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Don't buy Handspring products

I've been a fan of Handspring Visor handhelds for a couple of years now. When my older Palm IIIx wasn't working for me, I replaced it with a Visor Prism. That was a bit of an expenditure for me, but I found the always-backlit screen a lot easier to read. The color capability made it easier for me to categorize some things, and the Springboard slot offered some nifty expansion opportunities that Palm's then-current handhelds didn't match. In fact, six months after getting the Visor, I took a deal for a VisorPhone, turning the Visor into a cellular phone. I was willing to carry one gadget but not two, so this was perfect for me.

Except that the thing has been a piece of crap, and Handspring won't make good on it.

The first Visor Prism failed after 11 months. The touch screen went out. It had been a little reluctant to respond to some taps for a month ahead of that, and that's a real problem for a VisorPhone. The phone is just a springboard module with a speaker/microphone and an antenna; the entire human interface for the phone is on the Visor. You have to tap on-screen buttons to both place and answer calls. Without the touch screen, you can't call out, and all incoming calls go to voicemail.

So, since the Visor Prism was still in its 12-month warranty (but barely), Handspring replaced it under warranty, minus a $25 "advance replacement" charge so I could get the new one without having to wait for Handspring to receive the old unit. Everything was fine, for a while. (The VisorPhone itself came apart in late summer, but it too was under warranty, so Handspring replaced it.)

Jump to three weeks ago: December 26, 2002. I put some vacation-type information on my Visor (like movie times) and synchronized it, and set out for Oklahoma City and Norman for final Pride rehearsal and dinner and other relaxing things. I got to Sam's Club to purchase some things, and I pulled out the Visor to calculate unit prices for various sizes of one item -- and it didn't respond. The touch screen was dead. Completely. Soft reset didn't work. I was hesitant to try a hard reset, knowing I'd lose all information, but I figured that if it worked, I could at least make phone calls and use the built-in applications.

So I performed a hard reset. Oops. The Visor cycled to the introductory program that wants you to tap locations on the screen to synchronize the touch screen, except, of course, it doesn't recognize any taps. So, after a hard reset, it was stuck in the "Welcome" program -- completely dead, completely useless. Sigh.

I called Handspring the very next morning, December 27. I was told that Handspring would again replace the handheld, but that it was not under warranty. Even though it was less than a year since getting this replacement unit, the warranty is only 12 months from original purchase, or 90 days from receipt of a replacement unit. Replacing the Prism would cost $125, plus $25 for advance replacement by overnight shipping. Since I was planning to drive to Dallas on Monday to go to the Apple store there, I opted for advance replacement so I could have the phone on Monday, and I had called early enough that the shipment went out that day.

Of course, it wasn't marked for morning delivery. I had to leave for Dallas before the box arrived, but it was here when I got back about 12:30 AM on Tuesday (December 31). I unpacked it the next morning, put it on my cradle, and attempted to HotSync. That eventually succeeded, though it took about 10 attempts over three hours because the Visor kept dropping the connection. But by the afternoon, it was synced, and aside from having lost my phone quick-dial settings, everything was back. The phone worked, the Visor worked, all was well, with about 9 hours left in the year. I was supposed to ship the dead Visor (the first replacement for the original) back to Handspring in the box that the new one (the second replacement for the original) came in. However, the next day was New Year's Day, and since it was a holiday weekend, I put it on the to-do list for Monday or Tuesday. I had a few weeks to send it back before I'd get charged for it.

Now jump forward five days: Saturday, January 4, 2003.

i was going out for the evening, so I put more information on the handheld. Before I synchronized, I picked it up and looked at some info on it, then put it on the cradle and pressed the HotSync button. Synchronziation went normally without complaints. I then removed the Prism from the cradle, and as I did so, I heard a little "pop."

I tried using it. The touch screen was dead. Soft reset did nothing, and hard reset once again stuck the device in the "Welcome" program.

Make sure you get this, in case I'm not clear: the first Prism (#1, cost: $500) failed in 11 months, free replacement. The second Prism (#2, cost: $25 for replacement) failed in 11 months. The third Prism (#3, cost: $125, plus $25 for replacement) failed in five days. What's more, it was on a Saturday night. For the second weekend in a row, I would be without my cell phone and organizer.

So, on Monday afternoon (I'd worked until about 4AM on Sunday night), I again called Handspring. This alone isn't an easy task: Handspring offers several support numbers, and usually when I call one, they bump me to another one, where I get to wait on hold again. Now at this point, I'm mildly annoyed at having received an obviously-defective replacement that not only cost me $150 but didn't arrive in time to take on my first out-of-state trip in about a year. But these things happen, and I'm willing to call again.

When I connect, I get a second case number for Visor #3's death, and I explain that I want the same advance replacement option, but that I do not expect to pay for it since they shipped me a defective unit. The support representative explains to me that I will get a replacement unit (to be #4, my fourth in less than two years), and that I will not have to pay for it, but there's a catch.

Since I haven't sent back the dead #2 unit yet (I'm calling on the first Monday of 2003), Handspring says it can't send me another unit yet. I have to send #2 back first, and then they can send me #4 to replace the dead #3. With me so far? Oh, good.

I bellyache about this, because it's a real pain in the ass: the box they sent only authorizes second-day shipping, and it's Monday afternoon now. Airborne will pick it up on Tuesday, Handspring won't get it until Thursday, they won't send out a new one until Friday, and I won't get it until at least Monday, a week from the day I was calling. Handspring sent me a defective unit and I would be without one for at least a week because of it, but that was the best they'd do. I was told that I could call on Thursday afternoon to "check the status" of the shipment of #4. I informed the representative that, with this kind of quality, I'd purchased my last Handspring product.

So, steamed, I packed up the unit, and Airborne picked it up Tuesday while I was covering the Macworld Expo keynote. I didn't have time on Thursday to call, nor on Friday, with Macworld Expo and sleeplessness kicking in. For Mac writers, Macworld Expo times are the busiest weeks of the year; there's literally more news in one week than in the two weeks before or after the show. A month's worth of work in one week is enough to keep you off the phone and off "hold," especially since Handspring's estimates of wait times are typically off by a factor of five or ten. When I was told expected wait time of one minute, I waited ten. An expected time of five minutes turned into 30.

Monday (January 13, 2003) arrives: no handheld. No handheld on Tuesday either. I had tried calling on Monday afternoon, but was told to expect a wait time of 15 minutes (this, of course, after having sat through a solid minute-plus of droning phone tree announcements about checking the Web and calling another number, but I had been smart: when I got the second case number, I asked the guy exactly what number I should call for future reference). Not having 90 minutes to wait for my expected 15 minute wait, I hung up.

I called back this morning, Wednesday, January 15. I shipped #2 back to Handspring on the 7th, still have dead unit #3, and haven't received #4 as replacement. I've been without my organizer for 17 out of the past 21 days, and the promised shipment of #4 obviously hasn't taken place. I'm told I'll have to wait five minutes, which, as noted above, turned into 30.

In this call, representative "Suresh" turned whatever goodwill Handspring had left with me completely off. First, Suresh asked me to repeat and verify every piece of information I had already told the representative on January 6th when I got the case number for dead unit #3. Once I explained that, Suresh strongly suggested I should have called some other telephone number other than the one I was specifically told to call when getting the case number for dead unit #3. I told him that I was specifically instructed to call this number, and that I had spent half an hour on hold, and was not interested in "maybe" calling another number.

Suresh asked for the serial number of unit #3, so I pulled off the springboard module and read it to him. He then informed me, if I understood him, that I had given him the serial number of unit #2. I have no way of verifying if it's me or Handspring that's confused about this; I had two dead units here at once and I sent back the one that looked like it was older (the sticker with the serial number was more worn, probably, I figured, from adding and removing the phone module a few times).

At this point, Suresh informed me that there would be a charge for the phone support unless it resulted in a repair, but since he said I had the wrong handheld, he couldn't authorize replacement. He kept reading from a script, but the upshot was that if I didn't provide my credit card for billing me another charge to replace a handheld that had lasted for five days, I was just stuck with a dead unit. I asked three times to speak with a supervisor. Suresh refused twice, and on the third request he finally "checked to see if one was available," but to no one's shock, one was not.

When I was told I'd have to pay to replace a handheld that had died after five days, Suresh had the nerve to suggest that it wasn't five days: "We shipped the unit on December 27, and today is January 15, it's not five days." This was infuriating, because Handspring knew or should have known that I didn't receive it until December 30 because they wouldn't pay for Saturday delivery, and that I had called on January 6 to complain that the handheld had died on January 4. In fact, Suresh knew this because the first thing I gave him was the case number for the January 6 phone call reporting that unit #3 was dead. I only had to call back nine days later because Handspring hadn't replaced unit #3 yet, and for this guy to claim that meant I was lying about the defective unit just about pushed me over the edge.

Suresh kept pushing for credit card information to continue, but I told him that if there was any charge for this call, there would be hell to pay. At that point, he refused to even accept credit card information, saying that he had escalated the problem to a supervisor who will call back "within one business day." It's easy to see how this will go: the supervisor will call when I'm not available, like early in the morning or during Apple's quarterly results conference call today, and I'll have to call back and be on hold for another half hour and repeat this entire story, at which point I'll finally get #4 sent out to replace the first three handhelds.

So, as of now, I've had three Visor Prism units (retail: $495 each) die in a two-year period, two after eleven months and one after five days. So far, I've paid $175 in replacement costs ($25 each for two "advance replacement" shipments and $125 for unit #3) and have no working handheld to show for it, plus a couple of hours spent on the phone and no resolution from Handspring.

Last fall, Handspring sent me mail offering to "upgrade" me to the new Treo communicators for only $500 -- pretty much full price -- if I'd trade in the prism. I wonder how many days the Treo would have lasted. I do not intend to ever purchase another Handspring product, nor give any as gifts, and I recommend you stay away from them as well. If the blatantly defective and expensive products weren't enough reason, the horrible customer service I got today from "Suresh" is the icing on the cake. Spend your money with a company that cares whether its products work or not.

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