Update: Day 4

Day 4 came and went and I received no response from Jawbone Up.

Update: Day 3

I was getting no where with waiting for Jawbone Up Support. So, I put up this review of the product then tweeted about it.  It didn’t take long for them to respond to me after that.
I vented my frustration through the site then felt bad about it and took it down and now it’s back up because I think its important that purchasers are aware of what they are getting themselves into and that Jawbone UP Support truly is a Failure.

I didn’t contact them directly through twitter to potentially expedite this because it was the third day out of who knows how many days it was going to take to resolve this…. I wanted to see what their process was and how long it would continue to take to get my problem fix and potentially a new UP band and then document it here.  It’s not a complete shit show but its pretty close.

On day 3 I got a response.  Much to my dismay it seemed to ignore the facts I already presented in my original email testing the soft and hard resets. They asked me to do it again and then report if the problem doesn’t work. Did they read my email? Or is it just more convenient to copy and paste text into and email and suggest something again and again? Maybe its just their process.  I don’t blame the people who are handling these issues instead I blame the manager who have failed to develop a Support plan that makes sense and actually gives attention to detail and responses that make sense based on email communication going back and forth between customer and vendor.

So, I followed their instructions to a T and completed them again and still the up day didn’t work correctly.

I replied with my details and the end result of it not working. Now, I am waiting again for a reply.

Jawbone Up & Support Review – Terrible

Jawbone UP: Design Failure from Product to Support

The UP 2nd Gen band wasn’t quite designed for Real Life.

UP’s 1st Gen band was recalled and Nike Fuel came into the market. The updated Up 2nd Gen band isn’t proving to be much better than the first. Just one problem after another.

If you want a band to wear that is going to break after 8 days with no support life line or help to fix existing issues then spend $129.99 and don’t be disappointed when it happens to you.

When it breaks and it will you essentially have a glorified rubber band on your wrist.

Did you know Rubber bands cannot sync to iPhones.

If you want to feel what it’s like to put a Jawbone Up on your wrist go purchase a colorful rubber band. It too doesn’t come with support that cares.

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I was all giddy with excitement from my new Jawbone Up band that I purchased from a Best Buy retail store.  Everything was working perfectly with the UP band as expected until day 8.

From NEW to NOT Working in 8 days.
One really interesting feature of the up band is that it uses the head phone jack to connect and sync with an UP app on your iPhone.   The band has a battery that will last for 10 days.  The night prior to band failure I sync’d my UP  at night and when I got up in the morning my UP wouldn’t sync.  The UP tries to keep track of your sleep pattern with light and heavy sleep so you essentially wear it all the time (its water resistant not water proof) and shouldn’t get wet.  Don’t shower with it.  The band appeared to be working as I was able to start my UP Activity of riding my bike to work.  Its a stop watch function that you control with a couple of button pushes to start and stop an activity.  This information is stored in the band and then you sync it to your UP app on the iPhone.  After attempting to sync through out the day and every attempt failed I turned to trying to get support for it through Jawbone.

Its a nice site, big text boxes and search areas but it is all a facade.  Jawbone does NOT have the support capacity in place to handle the High Support Volume that they claim they are are getting.  Is it high because every other band out there is failing? What’s up with a 2 day waiting period to get someone to respond.  There really is no other customer service out there that will let a support issue slide for two whole days without a call back or email from a support agent.  Why does Jawbone Up think it is OK? I really can’t think of any product out there that I have recently purchased that I cannot simply call up and get a hold of someone to talk about the product if it was problematic. Respond to your customers that have problems with your product and don’t leave them hanging.   UP’s customer support turn around time is a FAILURE.  It lost my business.

Signing for the UP app through the iPhone with the Up band  are the credentials you need to access the site and submit a ticket. Upon ticket submission, a response is generated that says “Thank you for contacting Jawbone Customer Support. We are currently experiencing a high volume of requests, but will respond within two days.” On day 2 someone responded and told me to do a “Soft Reset”. They clearly didn’t read the tickets I had open.   I have already done both a soft and hard reset and UP still doesn’t work.  I replied and now I’m what seems like a never ending que.  It’s day 3 and I am curious if anybody is going to respond to my reply or simply wait until day 4 to get back to me. I have contacted them by phone and was told that someone would follow up with me through the support system and they wouldn’t help me over the phone.

This is frustrating! Jawbone UP isn’t a product that effectively works. Their customer support representative don’t care at all about helping you. They don’t want to hear about the issues and want to get you off the phone as quickly as possible and back over to the online support that doesn’t work any better.  To top it off, I cannot return this product to Best Buy even with all of the packaging and receipt.  Even with a 90 day receipt and warranty on the product Best Buy won’t accept it back.  If you have ever purchased an inexpensive camera when you open the packaging, there’s usually a letter stating you cannot return it to the store and need to go through their support.  Well, that is how it is for Jawbone Up with Best Buy.

I am stuck waiting on a company that won’t respond to me online through their ticketing system or over the phone.  The Jawbone UP is $129.99.   There are several places to purchase Jawbone Up, online through their store, Best Buy and Apple.  I recently polled my group of runners, those who purchases Jawbone UP’s from Apple have never had a problem.  The others who purchased from Best Buy (retail store and online) are broken and broke within the first 2 weeks of usage. The other 3 people opted for Nike Fuel bands and they don’t have any problems.

Maybe the components of UP bands that were assembled for Best Buy are flawed. The Apple ones seem fine.

Jawbone Support is terrible.  They have a Chat Now window and when you click on it all it ever says is our representatives are busy and to please add a comment to your existing tickets and an agent will get back to you.

I don’t know how many people are working as Support for Jawbone Up but it’s clearly not enough if you have a minimum wait time of 2 days before you hear anything from them.

I would suggest that you don’t invest in this and wait for another generation or two to come out and wait until the price comes down. The out of pocket expense + trouble = NO JOY.

Plus with many other bands hitting the market right now there is a lot to choose from;
Amiigo, Basis, Fuel.