Is a long story, and I also infodump due to my autism hah. Is about pixel 7 pro being faulty and defective, and ID mobile refusing to do anything about it.
Got a pixel 7 pro in late April, phone turned out to be defective.
It had:
• terrible overheating from simple tasks that even my Galaxy s20+ has no trouble with even after 3.5 years. Video, streaming, playing old games e.g marvel strike force, great big war game, epic little war game.
And by 3 months of having it, it popped a hole in the lens glass and had shatter lines. Is a known design flaw of the 7 and 7pro as google stopped rejecting warranty claims for it and started offering free repairs, although unless overheating is fixed, it will occur again. And it seems to be a considerable occurance amongst owners in owners groups, ive seen hundreds of people reporting it. The probable cause, which my brothers friend (who owns a tech and phone repair shop) agreed, was the overheating caused the metal camera frame to slightly expand and compress the glass, and it eventually gave way. I've seen dozens of pictures of it happening on both the big glass lens and the telephoto lens.
• terrible battery life, even my old galaxy s20+ outlasted it, and sometimes it didn't even charge fully overnight, sometimes I woke up on the morning and it would have 70-85%. I would be on 30% by 3-4pm too and I used it no more than I used & still use my galaxy s20+.
• screen would sometimes go berserk and scroll at 100mph from lightest touch or when trying to scroll, and would think it was pressing and holding to select things when I wasn't. Or it would sometimes go very sluggish and slow.
• signal and mobile Internet would have trouble even when I had bars of 4g. It would say no connection sometimes when I had plenty of 4g signal. Calls would drop sometimes and by mknth 2 it was not alerting me to most calls and texts, e.g I had the pixel, s20+ and my even older s8 all connected to Facebook messenger, s20+ and s8 rang when I was called on messenger, but pixel wouldn't show anything or make noise. Messages would sometimes not deliver or come through for hours.
Pixel buds pro kept going silent while still connected, although they do that on my Galaxy too so must be the buds are defective too... were a free gift but still… not having much luck with pixel products
• system UI failure and errors. Phone would crash and stutter, but one day it got bad and said system UI failure, and went dark screen and unresponsive. A Google tech advisor told me how to do bootloader which got it back, but still had bugs and glitches.
I contacted Google support through the pixels built in support, and they asked for the phone to be returned, so I did.
And they had the audacity to send me a refurbished device which had clearly had its screen, main back panel and camera glass replaced as they had blue stickers and blank screen sticker on. I was suspicious and complained to google as i also noticed some signs of wear on the metal frame and in the charge port, and the next day I noticed it said "refurbished" in tiny text in the block of lots of text, which confirmed my suspicion. I had Included a letter Listing all the faults, and specifically stated I did not want refurbished as i had heard it happens sometimes, and felt I deserved a new one as it was not my fault it was faulty, but they didn't do that.
I was NOT happy at having someone else's damaged and repaired phone and continuing paying full price, if I bought a new car on monthly payments, it had manurfacture faults, they asked for it back, and they sent a car that had been wrecked in a crash and repaired and was worth less, no one would be happy with that as its integrity inside may be questionable and resale value is effected, and I was planning on selling the 7pro near end of the year and upgrading to pixel 8 pro.
But a refurbished 7 pro on backmarket can be as low as £380 I saw, about £480 for a 256gb one. Whereas a like new (only damage to my original device was from the overheating lens pop, was immaculate otherwise) 256gb one I've seen can sell for up to £750 as they're £949 new.
So I had lost resale value and had a phone that had a history of heavy damage on both sides as only the small back panel had not been replaced. And If a new one went faulty, a refurbished ex damaged one gave me even less faith in fitness for purpose of lasting 2 years at least.
Complained to google and ID mobile, told ID I wanted either:
1) galaxy s23ultra, as I'd seen and screenshotted a flash deal on Mobiles.co.uk and ID mobile with a s23ultra which totalled £941 over 2 years, about what I was paying, and the basic s23 had worse specs than the pixel 7 pro so was not a fair swap.
2) a reasonable price reduction of 40% on the handset part of the contract, which would knock off about £10 per month, totalling about £200 reduction by end of contract even though I'm currently losing about £250 - £300 resale value
3) cancel contract and refund any payments made after the beginning of the complaint, 2 currently.
4) take the refurbished phone back, and send me a pixel 8 pro once released in october, and compensate me for the handset part of the contract paid in August and September while I continue using s20+ in the meantime.
And they outright rejected my complaint... and told me to go to google.
Which I later learned they're not actually allowed to do, as I saw on a lawyer website and on which. Com.
They are the service provider, contract holder, and one taking the money, therefore they have the legal liability and responsibility to sort out problems, not use manurfacturer as a scapegoat. The lawyer website also was where I read about being entitled to a price reduction if I rejected the replacement for being unsatisfactory replacement.
When an item is replaced because of manurfacture faults and not customer responsible, the replacement must be of equal or superior quality, or a price reduction to reflect the inferior replacement. The customer cannot be left worse off for something that wasn't their fault.
I tried google again anyway even though I no longer want a pixel 7 pro as I don't trust the build quality and durability, I had more faults in 3 months with it than I had during 10+ years with Samsung, not that Samsung has been perfect however, and on owners groups there seems to be alot of people reporting similar faults. And their best offer was not satisfactory as I would still be out of pocket, and its not their responsibility anyway, it's ID mobile's.
So I contacted live chat again and asked them to pass on a request for them to reconsider, and stated due to my disability and special needs (that are already known and logged with them as a vulnerable customer) I could not ring the number like they had told me to, and needed written format. I also asked for a deadlock letter if they were not going to fix the problem.
Today the complaints team responded again, not addressing my appeal, only telling me to ring again... -_- and no deadlock letter either.
I tried carphone warehouse email (they own ID mobile) and asked if they could help as at an impass with ID, and they told me it's an ID mobile problem... *facepalm*
So my option now is Ofcom / Cisas / Ombudsman, I've exhausted all the options possible to me, and they aren't able to / willing to make adjustments to accommodate my disability.
I don't feel they deserve any more payments, as I'm not in receipt of an acceptable device to the standard that I'm paying and rejected it, and i am using my old phone.
Would everyone agree that they are in breach of contract and I have the right to terminate contract or at least block any more payments until they fix this? (And be refunded on any payments made during the complaint)
Thanks for reading