My PlayBook Story/Frustration

Around late August last year I got my playbook, bought it brand new off Amazon UK, for 500 pounds (yeah, they hadn't cut the price by then, though that isn't the problem), so I get it and LOVE it, had the 8520 so I gladly upgrade to 9300 for the 3G, works fine till doom strikes, Jan 2012, the camera dies, just out of the blue! So i call RIM on their "Toll free number", (not toll free), but after a few hours, been advised to send it, then my 90 day complimentary support is activated.

Turns out because am in a country where the PlayBook wasn't launched, Uganda, I don't qualify for a direct RMA, have to go through the person (Organization), Smart-Deals to be exact, I bought it from. So i contact them via email and they are responsive till they stop replying my mail, haven't head from them since then.

So I have had no camera on my PlayBook since then, something I can live with! Then a few weeks back, the backlight starts flickering, and I lose ability to adjust the brightness, goes dim when it feels like, shortly afterwards, start losing color contrast. The contrast problem is over come by putting the device in standby then waking it up. Like this for about a week, then the screen starts going grey, pressing the power button to put it on standby and wake it up. Was starting to get unbearable, till it went grey for good, nothing works now, reinstalled the software, screen came up for an hour then grey again, and now can take days without coming on and when am bored, try it and it works for a bit then grey again.

I can't live like this people!!
:(

Have u tried to reset and update?


Since u can't send it to be fixed, u can try to fix the software by urself...

Sent from a beautiful but old BB 8520 or a new and shinny PB 2.0

Yeah I have, and it was a bit of a struggle with the screen going on and off. Its hardware, but never dropped it.

Isn't there any store that works with this kind of hardware?

Maybe its cheap...

U can try to search in Youtube for that troubleshoot, or, but i guess u already did that, search in this forum for the answer - Maybe u finda neighboor who knows about this subject...

Sorry, but i don't know best :(

Good Luck

Pedro

Sent from a beautiful but old BB 8520 or a new and shinny PB 2.0

This is one of those examples of "global" corporations that really are not. The fact that anyone can purchase their global product means that those purchasers should be covered by the same warranty as any other purchaser for repair even if the purchaser may have to pay some shipping costs.

By what was said, there's not RIM in Uganda...

I can relate to that since in the "Store"(not App World) there's no "Portugal"...

(But, we have BIS/BES and support in Portugal, so we are not that all forgotten ^^)

Pedro

Sent from a beautiful but old BB 8520 or a new and shinny PB 2.0

SO, if I were a businessman traveling to a foreign country, and my Blackberry phone or Playbook went belly up and I needed to return it for repair before I made it back to my home country, RIM would refuse to help me if I'm in a country that the product wasn't sold? I couldn't even pay for the shipping myself to the get the issue solved? That's bulls#!t.

RIM thinks they are going to win over the Enterprise market with THIS kind of support? NO THANKS. :mad:

Makes me p!ss3d off FOR you, man. That's pretty crummy, and not the service you would get from any other "global" vendor.

That is terrible. No warranty support in certain countries. How about Amazon.uk? Can't they put some pressure on "Smart-deals"?:confused:

Originally Posted by look_alive

SO, if I were a businessman traveling to a foreign country, and my Blackberry phone or Playbook went belly up and I needed to return it for repair before I made it back to my home country, RIM would refuse to help me if I'm in a country that the product wasn't sold? I couldn't even pay for the shipping myself to the get the issue solved? That's bulls#!t.

RIM thinks they are going to win over the Enterprise market with THIS kind of support? NO THANKS. :mad:

Makes me p!ss3d off FOR you, man. That's pretty crummy, and not the service you would get from any other "global" vendor.

I don't know about that aspect. But change the scenario a bit. You are a world traveler, you laptop dies and you're in NYC or Paris or (rim market) and you find the pb and it looks great so you purchase it. Now you're home and it dies - no warranty???!!!! Why not - it was purchased legally. It is sold by a company that claims its an international company. This is not solely a Rim issue. It is corporations playing global when it suits their needs but back off whenever they can.

Originally Posted by look_alive

SO, if I were a businessman traveling to a foreign country, and my Blackberry phone or Playbook went belly up and I needed to return it for repair before I made it back to my home country, RIM would refuse to help me if I'm in a country that the product wasn't sold? I couldn't even pay for the shipping myself to the get the issue solved? That's bulls#!t.

RIM thinks they are going to win over the Enterprise market with THIS kind of support? NO THANKS. :mad:

Makes me p!ss3d off FOR you, man. That's pretty crummy, and not the service you would get from any other "global" vendor.

Could you please provide supporting links for that claim you made?

I called in RIM customer care again yesterday and I was that if I shipped it to a country that had services it would be looked at! But hit a few snags on this, apparently lithium ion and lithium polyer batteries cannot be shipped!

Am slowly giving up hope!

Originally Posted by ugbadboy

I called in RIM customer care again yesterday and I was that if I shipped it to a country that had services it would be looked at! But hit a few snags on this, apparently lithium ion and lithium polyer batteries cannot be shipped!

Am slowly giving up hope!

Hmm. That is interesting. I wonder if they are handled specially by Fedex since that's the shipper Rim uses in the US. There was some "Declaration" sheet included in the rma box that needed to be placed back in the box shipped to rim but I don't recall details. I do know that lithium batteries can be a shipping issue, at least, at one time they were.

Originally Posted by ugbadboy

... apparently lithium ion and lithium polyer batteries cannot be shipped! ...

The US Postal Service recently stopped shipping these batteries and any appliances containing them. The halt applies only to internaitonal shipping, and the explanation was that the Postal Service had decided to respect some kind of international standard. The announcement hinted that things could change again next year.

But I think that the private shippers (Fedex, UPS, ...) are still shipping them, but they are much more expensive than normal mail shipments.

Originally Posted by look_alive

SO, if I were a businessman traveling to a foreign country, and my Blackberry phone or Playbook went belly up and I needed to return it for repair before I made it back to my home country, RIM would refuse to help me if I'm in a country that the product wasn't sold? I couldn't even pay for the shipping myself to the get the issue solved? That's bulls#!t.

RIM thinks they are going to win over the Enterprise market with THIS kind of support? NO THANKS. :mad:

Makes me p!ss3d off FOR you, man. That's pretty crummy, and not the service you would get from any other "global" vendor.

You may be getting a few things confused. Rim does its service through its service providers and in the case of enterprise, the Enterprise usually deals with it.

In the scenario of needing service in a foreign country, you would have to call your original supplier and arrange to ship it there for repair. Since repair is not overnight, usually a week or so, it is probably a moot point, unless you are in the foreign country for an extended period.

In the case of Enterprise and a company owned phone, you would call your IT department and have them overnight you a new phone from their stock of spares.

So, have you figured this one out?

Sent from a beautiful but old BB 8520 or a new and shinny PB 2.0

Try contacting FedEx or DHL to ship the faulty tablet to a service centre. Just be sure to buy the insurance covering loss or damage while in transit. There is no excuse for the lack of a battery compartment door on the back of the BlackBerry PlayBook since it would rarely be used and thus not likely to loosen over time.