Heart rate sensor gradually dying (Series 5)

[navaira]

Hi all,

as per topic title – my HR sensor has been slowly giving up the ghost.

In the beginning it would start dropping the readings during workouts. I blamed my own sweat, although it was strange that in the first year it had no problems. Later on I noticed it happen more often, then take up to 5 minutes to pick up the HR in the beginning of a workout. A (weird) workaround I found online was to start the Heart app, wait for it to take a reading, THEN begin the workout, which is… not great. But once it finally got to the point where AutoSleep couldn't give me results due to "not enough measurements" I sent it for repair – not directly to Apple, but to a reseller.

It turns out that Apple demand the reseller to reproduce the issue before replacing the watch. They can't reproduce the issue, while comparing with another watch, because it happens *during movement*. Unless they invent a comparison device that works out for half an hour and then checks how it went, the reseller can't replace the watch. They suggested I go directly to Apple.

I seem to recall people having problems with this as well, and reading those were software-related problems. Obviously, since I sent it for repair twice, I unpaired/re-paired the watch twice as well, so that's not it. I've been keeping it clean – the only way to avoid losing the heart rate readings, though, seems to be cleaning both the bottom of the watch *and the skin on my wrist* before workout. Hasn't this issue been around for years, though? Has there been any sort of repair program (I think not) from Apple? I searched the forum, but haven't found a solution…

Thanks in advance for any replies.

 

[Monkswhiskers]

When the weather turns a bit colder I get cadence lock, really annoying and can last 20-30mins into my run. I use online readiness diagnostics using HR so I ended up buying a wahoo tickr. It's one more thing to faff around with though and certainly no use for sleep.
Maybe keep a log of incidents, build a case and send to apple support. If you're out of warranty they will probably just shrug their shoulders though.

 

[navaira]

When the weather turns a bit colder I get cadence lock, really annoying and can last 20-30mins into my run. I use online readiness diagnostics using HR so I ended up buying a wahoo tickr. It's one more thing to faff around with though and certainly no use for sleep.
Maybe keep a log of incidents, build a case and send to apple support. If you're out of warranty they will probably just shrug their shoulders though.

My warranty expires on February 20. Looks like I actually have to hope the sensor breaks before then :/ I'll keep a log, though, good (sad) idea.

 

[ApfelKuchen]

I do suggest directly contacting Apple (phone/chat support rather than retail store). At least in North America (and perhaps elsewhere) they have a specialist group that deals in this sort of thing (Watch health-related measurements, etc.).

 

[navaira]

I'm in the twilight zone.

Apple support reminded me that their warranty is one year (which is illegal in the EU, but a lot of Apple operations are not entirely in line with the EU law and I'm hardly going to sue them) and queried me about which reseller store I used. It's a nationwide chain with 35+ stores and I bought the watch online. I repeatedly explained how post works and the Apple customer service lady was like, I see your point, so which store was it? Finally we settled on a non-solution: I am supposed to go to a store that is an AASP and "explain" to them even more what the problem with the Watch is, so that they can tell it to Apple, who will then refuse to replace or repair it.

I have a malfunctioning Watch that won't even get repaired at all because if Apple accepted it for repair, they would be admitting it needed repair, which would mean that they were after all obliged to do it under the reseller's warranty.

I sent an email to tcook@apple.com explaining the situation and asking for the best way to break the heart rate sensor within 11 weeks, but to my great surprise I haven't received a reply. 8-o

 

[navaira]

I've had a phone call with a service specialist, who confirmed there is probably a hardware defect. This would be covered by the reseller's warranty, EXCEPT Apple will not confirm that to the reseller, and so I have just written the following sentence:

"Therefore if I pay for the service, then the problem was obviously there, and then I shouldn’t have paid for the service, because the problem would have been covered by the reseller’s warranty, which it isn’t, because Apple must agree that there is a problem before the reseller can proceed to replacing or repairing the Watch."