Hey, I don't post a lot so definitely not a known user, but have used this site for research for quite a while and optimistic I can get some valuable feedback.
I bought a release day Bionic (upgraded from a Storm2 *shudder at the bad memories*) and was mostly happy with it. After a couple weeks I started having some issues where it was incredibly hot (more on that in a moment) dropping calls and locking up and giving errors that phone.android.app was not responding. Basically the cell phone functionality of my cell phone was not working. It ended when it got so hot it melted the back of the phone while I was on a call (call on blue tooth phone laying in passenger seat) Even though I was 3 days past my 14 day exhcange the local store manager agreed to exchange the device for me with a new in the box phone.
I recognize that I am a fairly abnormal case as I travel locally for work and live on the fringe of 2 LTE areas with a divide between them. I travel between these two markets 2-7 times per day. With both the original phone and the new one the data was having a hard time reverting to 3g after I left a 4G area. In a 4G area it worked great! Once I got it to come on in a 3G area it worked GREAT until I left the 3g area. After a frustrating day Tuesday where the phone cost me several hours of my business because of no data (despite ironically enough working at a VZW tower site) I was frustrated and called in yesterday. I was told by the first level 2 tech support person I spoke with that a software patch was due out in November but she couldnt give me any more details and advised that I could call motorola tech support and they may be able to help.
So I called Motorola tech support and was told by a "level 2 rep" (they love to escalate you quickly once you know how to actually turn the phone on...I wonder who the level 1 reps actually help?) that there was no patch in the works for the bionic and "Verizon has been telling all kind of lies just to get people off the phone. They have a major network problem." (BTW this call was recorded and available via voice print that is a direct quote)
I promptly called back in to Verizon, again escalated to level 2, and this rep told me that after checking his database there is no known patch coming. He said often reps will read things on the internet and assume it is true, but at this time Verizon had no indication of a pending update for the Bionic. He asked me "What can I do to make you happy?" My first reply was, of course, "make the phone I bought work as advertised" Once we established that was beyond his control, I offered this, "refund my money, take the phone back and revert my contract." He went to a supervisor on that one. The response was they could not offer me a refund as the phone was now used, but they would void my contract renewal and I could keep the device at the 2 year price I paid. "Then I would be free to buy any future device I wished at the 2 year contract price."
At first I thought that was a fair offer, but the more I think about it, if they know the phone is not going to be able to be updated, that may be a best case scenario for them and a way to minimize my options.
What does everyone else think?
I really want to love this phone. There are things about it that are unbelievable but the 3G/4G dropout issue is a deal breaker for me and my business a full time 3G phone would be better for me until they resolve this issue (Before anyone offers I have tried setting the phone to CDMA only, but even still when I pass through a 4G area it loses signal). Just curious to get others take on the offer at hand.
I bought a release day Bionic (upgraded from a Storm2 *shudder at the bad memories*) and was mostly happy with it. After a couple weeks I started having some issues where it was incredibly hot (more on that in a moment) dropping calls and locking up and giving errors that phone.android.app was not responding. Basically the cell phone functionality of my cell phone was not working. It ended when it got so hot it melted the back of the phone while I was on a call (call on blue tooth phone laying in passenger seat) Even though I was 3 days past my 14 day exhcange the local store manager agreed to exchange the device for me with a new in the box phone.
I recognize that I am a fairly abnormal case as I travel locally for work and live on the fringe of 2 LTE areas with a divide between them. I travel between these two markets 2-7 times per day. With both the original phone and the new one the data was having a hard time reverting to 3g after I left a 4G area. In a 4G area it worked great! Once I got it to come on in a 3G area it worked GREAT until I left the 3g area. After a frustrating day Tuesday where the phone cost me several hours of my business because of no data (despite ironically enough working at a VZW tower site) I was frustrated and called in yesterday. I was told by the first level 2 tech support person I spoke with that a software patch was due out in November but she couldnt give me any more details and advised that I could call motorola tech support and they may be able to help.
So I called Motorola tech support and was told by a "level 2 rep" (they love to escalate you quickly once you know how to actually turn the phone on...I wonder who the level 1 reps actually help?) that there was no patch in the works for the bionic and "Verizon has been telling all kind of lies just to get people off the phone. They have a major network problem." (BTW this call was recorded and available via voice print that is a direct quote)
I promptly called back in to Verizon, again escalated to level 2, and this rep told me that after checking his database there is no known patch coming. He said often reps will read things on the internet and assume it is true, but at this time Verizon had no indication of a pending update for the Bionic. He asked me "What can I do to make you happy?" My first reply was, of course, "make the phone I bought work as advertised" Once we established that was beyond his control, I offered this, "refund my money, take the phone back and revert my contract." He went to a supervisor on that one. The response was they could not offer me a refund as the phone was now used, but they would void my contract renewal and I could keep the device at the 2 year price I paid. "Then I would be free to buy any future device I wished at the 2 year contract price."
At first I thought that was a fair offer, but the more I think about it, if they know the phone is not going to be able to be updated, that may be a best case scenario for them and a way to minimize my options.
What does everyone else think?
I really want to love this phone. There are things about it that are unbelievable but the 3G/4G dropout issue is a deal breaker for me and my business a full time 3G phone would be better for me until they resolve this issue (Before anyone offers I have tried setting the phone to CDMA only, but even still when I pass through a 4G area it loses signal). Just curious to get others take on the offer at hand.