Motorola: Defying their own adverts?
Motorola: recently purchased by Google for $12.5 billion dollars. But are their phones all they are cracked up to be? Watchdog investigated further.
Chris Hollins: he works hard and he plays hard - and he expects his mobile to do the same. So, based on their TV advert, the Motorola Defy looks like the phone for him. The advert suggests this phone can survive a hard night on the tiles. But can it handle some of the more mundane things life has to throw at it?
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Sadly, not all Defy owners found the phone to be as 'life-proof' as the advert makes out. Daniel Barnett was walking down the road and went to crouch down when his phone slipped out of his pocket. Dan explains "It landed on its side and it smashed the screen, so I called up Motorola and they advised me it wasn't their liability and that I need to pay to get it fixed although I'd only had the phone for two months."
Dan's brand new Defy was unusable after eight weeks, but Samantha Whiteman's smashed after just six weeks when it fell off her sofa and onto laminate flooring. Motorola told her it would cost £69 to repair the phone.
Donna Churchill's daughter also had the Motorola Defy - but it lasted three weeks. She accidentally dropped it whilst she was out and the screen smashed. When they took it back to the store, they suggested that the Churchills contact Motorola directly. However, when they did, Motorola said it was accidental damage and that they would have to go through an insurance claim.
Professor Vince Mitchell from Consumer Marketing observes: "One of the really strange things about the ad is that it claims to be 'scratch-resistant' but the video footage shows it being drop proof and not just drop proof on carpet but on hard stone and that's really unusual that these two claims would contradict."
While these ads make bold claims, so does Motorola's VP of marketing, Andrew Morley, who states that the Defy is designed to "combat against daily wear and tear, dropping, scratching and other mishaps." But when you write to Motorola to complain, their customer services don't seem quite so confident. One rep said: "the phone has been advertised as crack resistant, not crack proof. Therefore a physical damage is not covered under the manufacturer warranty."
So, mixed messages from Motorola. Consumer technology expert, Stuart Miles comments: "Well, it all comes down to how you live your life. The Motorola Defy is tough, it's tougher than some phones on the market, but it's not as tough as some of the tougher phones on the market."
The Motorola Defy has got some sturdy looking features like rivets and a rubber back, for example, but whilst the screen is made from toughened glass, it's the same toughened glass that's used on a lot of Smartphones - so there's nothing uniquely robust about it.
We all know that Smartphones won't always be able to handle everything that life throws at them. But as Motorola are selling the Defy as 'life-proof', shouldn't they at least offer some kind of help when their brand new phones crack under the pressure?
Motorola Response:
1. What tests did Motorola conduct before deciding to market the Defy as Life-Proof, Dancefloor-Proof and Pool Party-Proof? Does Motorola stand by these claims in light of the cases detailed above?
Motorola DEFY is a popular phone with over four million units currently being used worldwide. Reported incidents relating to cracked screens represents less that 0.1% of all UK Motorola DEFY users, and we wholeheartedly standby the capabilities of Motorola DEFY as demonstrated in the marketing campaign.
Motorola undertakes rigorous tests to optimise each product for best performance and usability. For Motorola DEFY; specific drop tests, water and dust ingress performance tests were undertaken both prior to and post launch of the phone.
For water and dust ingress the phone is independently certified with an IP67 rating allowing for the phone to be submerged up to 1 metre for 30 minutes, and it is completely dust proof.
The rigorous drop testing used various surface materials, drop heights and multiple samples. Results consistently demonstrated that Motorola DEFY outperformed competitor products and all other products in our range. The tests concluded that there was only an average of 1 in 1000 chance of a drop resulting in a cracked screen.
Motorola DEFY features Corning Gorilla Glass - chemically enhanced glass which is scratch resistant and the glass is recessed below a casing screwed together for added robustness.
2. How does Motorola plan to improve customer service for those customers whose 'life-proof' phones break within a few weeks?
Firstly we want to apologise to the four customers featured on the programme. We are in contact with them all and are currently resolving each of the cases.
Our customer service centre handles thousands of calls a week ranging from queries, to product advice, to repairs and warranties and the vast majority of these are resolved to a satisfactory conclusion. We continuously look to improve service centre training, and we take the viewpoints of all our consumers seriously.
With all incidents of phone damage, our customer service team will continue to assess these on a case by case basis but should any one of the Watchdog viewers believe that they have had a similar experience with their Motorola DEFY to those featured on the programme we welcome them to get in contact with Motorola Mobility at www.motorola.com or UK free-phone 0800 678 3698 and we will happily review these cases.
We do want to be clear, however, that the total number of cases related to cracked screens represents less than 0.1% of users and we are confident that the vast proportion of the hundreds of thousands of Motorola DEFY owners in the UK has enjoyed an extremely positive experience.
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