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This is going to be REALLY long - it's part rant and part tips and tricks for how to "handle" Fitbit support from someone with years of experience. I'll try to keep the paragraphs short to make it easier to skim. And I know many people are going to wonder what kind of idiot continues to wear something to sleep that wakes her up every night - one with irrational hope, I guess. Anyhow...
I got my Versa on release day and I loved it. I have tempered expectations for any wrist worn tracker and I was very satisfied. Then, it restarted itself while I was sleeping one night and woke me up because it vibrates when it starts up. I wasn't even mad, I just decide to manually restart at the end of every day.
This manual restarting seemed to work, but after a while, it seriously affected the battery life. I called support and they figured this out for me. They suggested a factory reset if it kept restarting itself in the middle of the night. It did, so I did the factory reset.
When the factory reset didn't help, I called support again. They wanted to replace my Versa, but they wanted to do the month long slow boat process. And, really, I had a functional device that I loved, except for this one thing. But they wouldn't budge. I even spoke with a supervisor.
I decided to call Amazon, who I bought it from, because they know that excellent customer service is the only way to achieve one's dream of a retail monopoly that will eventually allow them to charge whatever they want and treat people however they want. Even though it was one day outside my return period, Amazon agreed to send a replacement and gave me a month to return the old one.
The new Versa did the same thing. I tried a factory reset and it didn't help. I started working with chat support, just to see how often it was really restarting at night. It was at this time that I realized that sometimes it was just vibrating for no reason, not restarting. This only happens at night, after it detects I'm asleep.
Chat support eventually started telling me they wanted to replace my Versa, even though a replacement already did the same thing. They still wanted to do the slow boat thing.
Eventually, I called support again. I think, because it was just outside the 45 day return period and it was my first replacement with them, they decided to just send a replacement "pebble," no return required. Several minutes after this conversation, I got another email from the chat support side "explaining" that they had no options but to receive the old tracker back before they could slow boat the new one.
It took 10 days for the replacement to arrive in SoCal from their warehouse in Indiana.
I got the replacement and the band I like wouldn't attach. I could JUST attach the Fitbit band, so I decided to go with that. After a day or two, the Fitbit band was making me itch. I was dreading calling support, because I knew they would gaslight me. Instead they said they have some defective pebbles that you can't attach bands to. After I sent a video of the problem, they overnighted another pebble to me, no return required.
In case you've lost count, I'm about to receive my 4th Versa, 3 in my possession.
I got the replacement and I was able to attach my band - though in retrospect, I think this one was a little defective, because it was more difficult to attach the band than on a new out of the box with a band attached Versa.
This replacement, of course, also had the same problem with vibrating randomly and restarting itself only while I'm sleeping. I contacted support to let them know and told them I was willing to do a factory reset but they needed to start thinking about escalating to engineering. They told me they needed a video of me doing the reset for whatever reason. Sent the video, continued to have the problem.
They wanted to replace this one too. At this point, I told them that they really needed to start treating this as a firmware issue, but they wanted to send a replacement. I told them I couldn't stop them, but they were going to eventually have to have engineering look at it.
I can't recall if I spoke to a supervisor this time, but I believe I did. They did want a return, which wasn't a problem, since I had one I couldn't attach bands to. They offered to ship the replacement overnight once they received the return in the warehouse. They even offered to pay me back to ship the return over night.
However, they only told me it could take "up to a week" to receive the return. I already had a Versa I could use and I knew the replacement would have the same problem. So I just did the regular return process, with the understanding that they would ship the replacement overnight as soon as they received the return.
After almost a week, my return was still sitting at the local post office, waiting for FedEx to pick it up. If you get a return label, give the package to FedEx, even use a dropbox. You could save yourself a week.
After two weeks, they still hadn't received the return AND they'd sprung the "we also get 5 days to verify your return" thing on me. I emailed to complain again and they said they'd just ship the replacement, since my return had been sitting at the FedEx office for 3 days.
I got the latest return and it was another defective pebble I couldn't attach bands to. I made a video showing the problem and called support to insist that they send me a new replacement, this time in the box, with a band attached. They said the video needed to show my case number, which was new. So I sent one. Then, they said they would send me a replacement BAND. This is like the people who have their trackers die with an almost full battery and support offers them a charger.
I talked to a supervisor and was told that I needed to send back a complete set in a box and they'd replace it with one. They also said they'd send the replacement overnight as soon as tracking for the return showed it was picked up.
I got the new replacement (6th Versa, for those keeping track at home) and it, of course, has the same problem as all the others. I contacted support and told them that this time, they need to have engineering look at it.
During this time, they tried to misdirect my attention and pretend I hadn't been telling them about the problem, or it was a completely different problem. They even asked for a video of me using the Timer app to show that the vibration motor was working - it's working overtime. I jumped through their hoops, but I had to shut the misdirection down. Then they started talking about my warranty. I told them I'd played along with the replacements long enough and they need to have engineering look at it.
I received a message that my issue was being "escalated." I hope that means I'm finally getting somewhere.
If you've stuck with me this long, thank you for acting as my therapist. I hope you've also seen that their hands are not quite as tied as they will tell you, if you keep on them. Ask to speak with a supervisor. And, if you need a replacement and you didn't buy direct, see if the retailer you bought from will help you first. They'll almost certainly have a better policy.
