• After 15+ years, we've made a big change: Android Forums is now Early Bird Club. Learn more here.

Best Buy exchange gone bad? sort of

Amaroth

Android Enthusiast
Nov 5, 2009
380
10
Hilo, HI
Today I finally went down to Best Buy to go and exchange my phone. The guy who did it was glad to do so. I was able to keep my same SD card. After the process was finished (in which I also bought a new car mount), I proceeded to browse the rest of the store.

I went and sat in the Studio room for a while to play with the phone, I noticed it had a loose screen. It was a very slight movement, but highly noticeable. The thing would kind of 'tap' every time I hit the back button. With the phone closed, you could push or sandwich the 2 parts together and see it smush and retract. I'm telling you it was very small but noticeably or else i would not be typing about this. My dusty phone that I had just exchanged, purchased on the launch day, was never loose and never 'tapped'.

Now I was debating for about 30 minutes weather I should go and try and get another one or not.
After a while I started obsessing over it and was making my screen go tappity tap tap tap......so I decided to go back and see about exchanging the phone. I hadn't even left the store yet.

There was a new guy at the counter, and I told him my issue. He pulled out 2 more boxed phones and also his own Droid from his pocket. He told me his did that too, and then we started comparing the phone i had to the new ones. I found on that didn't tap or wobble or anything. I asked if I could get that one and he said he had to go ask his manager. So he went and came back and said his manager told him that it isnt a defective phone and they cant return it. Then I said "what about if you showed him both of these phones?" You could very obviously tell that this new one was much tighter than the one I had got. So he said he would try, and went and asked his manager again. He came back and told me his manager wouldnt let him and that he says "all of them will eventually become loose." Almost exactly. Then I asked if I could talk to the manager.

I am not one to cause a scene but this was making me mad. I wasnt getting loud or anything but I was trying to get a different answer than "no".

So the manager comes and starts saying bulls**t about how the slider mechanism needs room and that's how all slider phones are blah blah. This was the same guy who sold me the phone on launch day. I tried to explain to him that my old phone i had exchanged due to tons of dust under the screen was never loose and has been TIGHT since I bought it on launch day. He then showed me on the new phone I wanted to get that it also clicks, if you press on the OTHER side of the phone by the search key. I kept trying to convince him that it is RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIM. The phone I had been given is LOOSE and the one I want is NOT. But I wasn't successful. He wouldn't change his mind no matter what. I told him I'd rather have my old phone back and he said he could do that. Then he got out my old phone because it was still there and he tried to convince ME that it was clicking on the search key side. I was so mad. He wouldn't give me another new phone but he would give me my old defective one back.

Somewhere in this conversation he also made a comment about "because you keep your phone in your pocket" referring to the dust under the glass on my old phone. Are you f*****g kidding me? Who doesn't put their phone in their POCKET???

anyway, I kept the phone I was given with the "tap" screen. When the slider is open, the screen also rocks forward and back a tiny noticeable amount.My dusty phone that I returned had no wobble or "tap" at all. I swear I am not lying.

I felt really bad after he turned me down after I tried all I could to prove him wrong.

Sorry this was so long but I had to share...
I plan on going to a different best buy and trying again, this time maing sure I check which phone they give to me.
Or I might just snap my droid in two and go and return it for a new one. I have the Black Tie warranty thing.

If anybody actually reads this whole story, what do you think I should do? And am I in the wrong here? This guy basically made me feel like an a**hole for even asking about it.

EDIT: wow and I just realised that the speaker on the back of my phone is totally DENTED. I am starting to question weather Best Buy are actually selling used droids as new....
 
Well you paid for a product and you are not satisfied with it. aslong as it's with in reason you are in the right. I read the whole story. What I get from it is you want a fone that dosn't wobble and won't get dust under the cover. So I would call your carriers customer service. I went through this with T mobile. They sold me a behold over the fone telling me it would tether. THEY DON'T they also told me it was a android. it is and it isn't!!!! I got a free months cell/data out of them and a behold II they waived the restock fee and let me keep the behold until the behold II came out. 3 weeks instead of 2 weeks. also they were very friendly with un-locking the behold (knowing I was going to return it) and even gave me a code to the admin settings to turn on some other apps that are factory "off" out of the box. In other words T mobile was more worried about keeping me as a customer of 11 years than losing me. especially since where I work was giving 24% discount on at&t and 25% on verision both with free fones. I did have to pay the 230.00 for the behold II but it does what I want. I'm happy, they are happy. (they kept me as a customer) I've been very pleased with T mobile over the years. They have bent over backwards to help me. even un-officially helping me tether my treo 680 on a blackberry plan. t mobile really encourages reverse enginering. they don't seem to care what fone you use as long as you pay your bill. and they are willing to help me use any fone as long as they can bill me.

So I would say dump best buy and call your carrier's customer support. if you can't get anywhere with them then I would suggest a new carrier. Or get the floppy fone then call customer support for a new one and just tell them IT's DEFECTIVE! be polite and ask thought out technical questions. make them understand that the fone is NOT funtioning physically as it should. takes about 3 days for UPS to drop you one and shipping back is free. (least with t-mobile)
HTH
later
Rich
 
Upvote 0
Although I do tend to agree that all of these droids will click, creek, or make some sort of wobble at some point... Whether its now or later. Coming from a engineering background its really hard to think of a way to have a slider that won't do that with in tolerance. There are ways to get around it. Mine isn't that bad but if it gets worse I'm going to try to place a piece of electrical tape under the sliding screen to act as a buffer between the 2 surfaces. It may seem silly but have you ever used a sliding phone before? Every HTC I have used or seen all was way more wobbley than this motorola. I'm quite impressed with it actually.

If there is something defective with your phone, replace it. But I fear this is a similar situation that we had with the Storm 1s. Someone posts something on the internet about "mine clicks different" and everyone gets paranoid about their phones not working "right" and the huge return list begins. Most of the time there is nothing wrong.

If there is another best buy in your area check them out.
 
Upvote 0
The best buy I dealt with in San diego exchanged my Droid because I said it was rebooting, (actually it wasn't it just didn't feel right to me). I asked how long this exchange Droid warranty is for and they told me 30 days. I would wait a week and take it back saying it reboots a couple of times a day. Honestly my Best Buy was a pleasure to deal with, sorry to hear yours wasn't.

Jason
 
Upvote 0
Lesson: Never buy anything from Best Buy. Period.

I disagree; I had a similar issue and had to exchange my Droid at BB. I had the Manager pull out every Droid one by one until I found one that was solid. A few he pulled out screens click like the BB Storm's screen. There was no way in hell I was going to take one of those. While checking the screen I also checked the model to see if it was a 1st batch production Droid. They were happy to go through all the phones and I found a solid Droid. Don't know if a Verizon store would have done that but BB took care of me. Take it to another BB if there is one in your area.
 
Upvote 0
For the one good story you give for Best Buy, all those messed up DROIDs will be sold to other customers, resulting in a dozen or more bad stories about BB. This is why I say never buy at BB. They're evil... always have been, always will be. You may be clapping your hands all the way home, but that means those dozen customers will be frustrated. But who cares right? You got them to root through all their inventory to find the perfect non-clicking one just for you!
 
Upvote 0
For the one good story you give for Best Buy, all those messed up DROIDs will be sold to other customers, resulting in a dozen or more bad stories about BB. This is why I say never buy at BB. They're evil... always have been, always will be. You may be clapping your hands all the way home, but that means those dozen customers will be frustrated. But who cares right? You got them to root through all their inventory to find the perfect non-clicking one just for you!

Come on and you don't think Verizon or any other retailer would do the same, get real. I found the perfect one for me and you should be just as anal if you spend your hard earned money.
 
Upvote 0
I also learned the hard way with the Droid to never buy a phone from Best Buy. I clearly clearly had a defective phone and they gave me a hard time. They would NOT exchange no matter how much I pleaded my case. I eventually just returned the phone, walked across the street and bought it at Verizon.

Best Buy is really stingy when it comes to cell phones and they won't exchange them.
 
Upvote 0
I also learned the hard way with the Droid to never buy a phone from Best Buy. I clearly clearly had a defective phone and they gave me a hard time. They would NOT exchange no matter how much I pleaded my case. I eventually just returned the phone, walked across the street and bought it at Verizon.

Best Buy is really stingy when it comes to cell phones and they won't exchange them.


What now that doesn't make sense, they will take back the phone for a full refund within thirty days but they wouldn't exchange it? :thinking:

Just tell them its rebooting and be done with it.

Jason
 
Upvote 0
I also learned the hard way with the Droid to never buy a phone from Best Buy. I clearly clearly had a defective phone and they gave me a hard time. They would NOT exchange no matter how much I pleaded my case. I eventually just returned the phone, walked across the street and bought it at Verizon.

Best Buy is really stingy when it comes to cell phones and they won't exchange them.

I think this is a case by case basis because I've exchanged mine several times at the same store and once at another with no hassle. When I was with Sprint I went through hell trying to exchange that crappy Palm Pre. They are really only supposed to exchange your phone once in a 30 day period.
 
Upvote 0
I think this is a case by case basis because I've exchanged mine several times at the same store and once at another with no hassle. When I was with Sprint I went through hell trying to exchange that crappy Palm Pre. They are really only supposed to exchange your phone once in a 30 day period.

Obviously this is very true. It depends on who is working at the store. I live on Long Island NY and people are real a holes here so that may explain why I had worse experiences, but I went to a Verizon to exchange the phone before I did anything else and it took a little convincing but I was able to get them to offer to exchange the phone, unfortunately they found out I bought it at Best Buy and said they can't exchange it I have to go to Best Buy. So basically Verizon was going to exchange it for me but couldn't and Best Buy wouldn't even give me a chance .
 
Upvote 0
Come on and you don't think Verizon or any other retailer would do the same, get real. I found the perfect one for me and you should be just as anal if you spend your hard earned money.

I hope you did find the perfect one for you. God forbid it have dust under the screen, or that it'll eventually click again, or shoot, maybe you should check to see if the 3.5" headphone jack is a bit loose. I heard there's a problem with that too. Look for it, you'll find it. There's being anal and making sure you don't have a defective product, and then there's an OCD that causes you to find something that really isn't there. But like I said, you're happy, cool. I just feel for and hate to be all those other customers that get the phones you turned down.
 
Upvote 0
I hope you did find the perfect one for you. God forbid it have dust under the screen, or that it'll eventually click again, or shoot, maybe you should check to see if the 3.5" headphone jack is a bit loose. I heard there's a problem with that too. Look for it, you'll find it. There's being anal and making sure you don't have a defective product, and then there's an OCD that causes you to find something that really isn't there. But like I said, you're happy, cool. I just feel for and hate to be all those other customers that get the phones you turned down.

So do I but do you think BB is the only retailer getting phones with loose screens. If you go to Verizon and ask to check the phone out before you buy and activate it and it has a loose screen you don
 
Upvote 0
I bought mine on release day at BB. had to return it the next day b/c it was rebooting very often. They exchanged it with little to no questions asked. This phone is doing the same thing, but not as often. I want to exchange it again. Can I have VZW exchange it via a phone call or does it have to go through BB mobile? thanks
 
Upvote 0
I bought mine on release day at BB. had to return it the next day b/c it was rebooting very often. They exchanged it with little to no questions asked. This phone is doing the same thing, but not as often. I want to exchange it again. Can I have VZW exchange it via a phone call or does it have to go through BB mobile? thanks

If you are still within your 30 days then you should take it back to BB.
 
Upvote 0
The thing is they told me with the black tie warrenty I would be able to return my droid for a new on e for any reason other than being lost or stolen . The manager guy I was talking to yesterday was the sane guy tthat told me this. That's why agreed to get it for 9 dollars a month in the first place. I'm going to try and go to sacramento soon and just tell them I exchanged it an d its been rebooting a lot during calls. Then ill make sure to check as many phones as I can till I find a sturdy one.

I did think about weather I was being too obsessed with it, but come on my old phone never had this problem. How can they tell me it isn't defective when I showed them proof that was extremely noticable when using the phones back key? I don't see how that wouldn't be considered a hardware defect.
 
Upvote 0
The thing is they told me with the black tie warrenty I would be able to return my droid for a new on e for any reason other than being lost or stolen . The manager guy I was talking to yesterday was the sane guy tthat told me this. That's why agreed to get it for 9 dollars a month in the first place. I'm going to try and go to sacramento soon and just tell them I exchanged it an d its been rebooting a lot during calls. Then ill make sure to check as many phones as I can till I find a sturdy one.

Yes I would defiantly do that, you paid your hard earned money for it, get one that you are happy with.
 
Upvote 0
I have the exact same problem with my droid. Except it started doing this a little after a week after I got it. This is my 3rd phone since the first 2 had rebooting issues.

Now best buy won't exchange it saying its 5 days past the 30 days. I can understand that but its not like I'm asking for money back or trying to rip them off. This is a legitimate concern as I don't want the keyboard falling apart like this in 2 weeks. Who knows what will happen in a year.

Time to write BB corporate a nice letter and see what they say.

Oh and it totally matters what kind of sales person/manager is running it. The people I dealt with the first 2 exchanges were totally cool and gave me no problems at all. I got a different person this time and she kept telling me its "normal wear and tear". -_- Yeah, after 2 weeks lol
 
Upvote 0
I'm surprised best buy even did this for you....mine told me I had to do any exchanges at the corporate store.

VZW corp stores aren't much better but they seem better than this......Either way, my phone taps and i don't really care, trust me, you're making a mountain out of a mole hill but if it's really THAT big of a deal go to a verizon corp store. Hell, it's not like the Storm where a screen not being 100% means it's unusable....it just means that you have OCD...
 
Upvote 0

BEST TECH IN 2023

We've been tracking upcoming products and ranking the best tech since 2007. Thanks for trusting our opinion: we get rewarded through affiliate links that earn us a commission and we invite you to learn more about us.

Smartphones