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My Experience with HTC Customer Support


Blazen

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Fair warning, this is quite a long story.

 

So it all started about a month ago when my 3-1 cable started acting up. Every once and awhile the screen on the HMD would flicker on and off for about 3 seconds. I was worried that it was the HMD that was causing these problems so I contacted customer support. Through some troubleshooting, we found the problem to be the 3-1 cable. I was relieved to find that my HMD was not failing after only 3 months of use. She spoke with the RMA team about shipping a new cable and the request was confirmed. Great, I thought. Then, this was the following question I had and response I received (Direct quotes from HTC Transcript)

 

Ana S.: Thank you, I will send you the terms and conditions and let me know if you agree.

Ana S.: File Sent - Vive Accessory Disclosure-Fulfillment.pdf

You: My only question is if the new cable is also under my current warranty, a new one, or no warranty at all?

Ana S.: Oh! It is under your current warranty.

You: Alright awesome! I agree to the terms and conditions :)

 

As you can see here, I asked about the new cable. The reply I received is that it is under my current warranty. "Wonderful," I thought. HTC got a 10/10 on that interaction.

 

Fast forward 2 weeks later.

 

Strangely enough, after installing my new replacement 3-1 cable and less than 2 weeks of some very light usage of the Vive, I begin to notice that the HMD is flickering these green lines and showing green dots all over the screen. I run a few troubleshooting options that I remembered from the previous interaction and found that the new replacement cable that I had received was causing the problem!

 

"Maybe I got a bad cable," I thought to myself. So I contacted customer support again. I was not worried because, as I stated earlier, Ana had told me that this new cable was under my current warranty still. Also, I had hardly used it and every time I did, it was under the warranty's "Normal Use Conditions." However, upon speaking to another customer support representative, I was told that the request to RMA it was denied due to this "one replacement only" policy.

 

I immediately went and studied HTC's warranty policy, and found there was nothing that stated this cable could only be replaced once. I asked if I could speak to a representative from the RMA department, but of course that was denied because they don't speak to their customers. I then asked if he showed the RMA department the transcript between Ana and I where she stated my new cable was under warranty, but he said they still denied it. Keep in mind, my new cable arrived August 1st and this conversation was August 16th, so this replacement cable only lasted about two weeks. I asked if he made that aware to the RMA department, and he said they know all the details and have denied the request.

 

So a couple days later I opened the chat again, requesting a new 3-1 cable. The gentleman I spoke to was very helpful and seemed to be the only person I've spoken to in the last 2 weeks that genuinely cared about customer satisfaction. He brought up the option of sending the request to a higher up team, which I agreed to. He said he would email me back with the answer from them an hour from then. We closed the chat and I patiently waited for the reply. Once it came in, he said it was denied - once again. I - once again - asked if he showed them the details such as the promise that my new cable was under warranty, that it was only two weeks, and that nowhere in the warranty did it state anything about a 1 time replacement. In the end, it was, once again, unresolved.

 

Open chat #4. This one was pretty brief. I simply asked to get a call from the team higher up so that I could speak to them myself on the matter. They said they would call within the next 1-2 business days, but called me while I was at work so it took about 5 days and multiple requests for me to finally get in contact with someone higher up.

 

Of course, once I got in contact on the phone with a representative of HTC, they told me the same exact thing. "One time replacement only" that is nowhere to be found on the warranty. I spoke to him saying that HTC's customer support representative specifically told me that my new cable would be under my current warranty. I said that I understand if people make mistakes, but cannot believe HTC won't take responsibility for these mistakes, but instead screw their customers over because of a hidden "one time replacement" policy. So again, this got nowhere.

 

But I did not falter here. I opened another customer support chat and, to my surprise, received the original person I spoke to who told me the new cable is under my current warranty. Of course, she denied saying this until I sent her the transcript of our first conversation. Then, she attempted once more to get it RMA'd, saying she'd see if they could make an "exception". However, I'm sure you can guess what happened next. This third request was also denied.

 

 This has been my two week struggle with HTC's customer support. They do not allow us to get in contact with their RMA department and have very shady hidden replacement policies that are not shown on their warranty. I plan on spreading this news to the reviews of many sites that sell HTC products to ensure that other people should think twice before buying a Vive. 

 

So now I have these two base stations set up in my college dorm with the Vive tucked away in a box underneath my desk. I was really looking forward to having Virtual Reality set up in my dorms, but it appears I made the fatal wrong choice 3 months ago when deciding between HTC and Oculus.

 

tl;dr: The Vive's warranty doesn't mean anything to HTC, refused to replace 3-1 cable after 2 weeks of normal use conditions despite customer support saying they would.

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That's all too common apparently.

I owned a Vive for two days before it broke, and after sending it in for repairs I am now asked to pay 300 € because they found "oxide marks", sign of liquid damage. It's obviously bs since I no one from customer care is responding to me, and they don't seem to mind the fact that I still didn't pay the service fee (50€).

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That's absurd. I cannot believe a company that charges such high prices for their products would have such terrible support. The original warranty did in fact cover sweat damages, but was recently changed. Why? Because they don't care about the customers, only the money! If your HTC Vive is under warranty and is used under the "Normal Use Conditions" as stated in their warranty, irregardless of how it broke, it should be repaired as it is under the warranty. What does warranty mean to HTC? To them it seems to mean "optional repair." They'll do it if they feel like it, and if it costs them more than a dime, they won't do it. Terrible support, I've already posted this forum onto a few places that sell the Vive and plan to cover all of them (amazon, walmart, ebay, ect.) This is straight up robbery. If the Vive is under 2 year warranty, it should function for 2 years no matter what if it has been used under normal use conditions. The funniest part is half of their warranty (not exaggerating, literally half) talks about how "you can't sue us." Like jeez, Once they have your money you're garbage to them as a customer. At least, that's my (and most of the forums I've read about customer support's) opinion.

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Why do you have to PM me just to tell me to contact you at [removed]? Why not make this email public to everyone so that other people's issues can also be addressed equally? There's a ton of people out there who deserve some support as well.. 

 

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 wrote:

Why do you have to PM me just to tell me to contact you at
[removed]
? Why not make this email public to everyone so that other people's issues can also be addressed equally? There's a ton of people out there who deserve some support as well.. 

 

Because having the address public would make it susceptible to web crawlers, which would lead to bots and spam, which would slow down and inhibit our ability to maintain contact with customers.

 

Anyone is free to PM representatives like  for assistance, and we're very open about that.

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I'd also like to point out that while this is a pretty negative post, I intend it to act as constructive criticism. Constructive in a sense that if people are made aware of the problems I am facing with HTC, then HTC will have to restrategize their customer support/warranty policies due to loss of sales from potential buyers who were informed of these practices; even if that means taking this forum to each and every site that sells the Vive.

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