Garmin customer support...another unaccountable entity

[Reel Cowboy]

I'm tellin you Brian, you're being too nice about this.
The minute you bring up the fact that his parents weren't married at the time of his birth, will light a fire under his arse.

[tin can]

I'm very surprised. I've had nothing but positive experience with Garmin Support. They usually go above and beyond. Brian, I'm wondering if you're getting opposition because you didn't register the unit.

[Warrior]

Like TC said had nothing but great experinces with garmin nearly deal with them on a daily basis.

[jsuber]

I have a contact at Garmin. I'll send you the information from the person I know. I had to get a Garmin GPSMAP76CSX repaired, but what helped me was my registration on the website. I encourage everyone to regsiter their equipment on mygarmin and then they can see all of the info and make a more informed decision. My garmin linked to my device and updated their info. Anyway they sent me a repaired one, and the Tides no longer work and your note reminded me to contact them.

[SHOWBOAT]

and my saga continues....next three exchanges:
________________________________________________________________________________________________

Dear Brian,

Thank you for contacting Garmin International. I would be happy to help
you out. I am sorry but dropping the unit in water is not considered
normal use. The IPX7 is a water resistant rating; IPX8 would mean the
unit is completely water proof. IPX8 is the highest rating a unit can
have and is designed for continually underwater use.

With Best Regards,

Jonathan C
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Thanks Jonathan,

I looked into the IPX definitions, please see the second note I sent you today. "An IPX7 designation means the GPS case can withstand accidental immersion in one meter of water for up to 30 minutes"--this language from the Garmin website is my exact scenario (except it was less much less than 30 minutes or a meter of water). This was a very brief incident, and one that the Garmin documentation states my GPS should have been able to endure, it did not.

Please ensure the responses you are providing me are Garmin's formal position. At this point I am not satisfied, feel I have submitted a warranty claim in good faith and believe I have been deceived.

This postering by Garmin will likely result in greater cost to Garmin than attempting to remedy a customer satisfaction issue, as I am keeping my peers advised as to these responses and the consequential delay in support I am experiencing.

That thread has already received over 200 views from individuals interested in seeing how this situation is resolved.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Thank you for contacting Garmin International. At this point in time I
would probably recommend contacting Garmin directly at xxxxxxxxxx. We
are open Monday through Friday 8am ? 7pm CST. When you call in we can
discuss this issue further.

[Rainman]

If you haven't yet I would submit the Dept. Agriculture Consumer Services complaint. They go to the top and skip the middle men. But you can too. Here's a link to the Department of State website that lists the Officers and Directors for Garmin.
Gary Kelley may be the top dog.
Good luck,

http://ccfcorp.dos.state.fl.us/scripts/ ... ling_type=

[Reel Cowboy]

How is this working out?
You gotta at least get some free stuff out of this, maybe some shirts and something.

[SHOWBOAT]

Well, I finally got around to calling Garmin last night and think I have finally reached end of job. Jonathan was out of the office, but I spoke with Tom L in Jonathan's absence.

Tom's initial position was that this unit is not waterproof!

I responded that not only had Garmin made an express warranty on their documentation, but that they had even set a quantitive standard as to the scope of the warranty. His next repsonse was that Garmin had no way of determining whether my facts pertaining to water depth and timeframe were accurate, and therefore the warranty would not kick in

Our conversation then turned to burden of proof, and that it is Garmin's duty to state there was another reason for the units failure, not my duty to have taken pictures of the GPS while underwater and prove how the damage occured. I concluded this conversation by stating that the amount time Garmin had spent in resisting my good faith claim and the negative publicity they were receing in light of this thread far exceeds the repair costs they are expecting me to step up to. After a brief time on hold, Tom advised Garmin would make an exception to standard policy since this unit is only 6 months old, and that even though water damage is typically not covered, they would support my unit under warranty upon receipt of PoP. I'll be faxing the requeste PoP today......

[Reel Cowboy]

Tom's initial position was that this unit is not waterproof!

I thought you had already proved that? Stay on top of it, they'll screw if they can.

[Dubble Trubble]

It never ceases to amaze me at how companies will spend millions on advertising how great their service is (the insurance industry is famous for this) then turn around and try to screw a customer after they make a purchase. If they would simply take a few of the ad dollars and put it toward decent, knowledgable C/S reps, they would not need ads, but would get lots of business from word of mouth.

Dubble

[creech]

It never ceases to amaze me at how companies will spend millions on advertising how great their service is (the insurance industry is famous for this) then turn around and try to screw a customer after they make a purchase. If they would simply take a few of the ad dollars and put it toward decent, knowledgable C/S reps, they would not need ads, but would get lots of business from word of mouth.

Dubble

Amen brotha

[Atticus]

Well, I finally got around to calling Garmin last night and think I have finally reached end of job. Jonathan was out of the office, but I spoke with Tom L in Jonathan's absence.

Tom's initial position was that this unit is not waterproof!

I responded that not only had Garmin made an express warranty on their documentation, but that they had even set a quantitive standard as to the scope of the warranty. His next repsonse was that Garmin had no way of determining whether my facts pertaining to water depth and timeframe were accurate, and therefore the warranty would not kick in

Our conversation then turned to burden of proof, and that it is Garmin's duty to state there was another reason for the units failure, not my duty to have taken pictures of the GPS while underwater and prove how the damage occured. I concluded this conversation by stating that the amount time Garmin had spent in resisting my good faith claim and the negative publicity they were receing in light of this thread far exceeds the repair costs they are expecting me to step up to. After a brief time on hold, Tom advised Garmin would make an exception to standard policy since this unit is only 6 months old, and that even though water damage is typically not covered, they would support my unit under warranty upon receipt of PoP. I'll be faxing the requeste PoP today......

I am sorry but this made me laugh out loud at my desk here at the office.

Garmin has always treated me right. Too bad they are giving you the runaround. Bad pub for them in my book.

[GatorBaiter]

....thus the reason I have a Hummingbird!

[Harmsway]

Showboat, consider starting all over as if you never called Garmin (hopefully you did not give them your serial number already). This time just play dumb. "I just stopped working."

[dolphinatic]

Well, after my 2nd attempt to get an update card for my 182, they have given up Neither card would work. They said my best bet was to try an update from a PC. I asked if they would be refunding my shipping fees and deposit on the 2 cards they sent me taking 1 week each costing $12.66 for shipping I was told someone would be getting back with me. Tomorrow will be day 3 and nothing