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http://video.sina.com.cn/p/tech/t/v/2013-10-23/093063053891.html
Frequent "font library gate" issues with Samsung phones; after-sales service troubles consumers.
Samsung Note and S series phones have design defects, resulting in high repair costs and difficulties in rights protection for users. An investigation by "Economic Half Hour" revealed that Samsung's "sudden death" problem has already spread globally, but after-sales services vary by region. In the UK: free repairs or replacement within warranty; in Hong Kong: completely free repairs. However, in mainland China, consumers face repair costs of over a thousand yuan for the same issue, which is suspected to infringe on consumers' fair trading rights...
In the investigation by CCTV Finance's "Economic Half Hour", many users of Samsung Note and S series phones were seen enduring troubles brought about by the font library gate issue. Consumers spend thousands of yuan to purchase genuine Samsung phones through official channels, only for the phones to inexplicably crash frequently after just a few months of use. But our investigation found that these troubles are not the main concern. The real trouble begins when consumers take their phones to Samsung repair points for maintenance.
In late October 2012, Ms. Liu from Beijing bought a GALAXY S3 phone at the Samsung counter in Beijing Book Building. As it was a new model and a genuine product, she paid 5480 yuan for the phone.
Reporter from "Economic Half Hour": This price is indeed not cheap.
Ms. Liu: Yes, it wasn't cheap. I thought this phone had good performance. Compared to girls using the Note, it was too big, so I thought this size and performance would be better, so I bought this phone.
Ms. Liu said that spending so much money was supposed to bring peace of mind, but unexpectedly, in September this year, her genuine Samsung phone, used for less than a year, suddenly crashed and could not restart.
Ms. Liu: At around 1 PM, I was still making calls with my Samsung phone, but when I picked it up again at around 3 PM, it was black-screened. All my contact list, important text messages, and photos were gone.
Ms. Liu believed that her phone was still within the one-year warranty period, and as a major international company like Samsung, they should provide free warranty services. Thus, she looked up a nearby authorized Samsung repair point near Beijing Book Building on the Samsung website and took her phone there for testing.
Ms. Liu: After about 20 minutes of testing, they said the font library glue had come off. I asked what that meant, and they said it was due to heavy external force impact, causing it to loosen and become unusable. Then I said first, there was no such external force. Second, if the glue came off, it could simply be glued back together, why did I need to replace the font library? They said this kind of fault must involve replacing the font library.
The staff told Ms. Liu that the font library is a chip on the motherboard of the Samsung S3 phone. Due to improper use by Ms. Liu, the font library glue came off, so the cost of replacing the font library should be entirely borne by her, with a quoted price of 760 yuan.
Ms. Liu: Then he asked if I wanted to repair it or not. I said no, it's too expensive. It's enough to buy a new phone. He said then he would give me a discount, how much can you discount? He said 550 yuan.
The quote from Samsung's staff quickly dropped from 760 yuan to 550 yuan.
Ms. Liu: At that moment, I felt quite awkward because it's not like a vegetable market. I said no, 550 yuan is still too expensive, I won't repair it. Then he said 500 yuan, it can't go any lower, this is the lowest price we can offer.
An official repair point of Samsung actually allowed haggling, which made Ms. Liu very confused. What puzzled her even more was that since this phone was quite expensive, she always used it carefully, never dropping or bumping it. There was absolutely no situation of "heavy external force impact" mentioned by the Samsung repair point staff. Was the font library chip damaged due to glue coming off or was it defective from the start? Ms. Liu decided to complain to Samsung customer service about this situation. After going through some twists and turns, Samsung customer service gave a reply.
Ms. Liu: He said he would return the test data and pictures to the manufacturer, who would confirm the exact problem, whether the font library glue coming off was really the problem, and the manufacturer would give a repair opinion.
Then, after coordination by customer service, could Ms. Liu's phone warranty issue be resolved smoothly? That day, the reporter followed Ms. Liu back to the Samsung repair point she visited last time.
Ms. Liu: Last time, they quoted 760 yuan and said it was not under warranty.
Repair personnel: What was the reason?
Ms. Liu: Font library. Why isn't this covered by warranty? My phone hasn't exceeded the warranty period yet.
Repair personnel: There must be an issue inside, but I'm not quite sure. Anyway, the system I checked showed 760 yuan. Because the engineer who showed you last time is not here today, and after such a long time, he might not remember exactly why it wasn't covered by warranty.
This time, the receptionist arranged for another repair engineer to meet Ms. Liu.
Repair engineer: It's definitely not just a font library issue, there are other reasons inside.
Ms. Liu: How long will the inspection take approximately?
Repair engineer: Now it's about half an hour, maybe forty minutes or so.
About forty minutes later, this repair engineer finally came out holding Ms. Liu's phone, but the test result was completely different from the previous one.
Repair engineer: I estimate that something entered your device here, look, it's like this now, once something enters, it becomes like this.
Ms. Liu: How could anything enter?
Repair engineer: It's estimated that the tail plug being immersed caused the font library to break, possibly due to liquid ingress in the tail plug.
Ms. Liu: Tail plug immersed?
Repair engineer: And during charging, it doesn't dry, causing a short circuit, leading to this.
For the same Samsung phone, at the same official repair point, one test result said external force impact caused the font library glue to come off, while another test said liquid ingress in the tail plug caused a short circuit damaging the font library. This made Ms. Liu and the reporter from "Economic Half Hour" very perplexed. Which test result was more reliable? When Ms. Liu raised doubts, this repair engineer quickly changed his statement.
Repair engineer: But I don't know, because I need to ask him specifically, he might not remember if it's your device or not, let me check, wait a moment. If it's glue coming off, it means the glue cracked.
After 40 minutes of testing, the conclusion was that liquid ingress in the tail plug caused a short circuit. Now, after being reminded by Ms. Liu, this engineer only glanced at it and immediately overturned his previous test result, changing it to say that the font library glue coming off caused the phone malfunction.
Repair engineer: This glue coming off, it could be due to human error, external force, or falling, all possibilities exist. Estimating the specific situation, anyway, in my opinion, it should be caused by falling.
Facing consumer questions, the staff at this Samsung repair point arbitrarily changed the test results. The following conversation unfolded, surprising consumers even more. Talking about repair price standards, the repair personnel started bargaining with consumers as if in a vegetable market.
Repair engineer: The lowest possible is 700 yuan.
Ms. Liu: Last time, I remember his friend said 500 yuan.
Repair engineer: Alright, I'll help you negotiate, if he says 500 yuan, then it's 500 yuan.
A genuine Samsung phone purchased through official channels, still within the warranty period, especially after encountering the font library gate incident, Ms. Liu did not enjoy Samsung's free warranty service. The repair point of Samsung pushed all responsibilities away cleanly. The only clear thing was the negotiable repair fee.
Mr. Li from Beijing had a similar experience. In late September last year, Mr. Li also purchased a Samsung GALAXY S3 phone through official channels. After using it for ten months, the phone suddenly crashed and couldn't be turned on.
Mr. Li went to the Samsung Service Center located in Anhui Northli, Beijing. After the staff tested his phone, they told him that this was also a fault caused by improper use by the consumer.
Mr. Li: They said there were water marks at the charging port, and it was either moldy or had some sort of growth.
Staff: The chips on your motherboard might have burned out, possibly due to water ingress causing a short circuit and burning them out.
Mr. Li found it strange that his phone would mysteriously get wet.
Staff: It might be sweat from everyday use, or moisture from talking on the phone, possibly due to this.
Mr. Li himself could not figure it out. According to the hardware configuration of this Samsung phone, it has water detection paper installed. If the phone gets wet, the paper will change color. However, the staff did not check the water detection paper but only judged based on visual observation that there were suspected water stains near the charging port, thus determining that it was due to water ingress causing the chip to burn out, and therefore it was not within Samsung's warranty scope. Therefore, the repair costs needed to be fully borne by Mr. Li himself.
Mr. Li: They said if I wanted to repair it, it would cost 780 yuan. They asked if I wanted to repair it, but since it was a bit expensive, I didn't repair it.
With a try-it-out attitude, Mr. Li found another Samsung service center, but received the same answer.
Mr. Li: It should not be covered by warranty. Then I said it might be the font library problem, and he nodded.
The cause of the fault was the same, but how to repair it, this repair point quoted a completely different price from the previous one, shocking Mr. Li greatly.
Mr. Li: He said this requires replacing the motherboard, costing around two thousand yuan. He said this was officially regulated, replacing the motherboard costs more than two thousand yuan, so I couldn't accept it.
Seeing that the Samsung phone within the warranty period could not be repaired, and the official quotes were getting higher and higher, Mr. Li eventually found a private repair point himself, spending 350 yuan to replace the font library and successfully repaired the phone.
Private repair point: I think this should be a hardware design defect. I think it shouldn't be an issue of whether it's covered by warranty or not.
Not only in Beijing, but also in Xi'an, Mr. Wang had a similar experience. In October 2012, he spent 5299 yuan to purchase a Samsung GALAXY S3 China Unicom contract phone. After nearly half a year of use, the phone suddenly had problems.
Mr. Wang: Initially, it would randomly restart, the phone would continuously reboot itself, and people couldn't stop it. Later, this situation lasted for about two days, and then it became unusable, unable to turn on.
Mr. Wang found a Samsung authorized repair point in Xi'an, where the staff told him that the phone required hardware changes.
Mr. Wang: They didn't admit it, saying we couldn't determine where the problem was, but we admitted it was a hardware issue with the machine.
Even though they admitted it was a hardware issue with the phone, the staff said it was not within the warranty scope.
Mr. Wang: He told me that there were some scratches on my phone. But we can't verify now whether the hardware issue was due to our own reasons or due to improper use by you.
Mr. Wang admitted that his phone had indeed fallen once. From the provided photos, the reporter saw slight wear on the upper left corner of the phone. But he didn't think this had a direct relationship with the phone crashing.
Mr. Wang: The scratch on my phone appeared in the first week after I bought it, probably due to accidental use, causing the scratch. But the font library door issue occurred five months later, I believe there is no necessary connection between the two. But Samsung does not recognize this, saying the scratch might pose a potential hazard.
After being refused warranty, Mr. Wang contacted Samsung customer service through other channels, hoping to get an explanation.
Mr. Wang: I called Samsung's official customer service hotline, and he said my situation needed to be applied for approval from higher-ups. After the application, it was also not approved, and the warranty was still refused. Then I posted on Weibo, tagging Samsung Mobile's official Weibo account, and Samsung's Weibo response was that they indeed applied for approval from higher-ups, but the warranty was still not possible.
Samsung's official Weibo replied that they could not provide warranty, but could apply for a discounted repair price for Mr. Wang.
Mr. Wang: They would repair it at cost price for me, meaning they wouldn't charge extra to fix it. They told me that when I took it to the store, they informed me that the repair price was 1600 yuan. Then I said okay, how much is the cost price? They told me the cost price was 1200 yuan.
Clearly, the phone was within the warranty period, so why did he have to bear repair costs of over a thousand yuan? Moreover, the repair point staff vaguely told him that there was a hardware issue, but what exactly was the hardware issue? Which part had the problem? Mr. Wang requested the repair point staff to issue an appraisal report for him, but it was rejected.
Mr. Wang: At that time, I asked them to issue an appraisal report, and the physical customer service said they absolutely couldn't issue this report. If they issued this report, their physical store would be shut down.
Ultimately, Mr. Wang, full of disappointment, found another private repair point, fixing the phone for just a few hundred yuan.
Mr. Wang: Their explanation was simple, they assured me that they almost repair three to five phones of this model every day, guaranteeing they could fix it. In the end, I paid 400 yuan to repair it.
The experiences of Ms. Liu, Mr. Li, and Mr. Wang are ones that many Samsung consumers domestically have encountered or are currently experiencing. When searching online for "Samsung font library gate," related web pages amount to over 1.03 million, and searching "Samsung font library" on Weibo yields 817 results. Additionally, QQ groups established by consumers affected by the Samsung font library gate number at least six, with the largest group having over 400 members. More importantly, all consumers claim to have purchased their Samsung phones through official channels and are within the warranty period, yet they cannot enjoy free warranty services. The official repair points of Samsung quote exorbitant prices, ranging from 700 to 800 yuan to over 2000 yuan, nearly half the price of the phone.
Many Samsung phone users with issues told reporters from "Economic Half Hour" that a small font library chip brought them helpless anger. Consumer rights being infringed upon is infuriating, but Samsung's indifference makes consumers feel even more powerless. As a major international company, Samsung's consumers are spread across the globe. Are Chinese consumers the only ones facing the font library gate issue? Do consumers in other countries using the same type of Samsung phones also encounter similar crashes? Are they also angrily helpless?
Samsung's frequent crash issues have spread globally, with vastly different domestic and international after-sales service experiences.
On an English forum for Samsung phones, a netizen posted a thread titled "Samsung Note2 (GT-N7100) Phone Suddenly Dies" on July 7, 2013. The reporter noticed that the post began like this: "Two weeks ago, my phone suddenly crashed and went black. At first, I thought it was a software issue, but then I reset the phone to factory settings and tried using it without any apps, but this didn't solve the problem. Even without any apps, it started crashing. I checked all my system settings, but couldn't find any issues. Sometimes it would crash when I was using Google Maps, sometimes when I was adjusting the settings, sometimes when I was sending messages, multiple times a day."
This foreign netizen's description closely resembles the experiences of Chinese consumers interviewed by "Economic Half Hour." Coincidentally, reporters from "Economic Half Hour" subsequently found numerous complaints from consumers about Samsung phones frequently crashing on various English forums. They referred to this issue as "Sudden Death Syndrome." Subsequently, when reporters from "Economic Half Hour" searched keywords like "Samsung sudden death symptoms" on English search engines, there were 184,000 relevant search results. Whether it's the 'Font Library Gate' mentioned by Chinese consumers or the 'Sudden Death Syndrome' referred to by foreign consumers, Samsung's frequent crash issues have appeared in multiple markets worldwide.
On the world's largest English video-sharing site YouTube, on May 12th this year, a foreign netizen posted a video titled "Help! Samsung S3 Won't Turn On," narrating how his Samsung phone turned into a "brick."
This video drew attention from nearly 30,000 netizens commenting. One commenter named wesover21 said: "Did you find out what the problem was? My phone did the same thing yesterday, and I'm ready to blow this piece of junk up with a rocket launcher. Why does this happen!" Many other commenters also indicated that their Samsung phones experienced the same issue. "My phone has had problems since the day I bought it, yesterday it turned off automatically, and then it couldn't turn back on. Samsung! Fix your product!"
Although most comments were complaints, some statements caught the attention of Chinese consumers. On this website called 'Samsung Expanders,' this netizen posted that he searched online for Samsung phone frequent crash issues and found that Samsung had already begun repairing these problematic phones in Europe (such as the UK).
In another technical product discussion site, in an article titled "Samsung Galaxy S3 Issues: What Do Consumers Complain About Most?" the frequent phone crash issue was also mentioned. The article wrote: "This issue occurs only in some 16GB Samsung S3 phones, and it is related to flash memory chips. If you encounter this issue, you will find that no matter what you do, your S3 cannot turn on." Notably, the article mentioned a specific solution: "You can go to Samsung's service department, where you can receive either a replacement or repair service." So, can foreign consumers enjoy free repairs or even replacements when they encounter frequent Samsung phone crashes? Let's watch another video posted by a foreign netizen.
Foreign netizen: I've been using this phone for six months, and today it suddenly broke down. This logo has been stuck here for an hour. I've tried everything, taking out the battery, putting it back in, restarting it, but nothing changed. Then I tried inserting the charging card and charging it before restarting. See this spinning circle? This phone is really broken. It's a hardware issue. I just looked it up online, and this symptom is called "Sudden Death Syndrome." If your phone has this problem, you just need to take it to a local phone shop, and you can exchange it for a new one.
From "sudden shutdown" to "unable to turn on" and then "font library damage," Chinese consumers were told that these were all caused by human damage and require paying high repair fees. However, many Samsung phone consumers in other countries claimed that they could enjoy free repairs or even replacements at Samsung repair centers. Is Samsung really implementing differentiated repair policies in after-sales service? Reporters from "Economic Half Hour" interviewed Xiao Zhao, a student studying in the UK.
Xiao Zhao: I asked if the phone bought six or seven months ago was still within the warranty period. They said there was no problem, it was very simple and quick.
Xiao Zhao, a student studying in the UK, told reporters from "Economic Half Hour" that she previously bought a Samsung S3 phone for her mother from a mobile telecommunications provider Carphone Warehouse in the UK. After using it for six or seven months, the phone suddenly black-screened and began to frequently crash. A few days ago, she consulted the after-sales repair matters on behalf of her mother. The service personnel at this London mobile phone store told Xiao Zhao:
London mobile phone store service personnel: Bring it back to Carphone Warehouse, and we will send it to Samsung for repair. It will take about 2 to 3 weeks. During the repair period, they will provide her with a temporary phone to use. If they can't repair it, they will give you a new one.
Xiao Zhao: Okay, so this is definitely within the warranty period?
London mobile phone store service personnel: Yes.
Xiao Zhao emphasized to us that she did not bring her mother's phone for on-site consultation. After a simple inquiry, the staff proactively told her that because her mother's phone was still within the warranty period, Samsung would provide free phone repairs and a free phone for use during the repair period. If it couldn't be repaired, they would also freely replace it with a new phone. Notably, the warranty period for Samsung phones in mainland China is only one year, whereas Xiao Zhao's mother's Samsung phone purchased from the British operator Carphone Warehouse has a two-year warranty period.
Xiao Zhao: As long as your phone is within the two-year warranty period, you can just send it for repair, it's very simple.
Not only does the repair method in the UK differ significantly from China, but even in Hong Kong, Samsung's repair policy for phones with font library gate issues is entirely different from that in mainland China. In the interview, reporters from "Economic Half Hour" learned that a Shenzhen netizen's Samsung S3 phone, purchased in Hong Kong, enjoyed free warranty services and had its motherboard replaced after encountering the font library gate issue. Another Guangdong Dongguan netizen also purchased a Samsung NOTE2 phone in Hong Kong. After encountering the font library gate issue, he sent the phone back to Hong Kong, and despite having flashed the phone, he still enjoyed free warranty services and had his motherboard replaced.
Meanwhile, in the United States, this netizen posted that his Samsung S3 phone intermittently crashed, and Samsung replaced its motherboard for him. Furthermore, the netizen pointed out in the post: Believe me, this is not a software issue but a hardware issue, and consumers within the warranty period are