Broken TomTom :-(

paramonkey

Hi All.

This post is not strictly about money saving, but hopefully it will mean I dont have to shell out for a new Tom Tom which will save me around £450.

A couple of days ago whilst driving, I went round a corner and my Tom Tom 500 unit decided to come unstuck from the windscreen slid across the dashboard and fell down into the passenger footwell. Obviosuly with driving I was unable to stop it from falling, but i glanced down at it and saw that it was still on as i could see the illumiation from the screen.

When I pulled over when it was safe to do so, I picked the tom tom up and it had turned itself off. I have not been able to turn it on since. I have been able to what looks like charge it as the green charging light illumiates.

The unit is still under the 1 year manufacturer warranty as I only bought it in July...so I am very keen to get it repaired (or replaced under warranty). This is where I have become unstuck... I have gone to the tom tom website and it says that I need to contact customer services, but I cannot find a way of doing that and I have searched the website from top to bottom. All i can seem to find which is relevant is a complaints postal address.

Now I feel that this should be reparied under warranty, as its still in its warranty, and its not down to normal wear and tear and it should not have come loose from the winscreen. It lasted from Sheffield to junction 26 of the M1...so they cannot say that I did not secure it properly to the windscreen.

I also have accidental breakage cover through my house insurance and wondering if I have no joy with Tom Tom if I could claim it as accidental damage through them. The only problem with either the warranty route of the insurace route is proving what happened.

Can anyone offer any help or advice on this.

you can email me direct if you prefer on however I am sure that I am not the only person to have or are suffering this issue. michael(decimal)d(decimal)fuller(at)gmail(decimal)com

Regards

Michael.

buglawton

Track down their Customer Services dept and send it straight back under Warranty. If TomTom bill you, put a claim into your Insurance. This is of interest ot me as I also use a TomTom sucker. Obviously one needs to keep the windscreen clean where you stick it, and don't let dirt get inbetween.

buglawton

PS before you do all that:
Try consulting the User Guide on the RESET procedure - I believe there is a little hole you put a ballpoint into. If that fails, remove the memory card & reinsert it (but you are not supposed to do this while unit is ON).

bestyman

Hi,
Tom toms are great, the customer service is terrible. There is a phone number for them but difficult to find, most returns are done by email.
Have you tried taking it back to the shop? don`t forget to mention that you dropped it ;o)

The pocketgps tomtom foum is full of really helpfull people whom Im sure have tomtoms number ( seen it there before)

Im sure this will help

http://www.pocketgps.co.uk/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewforum&f=93&sid=f1f5d8f96f7a6afa7d5286de66059dba

EDIT found this for you , pasted below

I've found TomToms customer support terrible, I've been waiting for a refund for 11 days and they don't seem to read the support mails you send them as their answers rarely have any relevance.

The contact details are hidden away here -
http://www.tomtom.com/support/index.php?Language=1&query=cpntact+us+phone&FID=368

---

Their contact phone number is 0845 1610009.

The fax number is 003120 8501097. It's a Holland No.

If you the phone, they open at 9 a.m. Mon-Fri. Get in early and be patient.

The fax number seems to be getting more popular. Include your email address as they prefer to reply this way.
_________________

paramonkey

thanks to all those who have replied...however tom tom is now back from the dead. Don't as me why, it just started working again and has been fine for about a week now. So touch wood it will be fine.

The only explanation I can come up with is that the battery was flat, as i trie to turn it on again one day and the screen briefly flashed. I then plugged it into the wall left it to charge for a few mins and then tried turning it on again...and sucess it worked.

If the battery was flat from the start as when i got home after it fell off the window, i had it plugged in whilst i was trying to get it to work and the little green light which indicates its charging was always on.

Thanks again...hopefully everything will work fine and i will never have anymore problems with it.

Michael.