Virgin Media Blackberry USB Dispute

MacBudman

I have a 24 month contract phone with VM, which ends in November of this year.
My problem began when the USB charging port on the device became loose and a few weeks later eventually fell out of the phone.

Sent the phone to VM last week for repair and was informed that they do not have a record of this type of problem as being a common fault with the Blackberry, therefore it was physical damage and the repair would be chargeable.
I argued that from what I have read about this peoblem is due to the design of the USB port being held in place with solder joints, making it vulnerable to breaking with the pressure of inserting the charge cable on a daily basis.
VM would not consider this as being a common fault so I eventually requested that the phone was returned to me un-repaired.

I received the phone today to discover that the back cover was missing as well as the battery, charger and USB port, which were all sent to them as requested.
Contacted VM who informed that they will send me the missing parts but unfortunately were unable to send the USB port as they have already threw it out and claiming that it was damaged.
I don’t see how they were able to make that decision on my behalf as they did not carry out the repair and the USB port appeared to be fine on inspection before sending it for repair.

VM informed they are unable to send a replacement USB port for the one that they threw out and have offered a £2 discount which they have advised will be the cost of a replacement USB port from e Bay !

Now I have to wait for the rest of my phone to be sent back as well as to source a replacement USB port, before I can get the phone fixed :mad:

Paying a contract for what ?

Any advice (if anything) would be welcome

grumbler

MacBudman wrote: »

VM informed they are unable to send a replacement USB port for the one that they threw out and have offered a £2 discount which they have advised will be the cost of a replacement USB port from e Bay !

Now I have to wait for the rest of my phone to be sent back as well as to source a replacement USB port, before I can get the phone fixed :mad:

I think it will be very difficult to repair as there will be no anything on the motherboard to solder the port to. Normally micro USB ports are surface mounted and fall out together with the copper tracks that they were soldered to.

Paying a contract for what ?

You have no choice unless you don't care about your credit history.

Any advice (if anything) would be welcome

IMHO, the only way is to sue VM.
SOGA/SOGSA, not fit for purpose etc.
However, for18 months old phone the outcome is pretty unpredictable.
The most recent similar thread: carphone warehouse & broken mobile

Some older threads:
Orange - faulty phone, what are my rights?
HELP Contract phone - refusal to repair?!

gjchester

MacBudman wrote: »

My problem began when the USB charging port on the device became loose and a few weeks later eventually fell out of the phone.

The problem is that this type of damage is in almost most cases caused by the owner pushing the cable in too hard or pulling out out quickly. I'm not saying this my be the case here, but it means in most cases it's user damaged. It only needs one hard pull to start a joint to break, maybe your running late for work, or forgot to unplug it when you picked it up, or the joint got yanked at an angle,

Many devices use solder joint and the occasional peg or a glue joint as a strain relief stop as a method of holding in the connector, why is this phone any different? Grumblers right, it's an almost impossible repair, it won;t have bene the solder the tracks will have lifted, you'd be looking at the circuit board the part sat on being replaced, and in a small device like the phone thats probably all the main board.

The problem would be unless there are records of this as a common problem then you'd have a hard time saying it's a design flaw, if it's a design flaw all phones of this model would be failing, sure some may fail this way, but that the case for all devices, if it's not a high fail rate it's not likely to be considered a design flaw.

Sorry it;'s not a better answer, but at 18 months the onus is on you to prove it is a design flaw, you could get a specialist report on the state of the device but at this point it would be almost impossible for you to say with 100% certainty that it's not been broken due to excessive force by you.

Good Luck

grumbler

gjchester wrote: »

The problem is that this type of damage is in almost most cases caused by the owner ... pulling out out quickly.... It only needs one hard pull to start a joint to break,

Anyone knowing physics a little will tell you that this theory that you keep telling again and again cannot be true. Any force in this case doesn't depend on how fast you pull the cable out.
Re "pushing the cable in too hard", the port has to be supported by the chassis. If it is not and the port can be broken without braking the chassis, then it is a flawed design = not fit for purpose.
Re "yanked at an angle" - yes, this is a likely scenario, but again, I'd expect the port to get broken only together with the chassis if the handset is designed correctly.

Many devices use solder joint and the occasional peg or a glue joint as a strain relief stop as a method of holding in the connector, why is this phone any different?

Surface mounting is fine for internal components, but can't be used recklessly for everything. If a component is subjected to external forces, extra measures must be taken to support it.

prowla

I agree - if normal use requires you to plug in the USB at least daily and possibly several times a day if syncing, etc., then the component has to be designed and manufactured to withstand that.

Not saying that that is what a BB has (because they are professional business grade units), but a couple of tiny blobs of solder is self-evidently not sufficient for that.

chanz4

The bb power connection is very small and thin, bet the op has pushed it in too hard

Guys_Dad

Absence of similar problems on the net would seem to make your case much more difficult to prove.

Of course, it may not be a design fault but it could be a manufacturing one.

The point is it looks to me like it is an uneconomic if not impossible repair - going by the previous posts in this thread.

As you are aware, the onus after 6 months is on the customer to prove that the manufacturer/vendor is at fault and I am not sure how you would do that.

On the face of it, you appear to be fighting a lost cause, unfortunately.

gjchester

grumbler wrote: »

Anyone knowing physics a little will tell you that this theory that you keep telling again and again cannot be true. Any force in this case doesn't depend on how fast you pull the cable out.
Re "pushing the cable in too hard", the port has to be supported by the chassis. If it is not and the port can be broken without braking the chassis, then it is a flawed design = not fit for purpose.
Re "yanked at an angle" - yes, this is a likely scenario, but again, I'd expect the port to get broken only together with the chassis if the handset is designed correctly.
Surface mounting is fine for internal components, but can't be used recklessly for everything. If a component is subjected to external forces, extra measures must be taken to support it.

You right but like all devices it's designed to a cost, it's designed jsut enough to be OK not built to last much longer than two years as that the typical life.

Your also right that in a perfect world it would not matter how hard a cable is pulled out, unfortunalty general pocket fluff get in to the connectors and cause friction and poor connections which tend to lead to the user forcing the plug in or pulling harder to get it out. Once the tracks start to life of the circuit board even normal forces on insertion and removal will make it worse.

I've fixed enough computers where the root cause is dust / fluff/ cat/dog hair to know that people do not generally take care of electroncs, but yet it's always the maker at fault, never the fact they've rammed a connector in and out because there was a poor connection caused by fluff.

MacBudman

Guys_Dad wrote: »

Absence of similar problems on the net would seem to make your case much more difficult to prove.

I would agree that there is a lack of users experiencing the same problem, however there does appear to be a large amount of replacement USB ports getting sold for this particular phone ?

I can only comment from my experience as a user of this model and do respect all feed back and views on this but just feel that any connection that requires some degree of force on a daily basis, should be supported within the frame to protect the solder joints from breaking.

Design flaw or guaranteed repair costs ?

diamonds

sale of goods act says electronic & electric items should last 6approx years, no where else in the world has that & phones are built to last a third of that...

gjchester

MacBudman wrote: »

I can only comment from my experience as a user of this model and do respect all feed back and views on this but just feel that any connection that requires some degree of force on a daily basis, should be supported within the frame to protect the solder joints from breaking.

Let me give another example.

When your TV doesn't change channel when you use the remote what is likely to be wrong? Obvious really, most of the time it's the remotes batteries.

However what do we tend to do, go find fresh batteries, maybe, or do we (as most people do) just press the remote harder to make it work?

The connector is probably about built about right, the problem is humans tend not to think rationally when something doesnt work and press/pull/hit harder to make it work, when most of the time that action won't make any different to the fault, just possibly create new ones.