

Apologies if I misread the conversation. I definitely hear that feedback, and can assure you that it has been received by our team.