[chrispyweener]

Hi all,

After the many disappointments that my recently purchased N97 has put me through, not to mention Nokia support being generally not as good as it should be, I'm seriously considering trying to return my N97 for a refund.  

I've had the flash flooding the left hand side of pictures unless the lens is spotless, and even when it is clean it still does it a little.  Also the GPS is unusable which I consider to be an essential requirement of this phone.  It crashes a lot, even on FW 11, it runs out of RAM all the time.....the list goes on.

Anyway, my question is what do I have to do in order to make this happen?  I'm assuming that because I'm past the '14 day cooling off period' this will be difficult?  Will it involve sending the phone back for a replacement (which won't help) or frequent visits to a care point before Nokia will agree that the phone is not fit for purpose?

It's a shame really as I was hoping for so much more but feel I have been let down by this device since day one.

Especially considering it was £500 to buy, I expect better from a purchase so this costly.

The only other alternative is selling it on eBay at a loss which I'd rather not do for obvious reasons.

Any thoughts welcome

Thanks,

Chris.

[psychomania]

All you can do is contact the store/network that you bought it from and ask them what their returns policy is.  You may also want to read up on consumer laws before speaking to them. Your right to return is between you and the seller, not you and the manufacturer.

The care point is completely separate and has no bearing on if you can return it or not to where you bought it from.  They will only repair faulty phones or replace them if they are beyond repair by an issue covered by warranty.

[sockatume]

First and foremost, the company that sold it to you has the obligation to make sure it's fit for purpose, etc. etc. . The Nokia manufacturer warranty is just a bonus. So if you bought it from the Nokia online store, they've got a responsibility to repair or replace it if it's a lemon. Don't let them fob you off with Nokia Care. This might get complicated because I'm sure their policy will be to just refer people to the warranty. I don't think Nokia will ever give you a refund via a care point. If it wasn't the Nokia online store, then go bother whoever it was that you did buy it from, until they give you a replacement or refund.

Message Edited by sockatume on 29-Jul-2009 01:16 PM

[chrispyweener]

I purchased it from the Nokia Online shop (uk) so I take it my point of contact should be them?

A care point clearly cannot resolve design flaws or firmware issues so you're right, I don't want to be fobbed off by being told to take it to one of them when they cannot help me.

[psychomania]

So the only people that can help you are the online UK shop.  I believe the UK shop is run by a 3rd party acting on behalf of nokia, but I may be wrong.  Even so the shop is the only people that can issue a refund, not nokia themselves or a care point.

If they will not give you a refund then selling it elsewhere is probably easier than taking legal action against the shop.

If you believe it to be faulty your only option is the care point or mail in repair service.

Message Edited by psychomania on 29-Jul-2009 01:23 PM

[asandino]

---

chrispyweener wrote:

I purchased it from the Nokia Online shop (uk) so I take it my point of contact should be them?

A care point clearly cannot resolve design flaws or firmware issues so you're right, I don't want to be fobbed off by being told to take it to one of them when they cannot help me.

---

I am sure with a simple list which youcan put together from this forum you should have enough grounds to take it back.

Is like buying a car that only works when is sunny,  or buying a washing machine that only cleans clothes that are white, or a fridge that only works during weekends.  If the phone is not fit for purpose you should be able to return it. 

 Make sure you put your list of issues, bugs, etc.  And if they come with that **bleep** about 14 days just tell them that you were waiting for the new firmware update which was suppose to fix all this but it did not which is entirely true.

Obviously this all depends on which country you bought this from. As far as I know if you bought it in the US or Europe you should not have major problems, anywhere else I am not too sure how their return policies are.

Good  luck, let us know how it goes.

[sockatume]

If they try to tell him he can't return it because it's outside of the cooling off period, he should just remind them of his rights. The cooling-off period is for cancellation if you examine the goods and it turns out it's not what you wanted, he's still well within his rights to return it if it's what he wanted but it's not of an acceptable standard.

[psychomania]

To prove it's not of an acceptable standard usually involves taking legal action, and building a concrete case. All I can say to that is good luck!

A visit to trading standards may be wise to discuss the best course of action.

If it's not acceptable because it's faulty they will more than likely bounce you back to the care points or mail in repair service.

[chrispyweener]

Ok, just got off the phone to Nokia care UK and they've agreed to give me a refund if I return the phone to them which may take a few days.

I did get rather annoyed on the phone as they asked what was wrong with the phone, I told them and the chap asked why I had bought it if there was so much wrong with it!  Astonishing......

After I had calmed down he seemed a lot more willing to listen as I detailed my issues, but then my phone decided to cut me off so I had to call back.  The second time I got through I spoke to another chap who has just emailed me a return form so I can post it back to them and get the refund sorted.

All of this has left a very bad taste in my mouth with Nokia which is a real shame as this device proved to be so promising. 

[psychomania]

There you go then, all you had to do was call the place of purchase. Simples

I'm guessing you were still within the 1st month for them to agree that easily?

[chrispyweener]

Just over as it turns out - it was shipped on the 21st of June and today's the 29th, so 8 days over.

It's not over yet though - we'll see what they say when I return the item.  They made it seemlike there would be no issues with the return so I'm hopeful but things are never as easy as they seem.

It's odd - the place I'm returning it too is about 5 mins from where I live too!    I could drop it in by hand if they wanted.

[psychomania]

Lucky!

Hope you get a full refund quickly and manage to find a phone that suits you better.

[chrispyweener]

Thanks mate.  I'm currently unsure if it will be a Nokia.  Don't get me wrong, the N97 was a disappointment but I'll be reverting back to the trusty N85 in the mean time whilst I decide.  What's really done it with me today was the way I was spoken to by them on the phone.  That could be the final nail in the coffin for Nokia I'm afraid.

I'm actually saddened it came to this as I feel Nokia have so much potential but they let themselves down over such silly things.  

Ah well, onwards and upwards. 

Thanks for the advice all.  Much appreciated.

Chris.

[psychomania]

I hope you find that the grass is greener, wherever you choose to go. I've had my ups and downs but found that it seems to be a similar story wherever you go with regards to smartphones.

I considered samsung but they seem to be worse at fixing bugs than nokia.  Refuse to buy an iphone as it's still lacking some of the basics and disagree with the restrictive contract terms. Android based phones look interesting but the hardware has been unexciting so far. I'll never buy a windows based phone, just don't like them!

If you do decide to give nokia one final chance you may want to consider the N86.  It's like an N85 on steroids.

[chrispyweener]

Yeah, I've had a few smartphones myself over the years and had a mixed bag overall.

Nokia 7650 - one of the first S60 phones.  Had this for ages and was dead chuffed with it.  Was a bit bulky but did the job.

HTC Artemis (P3300).  This was 'ok' but Windows Mobile on it was quit clunky and it lacked 3G and a decent camera.

HTC Touch Diamond.  Again, not bad but no amount of 'skinning' can hide the horrible Windows Mobile interface and reliablility issues.  I vowed I'd never get another Windows Mobile after this.

N95.  This one was brilliant.  After I'd stiffened up the slider it was an awesome phone, albeit a bit outdated by the time I got mine on FW 30.  Still very good though - the wife now has this. Was lacking USB charging and was a bit battery hungry so the materialistic side of me wanted something new.

N85.  Again a good phone but I still felt something was missing and I think it's the touchy feely screen.  Otherwise this phone since the last FW revision has been very good.  Shame about the wobbly slider and button facia that is held on with double sided tape and peels off.

What next though I wonder?  I'm going to wait and look hard at the other alternatives I think.  Omnia HD looks nice and from what I gather seems to be all that the N97 is lacking  hardware wise (keyboard excluded) but there's less compatible software out there and as you say Samsung are not as on the ball with firmware updates.

Apple.....hmmm.....I've been telling myself I won't touch one as they're still lacking in the basics but the few things that they do actually do they do well.  There are known faults but I'm not sure how common they are.  Also I'd have to get a PAYG one for it to be realistic cost wise and there's no tethering. 

Decisions decisons.

[enam68]

Hello everyone this is my first time i so regret why i was not here when i decided to Buy N97,anyways i bought N97 and faced almost all the same issues from camera lens being scratched to missing the Alarm in the morning kept it for only 4 days though since we dont have a refund policy here i had to switch back to the Old Trusty N95 8GB before doing that i tried to convinced Nokia people about the camera lens scratching issue and they refused to accept it as a Gneric fault they kept teling me to bring the set to Nokia care and let them replace the lens and for that they were not sure how much time will it take considering the fact that even if they change the lens cover it wont be same for me.Hence i simply trade it OFF with some Loss I waited for months for this phone then waited for the prices come down its a pitty i could not hold it for long !!

[djdarkstorm]

Ive also today decided to return my N97 due to all its problems and also stuck on the Three firmware.

I was expecting so much more from this device but I cant even recive calls on it as reception is worse than my N95 which I have to stand halfway down the garden to make a call even though network cover in my area is suppsoed to be great.

This N97 has really let me down and I was so looking forward to it aswell being a Nokia fan for many many years.

A few things for me other than the main call issues were not going to be fixed by a replacement as the touchscreen is horrible it feels cheap like bubble wrap and is really unresponsive and needs double taps here there and everywhere.

The wifi speed was just rediculous it took around 1 minute to load a normal web page and then stole all the phones memory with its cache etc.

There was no app that could connect to my home network for upnp photo, music and video streaming like the N95s Home Media App.

Random reboots some occur when plugging in via usb and some others just for opening the keyboard or an app.

Unable to unlock the keypad or touchscreen using the unlock key so then having to take the battery out and in again.

The 128 ram onboard really needed to be at least 256 to multitask as even with the minumum running the phone just felt slow and sluggish.

The keyboard felt very cheap and I was worried about the keys falling off plus the d-pad was far to close to the a key.

Plus so many more bugs and hardware problems like the scratched screen which I didnt have "yet" but was sure to happen after taking a few shots of my kids.

So for me its back to my Iphone 3G as even though I hate it due to its restrictions and having to use Itunes it just feels so much more better built and the things it does it does them well.

So I wish you luck and hope that you get refunded and find something more to your liking.

And to users considering getting a N97 I would say to them wait for a while until the next upgraded batch comes out as the firmware is a nightmare and will proberly take at least 4 more updates to be stable. Plus the hardware design needs to be sorted out as Nokia are expecting you to pay around 500 for this device you need to be getting your moneys worth and they need to at least double the ram and fix the poor design of the camera.

Now like I said I hope this post helps others as I really wanted to shout from the skys that I had the N97 but it really let me down

[miamicx4]

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psychomania wrote:

I considered samsung but they seem to be worse at fixing bugs than nokia.  Refuse to buy an iphone as it's still lacking some of the basics and disagree with the restrictive contract terms. Android based phones look interesting but the hardware has been unexciting so far. I'll never buy a windows based phone, just don't like them!

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Please explain this paragraph in more dept for me please. I like to hear your comments especially regarding Samsung & iPhone vs Nokia.

[chrispyweener]

Just remembered, one of the other things they said to me on the phone when I listed the problems I'd been having was that they'd never heard of these issues before, like the low RAM warning, the GPS being unable to get and keep a lock, the flash flooding the left hand side of pictures, the web browser closing itself at random etc.  Something I found very hard to believe.

My advice to anyone having issues now is to phone them up and ask for help especially if purchased from the Nokia Shop.  Endless denials that they've never heard of these problems before is clearly nonsense and reporting faults (you could hear him making notes in the background) means there's a hope the issues will be reported to the dev teams giving them a chance to fix them in future FW releases.

In terms of a replacement, avoiding WinMo like the plague as it's REALLY non finger orientated, you're left with other S60 phones like the Omnia HD (looking promising for me at the moment), the iPhone 3G / 3GS, or the Android.

The Omnia seems to tick all the boxes that the N97 does and a whole lot more although I'm currently looking into software compatibility at the moment.  Double the RAM, capacitive screen,  GPS that works, 8mp camera with some funky features, a nicer interface and it's £60 cheaper than the N97.  You get 8GB or 16GB internal memory plus an SD slot.  I just need to make sure that it's not going to have some silly tiny C: drive which is already almost full, and that Mail for Exchange (or the equivalent) works on it as I do need that.  Losing the pop out qwerty keyboard is going to hurt a little but with a capacitive screen and a lanscape on screen keyboard I'm sure it's not far off the iPhone for typing, albeit without the clever predictive stuff.

iPhone 3GS wise, I still can't bring myself to do it - I crave functionality too much.  No OBEX support (sending files over bluetooth), still a very average camera with no flash (even LED is better than nothing for close up stuff) and the contracts are just bizarre.  Talk that you can't use an existing O2 SIM in a PAYG one puts me off as I want to put my work SIM in it.  All other phones don't have this issue and it's a big one.  Also, no tethering on the PAYG one unless you hack it to a degree.  Don't get me wrong, they're lovely to use but I'd rather take a slight hit on how slick the phone is for the much needed functionality that even the latest iPhone OS doesn't provide.

It's a personal thing I guess.

[mauriceperks]

I too am considering asking for a refund. I have had so many problems even after a complete replacement. The worst part of all is that the support line does not answer you or call you back. After having many Nokia phones over the years this is by fr the worst that I have had. I have great doubts that this phone, especially its software was ever tested.