Consumer rights & recourse with large global corporates?

[rudi-h]

I own a Garmin Fenix watch that experienced a catastrophic malfunction (faulty battery it seems) a few days ago.  The watch is ~2 years old which is outside of the Warranty period (which is only a measly 12 months), but well within the expected life of a smartwatch (any brand).  Note that the battery doesn't just run flat faster than it used to, the watch completely stopped working.  Also, the watch was not subjected to any external damage or misuse.

Garmin SA quotes me R4k to repair the unit (you heard right, R4k to REPAIR) and the warranty on the workmanship of the repairs is only 90 days.  By virtue of the catastrophic nature of the battery failure, they are clearly selling sub-standard products.  The issue that I have is that even if I would be silly enough to pay the R4k to fix a factory / quality fault that should have never become my responsibility, the workmanship on any repaired unit is only warranted for another 90 days.  What recourse do I have if I go down the path or repairing and the watch keeps failing every time just outside of warranty?

This is blatant bullying by a large corporate.  Surely there has to be something from a consumer protection perspective that one can do to come to a reasonable conclusion?  Any lawyers on here that can provide some assistance?  I'd much rather spend R4k on professional advice than pouring it into a bottomless pit of a company that has no regard for product quality and customer service.

Garmin SA has 14 pages of one-star ratings on HelloPeter, so clearly I'm not the first person to run into a brick wall.

Edited February 8, 2022 by rudi-h

[BikeisLife]

Had the exact same issue. The "repair" is actually a new unit, R4k isn't bad considering the instinct was R2k. 

Make sure you are charging your device in a 1.2A low voltage output (your laptop works well here), this is what killed my battery and I'm sure it is probably the case with yours too. Sucks that they do not make this clear on the box etc. or supply a proper charging base with it.

[shaper]

With reference to you quality claim, considering they sell millions of units. one could expect a small percentage to have issue. Nothing is perfect.

On a personal note, had the following

Edge 500, was a workhorse for more years than I can remember.  Eventually had a software glitch, was replaced with an Edge 520 for a vastly reduced replacement cost.  

Edge 520 still going strong after many years.

Forerunner 910XT, worked for many years, eventually barometer went was replaced with a Fenix 3 for a nominal replacement cost much cheaper than a new F3

Sold the F3 after a few years and got an Fenix 5

Sold the Fenix 5 after 2yrs and got the Forerunner 945 which I have had for over 2yrs without issue.

My experience with garmin and their products has been great including the replacement policy.

When I buy one of their products I know it has a 12 month warranty, same as my Samsung phone, which is also not cheap product. It is not an unknown consideration and am happy with the t&c's.

Alas you bought the watch and by doing so agreed to the warranty conditions.

So R4k for a replacement out of warranty is to me is still a good deal on a new replacement Fenix.  The alternative is to use your R4k and try to pick up a cheap replacement from the classifieds.

[IceCreamMan]

Iirc garmin have a 2 year warranty here.

I would be annoyed too if a high end smartwatch failed in under 2years. I would approach Garmin and ask them to reconsider.

[RobertWhitehead]

I know this may be a dumb statement but I am going to say it in any way: you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar 😁. 

At the end of the day you're dealing with a human on the other end and by working with him / her you'll be able to get the issue resolved but by trying to take them on you may end up causing yourself more ball-ache and frustration. Just my 2 cents 😜. 

[rudi-h]

23 hours ago, RobertWhitehead said:

I know this may be a dumb statement but I am going to say it in any way: you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar 😁. 

At the end of the day you're dealing with a human on the other end and by working with him / her you'll be able to get the issue resolved but by trying to take them on you may end up causing yourself more ball-ache and frustration. Just my 2 cents 😜. 

I like to think I'm generally pretty polite and easy to get on with, so i doubt that my attitude and demeanor going into this was unreasonable.  The problem is twofold.  Firstly, they did not respond to my complaint on email nor calls, so I had to drive there in person. Secondly, the human on the other end is seemingly constrained by unjust corporate policy.

After driving there to resolve this in person (very politely by the way), the customer relations manager and senior technician discussed this with me.  After some initial pushback, they did violently agree that it's not fair nor acceptable towards any customer for their flagship product to fail after only 2 years Yet they still claim to be unable to provide an alternative proposal.

The argument is that these units are non-repairable, thus there is no option to only replace a battery due to some quality testing protocol they claim cannot be done.  The thing is that I have no interest in a new watch, I am happy with the one I had and paid for.  So no matter how much relative discount is offered on a replacement unit, paying R4k for something that I already own and that should still be working, is simply not a good deal. If I were to spend more money towards sports watch, it would be for an upgrade in future out of choice, not necessity. 

Perhaps unfair to call the local agents useless, because after ignoring the initial email complaint, the in-person experience was better.  Still no resolution, but at least they agreed to log this with Garmin USA. (which IMO should not require a personal visit to initiate) 

[rudi-h]

On 2/4/2022 at 4:22 PM, shaper said:

With reference to you quality claim, considering they sell millions of units. one could expect a small percentage to have issue. Nothing is perfect.

That is why they need to own up to factory faults and not push the responsibility to consumers

On a personal note, had the following

Edge 500, was a workhorse for more years than I can remember.  Eventually had a software glitch, was replaced with an Edge 520 for a vastly reduced replacement cost.  

Edge 520 still going strong after many years.

Forerunner 910XT, worked for many years, eventually barometer went was replaced with a Fenix 3 for a nominal replacement cost much cheaper than a new F3

Sold the F3 after a few years and got an Fenix 5

Sold the Fenix 5 after 2yrs and got the Forerunner 945 which I have had for over 2yrs without issue.

My experience with garmin and their products has been great including the replacement policy.

When I buy one of their products I know it has a 12 month warranty, same as my Samsung phone, which is also not cheap product. It is not an unknown consideration and am happy with the t&c's.  A warranty term is not the only piece of the puzzle that makes up a supplier's quality commitment. Most things we own are outside of warranty, and it is not unreasonable for us to expect that cars, appliances, tech gadgets etc. should last well beyond 12 months.  Warranty is only a part of the quality equation supposed to deal with obvious infant mortality and does not remove responsibility for quality related issues that manifest later.

Alas you bought the watch and by doing so agreed to the warranty conditions.

So R4k for a replacement out of warranty is to me is still a good deal on a new replacement Fenix.  The alternative is to use your R4k and try to pick up a cheap replacement from the classifieds.

I guess it's a matter affordability to you, for me it is the principle. Perhaps R4k is affordable to some, and getting a new watch may seem nice enough to justify it.  Lets scale it 100 times. What if this were a R1.2 million car that wouldn't start one morning (due to assembly error), and the only option is to replace with new at a cost of R400k? Would it still be a good deal once it's not that affordable anymore?

 

[Jehosefat]

On 2/6/2022 at 8:15 AM, rudi-h said:

 A warranty term is not the only piece of the puzzle that makes up a supplier's quality commitment. Most things we own are outside of warranty, and it is not unreasonable for us to expect that cars, appliances, tech gadgets etc. should last well beyond 12 months.  Warranty is only a part of the quality equation supposed to deal with obvious infant mortality and does not remove responsibility for quality related issues that manifest later.

Just because you expect something to last for a certain amount of time does not mean that it will. Everything will fail at some point and even the same items will not fail at the same time, some will fail early and others will last for ages.

If any of your appliances/gadgets etc. fail outside of the warrantee period the manufacturer is very unlikely to replace or repair it for free. So why are you picking on Garmin specifically here? Never had any other item that you bought fail?

[rorydewet]

I think Garmin are been more than fair.

If you don't like it go get another branded watch.

See what they give you when you have issues.

Promise it will be less than what Garmin offers

 

[andreas17777]

Does anyone have the local area agent for Somerset West number? As I booked my Garmin in last Monday at Sportsmans Warehouse (where I bought it) and it hasn't arrived at Garmin yet. There is no place where I can complain or raise my concerns (I have emailed them with no response). Unit was bought in October and literally broke out of the mount 2 weeks ago when I was riding.

[lechatnoir]

3 minutes ago, andreas17777 said:

Does anyone have the local area agent for Somerset West number? As I booked my Garmin in last Monday at Sportsmans Warehouse (where I bought it) and it hasn't arrived at Garmin yet. There is no place where I can complain or raise my concerns (I have emailed them with no response). Unit was bought in October and literally broke out of the mount 2 weeks ago when I was riding.

SWH will be the ones dealing with Garmin. I've heard of delays from SWH to Garmin on a number of occasions. Your best bet would be to follow up with SWH, find out when they sent it (or plan to) and how long it will take to get to Garmin so you can check in with Garmin once your unit is actually there. until it arrives at Garmin, they will be totally in the dark in fairness.

[rudi-h]

1 hour ago, Jehosefat said:

Just because you expect something to last for a certain amount of time does not mean that it will. Everything will fail at some point and even the same items will not fail at the same time, some will fail early and others will last for ages.

If any of your appliances/gadgets etc. fail outside of the warrantee period the manufacturer is very unlikely to replace or repair it for free. So why are you picking on Garmin specifically here? Never had any other item that you bought fail?

you guys either have a lot of spare cash lying around, or you just simply don't expect much from suppliers.

there is a major difference between a garmin and any other product out there, which is that a garmin watch is allegedly completely irreparable.  This means 2 things.  Firstly that my "broken" watch has zero value.  secondly, there are no repair options offered.  The ONLY option for me to get a working watch is therefore to take the R4k deal from garmin and failing to pay that, have no watch at all after spending R12k 2 years ago for a top end sportswatch.  This doesn't sound very competitive to me?  I also never asked for a new watch and would have been willing to pay towards a battery replacement given that this would/should give me 2 more years worth of life on the watch.  The issue is that there is no option B.

the final point is that the cause of failure is not use related.  I.e. there's nothing that I could or should have done different to preserve or extend the watch's life.  The defect has its roots in poor product quality / factory defect. 

 

[Cheabb78]

I don't think this is unique to Garmin. My daughters Beats headphones stopped working on one side, about 6 months out of warranty. Apple would not repair, but offered a discounted replacement pair. At the time, certain retailers had a special on a newer, noise cancelling model, for less than the discount they offered. Not saying it's right, but not a lot you can do unless there's an unauthorised repair guy out there, or you switch brands as suggested above. I still have Garmin's, and my daughter has new Beats... 

[Jehosefat]

8 minutes ago, rudi-h said:

you guys either have a lot of spare cash lying around, or you just simply don't expect much from suppliers.

there is a major difference between a garmin and any other product out there, which is that a garmin watch is allegedly completely irreparable.  This means 2 things.  Firstly that my "broken" watch has zero value.  secondly, there are no repair options offered.  The ONLY option for me to get a working watch is therefore to take the R4k deal from garmin and failing to pay that, have no watch at all after spending R12k 2 years ago for a top end sportswatch.  This doesn't sound very competitive to me?  I also never asked for a new watch and would have been willing to pay towards a battery replacement given that this would/should give me 2 more years worth of life on the watch.  The issue is that there is no option B.

the final point is that the cause of failure is not use related.  I.e. there's nothing that I could or should have done different to preserve or extend the watch's life.  The defect has its roots in poor product quality / factory defect. 

 

That's hardly Garmin specific. There are numerous items that are designed as a single integrated system that makes repair impractical. e.g. the mainboard on my smart tv went and it was cheaper to replace the entire tv than just the mainboard.

I have no idea why you are referring to things being competitive. There is competition, if you don't like Garmin's approach them why don't you buy a Polar instead? Maybe see what their out-of-warrantee policies are (I doubt they are better than Garmin's to be honest).

To your point about repair not being an option. Even within warrantee periods, repair or replace is entirely at the manufacturer's prerogative.

Finally, every part of every appliance/gadget has a time to failure, some will last longer than the average and some will be shorter. You seem to have been unlucky and got one that lasted less time than the average. That doesn't mean that it's the manufacturer's problem, that's just how things work. They are required to ensure that the item works for "at least" 12 months and that is exactly what they do with the warrantee.

[DJuice]

Garmin shafted me for R10 800 last year for a replacement Fenix 6, 8 weeks between sending unit, paying up, sending wrong unit and finally a new watch.

Decided this is my last Garmin, by the time this one is kaput, hopefully there are new competitors.

Go on Hammerhead, name it the Karoo Burn.

 

 

[Dust46!]

I was very surprised at the bad rating Garmin South Africa has on Hello Peter, I have only had positive dealings with Garmin SA in the past but it is quite alarming.