Verizon just made my day...

[tweedies411]

I bought my Incredible from a 3rd party (craigslist) about 2-3 weeks ago and I've been absolutely pleased with this phone (even coming from my previous Moto Droid) Everything has been going great with the phone until this morning when my speaker mysteriously blew out. I went to Verizon thinking oh man they're gonna give me a bunch of crap saying the phone won't be replaceable b/c i did not purchase it from Verizon blah blah. Well needless to say I walked in, told the girl behind the desk about how the speaker blew and she said she'll take it into the back and have one of the techs check it out. She came back out about 5 min later and said yep your speaker is definitely blown, would you like me to ship a new one to you? So of course I said yes, she then proceeded to do all the things to have it mailed to me, and said I'll have it by Tuesday. Not only is Verizon sending me a replacement, but she said it will be a brand new one b/c the phone is too new for a "certified like new" replacement! She then asked me if I wanted to put insurance on the phone because the phone is worth so much money and of course I chose to do so (even though the phone wasn't even purchased from Verizon she said I was within the 30 day limit to add it to my plan) So needless to say, I had a great Verizon experience today!

 

[sabrewings]

Not to be too big of a buzz kill, but people have been receiving reburbed phones for months now.

 

[yojoe600]

cool!

 

[adrynalyne]

Not to be too big of a buzz kill, but people have been receiving reburbed phones for months now.

Yeah but refurb > new-ish with blown speaker

 

[gidget]

Yeah but refurb > new-ish with blown speaker

yes it is! also, my refurb was in perfect condition. who knows if these things are new or not, but they are definitely good refurbs. and if it's not a good one, just take it back again. verizon has been very good to me on that score, no complaints here.

 

[sabrewings]

Yeah but refurb > new-ish with blown speaker

I know. Just wanted to brace him for when it comes in a brown box with no battery.

 

[tweedies411]

haha well either way they're sending me another phone and i was able to add insurance even though the phone was not purchased from verizon. Before I got my Incredible I asked if i could add insurance on my Moto Droid (which was purchased from Verizon as an upgrade) and they told me no because it was out of the 30 day limit. Also everytime I have brought a phone to Verizon that I have purchased from a 3rd party I had to pay $50 to replace it (mostly Blackberrys). I'm just excited they're doing this for me no questions asked!

 

[ACD168]

Verizon has no way of telling that you didn't buy it from them. all they can see is when the phone was purchased. I bought a droid eris. within the 30 days went and exchanged it for a moto droid. after a few months I decided I hated to moto droid and wanted the eris back. So, I posted a craigslist add saying I would trade my moto droid for an Eris. did the trade, and then with my Eris, my trackball got screwed up. I called and was able to get a refurb. I don't know if it was because they thought this was the eris i originally had, or if they just saw when that eris was purchased, since it was within 1 year.

 

[FramCire]

Verizon has no way of telling that you didn't buy it from them. all they can see is when the phone was purchased. I bought a droid eris. within the 30 days went and exchanged it for a moto droid. after a few months I decided I hated to moto droid and wanted the eris back. So, I posted a craigslist add saying I would trade my moto droid for an Eris. did the trade, and then with my Eris, my trackball got screwed up. I called and was able to get a refurb. I don't know if it was because they thought this was the eris i originally had, or if they just saw when that eris was purchased, since it was within 1 year.

It seems strange to me that Verizon wouldn't and DIDN'T check to see if you bought it from them. OP: Make sure you check your bill to see if they try to charge you.

 

[killadanny]

Check your bill for any surprises, otherwise thats some sort of miracle. Good of VZ to please a customer without issues. Lol, "5 mins later, yep your speaker is broken."

 

[ACD168]

I found it to be strange as well. I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to get the refurb. but all of a sudden he goes,w ell you are still within the 1 year warranty so what I can do it go ahead and send out a like new replacement.

they actually ended up crediting me $150 for that eris, and giving me the DInc for free and I got to keep and sell they eris so I basically made $150 and a free brand new DInc. worked out good. at first I thought I made a bad choice selling the moto droid for the eris, but hey it got me a free DInc lol.

 

[bugeyeblue]

It seems strange to me that Verizon wouldn't and DIDN'T check to see if you bought it from them. OP: Make sure you check your bill to see if they try to charge you.

As long as the phone is less than one year old (and sometimes even that doesn't matter), they will replace it under manufacturer warranty. I've had this done more than once over the last couple of years for similar reasons as the OP, buying a phone 3rd party doesn't really hurt you even if it's damaged. About 6 months ago I had bought a Blackberry Curve (8530) on Craigslist. The next day the trackpad stopped working. I called it in to customer service and had a refurb in-hand 2 days later.

The only way you can really get burned buying 3rd party is if you get a bad esn. I've purchased probably 15 phones (I'm always buying and selling a phone) on Craigslist in the last couple years, and I ALWAYS activate the phone before paying for it. 100% security that it's got a clean ESN.

 

[BetaMan]

Good deal. Glad to here VZW came through. I love my DInc and would feel lost without it. If mine bit the dust, I'd be camping out at Verizon until they replaced mine with either a referb or hopefully a new one. Mine has been perfect since I got it and remains so. I just rub it with a cloth diaper and polish it all the time (not really).

 

[dixonba]

It's been my experience that the policy is that when you transfer the phone from the purchasers account, the warranty goes bye-bye. Maybe they've changed that or maybe you got lucky.

 

[jdella681]

yea you def lucked out. any purchase from ebay or craigslist does not come with a warranty. and based on the backorder on the dinc chances are your phone is brand new. yes the phone comes from the same place as refurbished phones, but verizon allocates an x amount of new dinc's in cases customers receive a doa.

 

[tommy_ed]

It's been my experience that the policy is that when you transfer the phone from the purchasers account, the warranty goes bye-bye. Maybe they've changed that or maybe you got lucky.

correct. it should be showing up in eroes (verizons computer system) as customer provided equipment. I'm sure they just looked at the date it was added to your account, and didn't notice the coding. Hopefully tech won't notice it when they create a replacement order and no, it won't be new

 

[seVer]

shame on them for not doing their job and veryfing the purchase, and shame on ... well, I'll leave it there. You rolled the dice and won because the reps didn't do their job. you lucked out for sure.

oh, and just to confirm-- the warranty does NOT transfer between accounts/owners. Insurance can only be added to NEW purchases, not phones that are "customer provided". I don't think that rep will be around very long.

 

[Mitchrapp]

Nice that it worked out well.

 

[TXSooner]

It seems strange to me that Verizon wouldn't and DIDN'T check to see if you bought it from them. OP: Make sure you check your bill to see if they try to charge you.

I bought my Blackberry Curve off of eBay and had it replaced by Verizon 4 times, there was never a question as to where I bought it. Im glad to not have that junk anymore now though

 

[sirchadwick1]

Consider yourself lucky! Probably a 1 in 10 chance that would actually happen again.

 

[ifw]

On Friday I detected that my USB port was broken. I went to the VZW store in Sugar Land, TX. Had good service from the get go. They quickly detected it being a hardware failure, and ordered a new phone for me. The phone arrived today (Monday). I think that if I would have gone in a bit earlier on Friday, I would have had it on Saturday, as they overnighted the shipment.

Thought I mention this good service here, as we tend to complain a lot about things that do not go our way.

I was also told that within 10-14 days VZW should have caught up with the demand for the DINC and that they will actually have some in store.

 

[socarwolverine]

I gotta agree that the warranty does not transfer (which I think is kinda dumb but oh well). I bought my eris off of a poster here on AF. I had some troubles and the first store I went to saw that I hadn't gotten it through VZW and said they wouldn't replace it. The second store again saw I didn't get it from VZW but said he'd try to get a refurb and he did. Nice thing is, after you get the first refurb you won't be bothered about not buying from them anymore. I went through 3 Eris's (1 off AF, 2 refurbs) and Verizon decided to send me an Incredible as my 3rd refurb. Definitely an upgrade.