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Best Buy Horror Story

J

jpellizzi

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 8, 2010
21
0
Zagg Front Protector Installation.

Just an FYI, you'd probably be better off trying your luck with wet installs yourself. I figured hey, $7.99, whatever I don't trust myself.

Two hours later I regret I ever walked into the store.

So the guy was just doing a front skin for me, not even full coverage. He says 15 minutes.

45 mins later I figure there's a problem or he has no idea what he's doing.

I finally get the phone back and it looks like hell. Air bubbles everywhere, marks under the skin, and it's not even aligned. Totally crooked.

The guy I gave my phone to wouldn't even leave the back, some other guy handed it to me. I also noticed he didn't even punch out the hole for the speaker or home button. There's a large drop of water hovering over the ear-speaker, and I'm freaking out. I demanded a refund, and at this point I'm sure my phone got wet.

So he takes off the whole thing and gives me my refund. I make a test call and lo and behold, my ear speaker is screwed. I can barely hear the person on the other end with the volume all the way up, and its crackly and distorted. So I started complaining to the guy. He keeps saying 'Don't worry it'll dry etc.'

So after a few minutes of arguing with him and a manager, they're closing so I have to leave. They said come back tomorrow if its still not working.

So I just got home and the speaker seems to be working again, loudly enough, although I can't tell if its any different than it was. The two liquid sensors on headphone/USB are still white (thank god).

I'm not really sure what else I can do, if anything. What should I do? If everything's working and the liquid sensors weren't tripped, is it worth taking up a fight? All I could probably hope for would be a new phone, but I didn't even get mine from Best Buy.

What would you guys do at this point. I hate just letting things go.
 
What are you talking about?
What did Best Buy do with water on the front of your phone?

All I can say is don't let Best Buy do anything you would not do yourself.
 
jessica. said:
What are you talking about?
What did Best Buy do with water on the front of your phone?

All I can say is don't let Best Buy do anything you would not do yourself.
Click to expand...

He's probably talking about the ZAGG invisible shield installation available at best buy.

To the OP, sorry to hear that. I've heard that there are two additional sensors inside the phone, so hopefully those aren't tripped. No way to really know now. You can head back to best buy tomorrow, but they'll probably give you a schpeel about how they're not responsible for damages while installation. There's usually always fine print like that.
 
If theres no damage just take it as a lesson learned, don't ever leave anything electronic with Best Buy, I know some 10 year olds that know more about technology than some of the morons that work there.

This is why youll commonly see people on this forum refer to Best Buy as "Worst Buy"
 
They offer the service of putting on screen protectors for you. You need to use water to get some of them to stick to the phone.
 
I wouldn't trust Best Buy with anything. One of my friends took his in for a Zagg install and saw the employees handing round and messing with apps on an iPhone 4. When he asked them if it was his that they were messing around with, they said yes sheepishly and told him that they were just checking to make sure the camera worked ok. He kicked off and got the manager who gave him a $50 gift card by way of apology. No one's touching mine when I finally get it.

Don't let it drop. If the store manager won't do anything for you (like a gift card) even if it turns out to be ok, then email corporate.
 
I think your only concern is the phone might have water damage is the furture, why don't you complain it to higher up so you can document what happen, and if something happen in the furture, you get proof.
 
jessica. said:
What are you talking about?
What did Best Buy do with water on the front of your phone?

All I can say is don't let Best Buy do anything you would not do yourself.
Click to expand...

Did you even read his post?



If this had happened to me, I would demand a new phone from Best Buy. You have no idea where that water went and what long term effect it could have on the phone. If it was a little wet and everything worked fine, then maybe you could just let it go, but the fact that you KNOW water got in there because the phone wasn't performing right is unacceptable.


Personally I would take it to Best Buy corporate customer service and have them arrange something in store for you. That was a PATHETIC install on his part and they should be held accountable for doing damage to your phone.

I'm annoyed just thinking about this.
 
Ferris23 said:
Did you even read his post?
Click to expand...
Open mouth, insert foot Ferris. Did you notice the edit time vs my post? I'm not much of a tool to quote the entire post just above mine but before you chimed in the OP did not bother to mention what he was on about. :rolleyes:

FWIW: 8:41 pm occurs before 8:45 pm.
Screen shot 2010-07-11 at 8.55.32 PM.jpg
 
You shoulda hung around the parking lot and kicked his ass as he was going to his car.

Just kidding :D - hope it works out and your iPhone doesn't suffer any long-term damage. I agree with those that say to complain up the chain, regardless of the fact that Best Buy hires morons, it shouldn't mean they should be able to damage your phones during installation, there should be a reasonable degree of proficiency if they're going to offer a service.
 
i'm a Best Buy employee and i wouldn't trust anyone else to install my shield.

but being an employee, if they screwed up the install i'd get another with no problem.
 
reliantj said:
i'm a Best Buy employee and i wouldn't trust anyone else to install my shield.

but being an employee, if they screwed up the install i'd get another with no problem.
Click to expand...

You'd get another iPhone if someone put too much water and damaged the phone? BB will do that for you?
 
if you cant do it yourself, dont do it at all. i would of never trusted BB to touch any single thing i own. another reason why i never went to them to install my car stereo system, computer help, TV instillation, ect.
 
I had the CEO of Invisible Shield install it on my iPod and naturally the install went perfectly.

But I will say this -- I think it's nuts to wet the phone to put that shield on. They say it doesn't wreck the phone but I think it is too risky. It really doesn't add much protection and on top of that you are left with that revolting orange peel effect -- what a way to destroy the retina display.

These things are a total ripoff, imho.
 
I totally understand that there are exceptions to the rule, but I will say this:

As a Best Buy Mobile employee, I have done nearly 450 zagg installs (yup, I keep a rough count), and I have NEVER once had it ruin a phone from water damage or anything related. If there were ever damage to a phone (again, this has never happened to me, or anyone I work with, but I also understand that it is a possibility), then the phone would need replacing no question.

I have also done many many installs on my own devices without any issue whatsoever. I definitely encourage you to complain as much as is effective if that is the plan, but I also believe that there is a small chance anything is permanently wrong (again, not definitively) with your phone.


P.s. A poor install is totally not cool. If something went wrong, then they need to own up to it. I NEVER let anyone install on anyones phone if they aren't 100% comfortable doing it. And I would NEVER let a novice install on a phone that is not only new, but impossible to find. I am sorry that all of this bad fortune was tossed your way :( I hope you get some resolution.


(This is all MY opinion, and not the opinion or stance of Best Buy regarding any issue).
 
fender57 said:
You'd get another iPhone if someone put too much water and damaged the phone? BB will do that for you?
Click to expand...

no silly ass. who the hell would put that much solution? it's only on the front and back anyhow. they're not that stupid, i hope. although one of the bb mobile employees kept insisting her iphone had 2 speakers -_-. she's one of the exceptions haha.

anyways, that's why i do the installs myself.
 
Thanks for the comments guys... I think I'm going to try and find some Best Buy/Geek Squad corporate number tomorrow. The store manager was no help whatsoever and I'm not sure who to turn to next. The speaker still crackles a little bit and I can't be sure if it was always like that, or if its a result of the water hitting it. I am 100% positive that the water got onto the speaker, which is no good either way, even if it dries. My crackling/low volume test call at the store, in front of 2 employees, should be enough to verify this.

If anyone knows a corporate number, or where I could look, it'd be awesome. I'm going to start looking now.
 
I had BB install my Zagg on my 3GS and it was the longest 30 mins of my life, the guys was nice but clearly did not know what he was doing. So i tried it at home which was was worse. So this time with the IP4 I went to the kiosk in the mall that sells the Zagg and had them install the one I ordered online 50% off code from here. They charged me an extra $5 but it was worth it. It look them 3 min tops and it still looks great after almost a month.
 
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