Well.... my Surge band had gotten to the point where no repair would work, and the band was in the final throes of breaking. I really like the functionality aspects of my Surge, but very frustrated with its wearability.
To recap...I purchased my first FitBit Surge in January 2015. I wear my watch every day, though I do not sleep with it. The bands did the usual breaking around the screws and along the edges near the watch face. I returned it to the "point of purchase", a popular outdoors store with a remarkable "return any time within one year if you are not satisfied" warranty program. In August 2015 I did, they gave me a new watch. As it was a 'return & re-buy" transaction, my FitBit warranty effectively started at zero.
Of course, the new Surge experienced the same issues. I did not get the "bubbling" that many of you describe, just the deterioration of the rubber. Now, at August 2016 I erred in not repeating the "return & Re-buy". The company would have done so, but in fairness to them, after all not their fault, and I did not want to take truly unfair advantage of their policy. This is a FitBit problem... I'll get to that later.
So, now it is August 2016. This watch, still seeing daily use, has been through the wars. First, in November 2015, one of the "bars" in the longer strap that was taking the daily strain of the buckle broke away at one end. On examination, the other end was torn as well, and easily broke away when I put light a light "oull" on it. So, the bar is gone completely. The buckle now catches the next slot.
A few weeks later, the edge of the band broke near the missing tab, so now only the other edge held the tail of the band in place. My first solution to this was to carefully staple the two ends of the broken side together. Each time I did this, it would typically "hold" for 2 or 3 weeks, and I did this many times. However, over time, I put a lot of little staple holes in a relatively small section of the band, and it began to look like this repeated repair would have a short shelf life.
Then I remembered seeing a demonstration of a "super glue" at a local home show. I bought some online from their web site "thelastglue.com", and used a drop to glue the two broken ends back together. It worked very well, and held for about 6 weeks. Each time it has broken again, I have cleaned up the excess glue, re-glued it, and I get another 6 weeks.
Then a large chuck broke away on the underside of the shorter strap (the one with the buckle) near the screw. And, I realized, that the band was tearing down the strap away from the screw. Only the top surface of the band was still holding on. I saw another post on here of someone reporting they had bought and fitted an after market strap, and as mine was now truly on its last legs, I decided to give it a try.
The set I bought provided two of each half of the strap, a rubber "face protector", and a set of tools for performing the swap. I sat down half an hour ago, and I think I'm good. The new strap is on, I didn't loose any of the screws, and all four are firmly re-screwed into the watch. Now, in taking off the side where the GPS antenna is located, it did come off. I cleaned off excess glue from the old strap, set it in place, and put the new strap in place. I'll test it later to see if it still works. At the very least, the timekeeping, stopwatch, and heart rate and step counting functions will still work.
Now, some fairness to FitBit. I have never had a problem charging my Surge. The cable has always snapped into place, I have never had to "jiggle", or specially position the watch to recharge it. I sit it on my open laptop overnight, next morning fully charged. And yes, I sweat... a lot.... I work in automotive electronics repair (mostly repairing failed instrument clusters, gauges and digital displays), in Phoenix AZ. It gets hot out here, and even the quickest job requires I dismantle a dash out in the 105 degree sun. So my arms sweat. The recharging point has not been affected, and two years in, works perfectly.
Now the negative. FitBit, what are you thinking??? Your "in warranty" support is perfect. For out of warranty, you need to rethink. 25% off a replacement doesn't cut it, and you are loosing your best customers in droves. Best Customers? Yup, we are the ones who bought your most expensive product, your flagship product, and we use the heck out of it. Someone who uses it once a week probably hasn't seen the problem. Your other products with customer replaceable bands have not seen the problem. But those of us who use our Surges every day certainly have. Seriously, with the experience we have had, do you think we will buy the Surge Mk 2? Some will, most won't.
So how could FitBit make good? It's very simple, and really would not cost FitBit much to implement. Offer a program where a customer can return their Surge to FitBit, and Fitbit replaces the band. FitBit's cost? A band (which you make by the thousand and shouldn't cost much on a unit basis), and 10 minutes of a technician's time to swap it. OK, maybe a $50k annual salary for this person. And the shipping back to the customer. $10 per. But just think of the good will and customer loyalty such a program would generate! I would bet customers would pay the $10 shipping. Just think of this forum full of praise from your best customers, thanking you for the awesome product support. If you are looking for someone to do this work, contact me. I am sure we can work something out!
Think FitBit, and for a change do what is right, not the minimum that is expected of you.
russmbrown at cox dot net. FitBit, please at least let customers contact me directly if they want some help with this!
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