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Smart Watch Frustration - A Christmas tale of woe

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I must by cursed to never have a working Smart watch. I seem to part of an insanity experiment. Here is the history of my experience for your enjoyment at Christmas time. My sad tale of woe.

  • I wander into the company store and excitedly purchase a Fossil FX-3001 at the end of Dec 2003. I have to wait 4 weeks before I receive it, so it was a belated christmas present.
  • I receive watch one in Jan, the plastic/metal carton nearly kills me, but I activate it and procede to continuously show my work mates how great it is and how I know exaclty where to be for my next meeting.
  • End of Jan 2004 - watch one goes blank and stops working entirely. Not a hint of life. I send it to the Fossil repair center.
  • Feb 2004 - Get new watch two, register it, continue to enjoy it and proudly show it off again, especially to Arpan, who desparately wants one. 
  • Feb 2004 - Watch two starts to reset on an hourly basis to 12pm 1/1/2001, rendering it useless. I send it to the Fossil repair center again.
  • March 2004 - Get new watch three, register it and enjoy it and tentively showing it off. By now everyone is uninterested in it.
  • May 2004 - Watch starts to reset on a 2-3 hourly basis. Worse still I start to tell people the wrong time and cause confusing including one old lady in the street who asked my the time and then argued that I was wrong. I should have agreed with her. 
  • May 2004 - Nov 2004 - I suffer watch three.Whilst it is in a good reception area (i.e. around my home) it works Ok. If I go anywhere out of reception range (i.e. the steel buildings at work, 20 miles north of my house or the UK) the watch becomes immediately useless, resetting to 12pm 1/1/2001 continuously. i.e. it is not even a watch.
  • Nov 2004 - I give up. I send watch three to the Fossil repair center having spent 30 minutes on the phone with a technican trying to "fix" it.
  • Dec 2004 - Get new watch four which is a new design, the FX-3005. The clasp must have been invented by someone from the Spanish Inquisition and it takes me about 10 minutes to figure out how to open and close it. I take watch four out of its brand new box and set it onto the charger. There is no comforting "beep" to indicate that it is charging. I spend 1 hour trying every combination and position on the charger. The next day I speak to the Fossil technical help desk and they determine, as I did the night before, that watch four is a lifeless heap of metal and plastic.  I sent it to the Fossil repair center.
  • Dec 22nd 2004 - I recieve watch five which is also a new FX-3005. Curiously this one is not in a new box and is simply wrapped in bubble wrap. I take it out and note that it is ready charged, but at least it is working, being careful not to slash my wrist with the dangerous metal clasp. I leave it to charge overnight and sync my personal settings.
  • Dec23rd - In the morning I note that it still has not synced my settings, so I go to register the watch ID on the MSD Direct site. Worringly it replies that this watch is already registered. No problem, I phone MSN Direct. To cut a 40 minute conversation short, I am told to 'reboot' the watch by continuously pressing three painful buttons (it takes 9 attempts)  to generate a new 'dynamic' ID for the watch. It turns out that this is all in futility. And here is the crux. This watch was previously owned(by the ID) and the icing on the cake is that the ID cannot be reset and assigned to my account. I am told by the help desk that the only thing that I can do is send it back to the Fossil repair center. Aaaaargh.Aaaaargh.Aaaaargh How can it not be possible to cancel the previous account that has this ID and assign it to mine - This is simply madness. I say to the person that this is costing on postage and the Fossil repair center have claimed twice in the past that this can be credited to my account. She informs me that that is not the case and that Fossil has misinformed me i.e. lied through their teeth.
  • Dec23rd - I phone the Fossil repair center and am informed that they are closed until 27th Dec - Merry Christmas.

So here I sit at work with useless watch number five that I have to send back to Fossil again. My wife thinks them I am insane to continue with this. I will tell you what happens in this saga with watch six next year. Of course it has to be lucky number seven that will pull through for me.

Comments

  • Anonymous
    December 23, 2004
    what a mess!

    I'd tell them to keep the watch and refund all the money.

    but before you do that make sure you have recipts to show the history of this lemon.

    I wonder if you got a set of bad product or if the watches are just no good?

  • Anonymous
    December 23, 2004
    Wow. You have far more patience than I.

    Perhaps this is why I have a watch that does one thing: tells me the time.

  • Anonymous
    December 23, 2004
    sounds like a mess! I would just get my money back and buy a new watch

  • Anonymous
    December 23, 2004
    Hey Mark,

    No offence, but I could not stop myself from smiling. But I disagree with your wife. Let us know the outcome of the Watch no. 5.

  • Anonymous
    December 23, 2004
    I've had similar problems with mine. I sent back Watch #1, and Watch #2 (the same 3005 model) was DOA. I'm hoping I don;t have to go through as many as you do... somehow your story is not all that encouraging. Does anyone make a smart watch that actually WORKS?

  • Anonymous
    December 24, 2004

    Stockholm Syndrome!

    http://ask.yahoo.com/ask/20030324.html

  • Anonymous
    December 26, 2004
    Mark.....I'm sorry to hear about the problems you've had with the Fossil Smart Watch....it sounds like we've dropped the ball.

    I'd like to fix this for you.....contact me at:

    bgeiserATfossilDOTcom

    Bill Geiser
    VP Fossil Technology Watch Division

  • Anonymous
    December 27, 2004
    This comment was rejected last time, but I'm submitting it again.

    Stockholm Syndrome!

    http://ask.yahoo.com/ask/20030324.html

  • Anonymous
    December 28, 2004
    I feel for you! It's nice to see I'm not the only one that this kind of thing happens to. At least you have an outlet to vent where people are listening. If it makes you feel better, I would advice anyone against buying a "smart watch" after reading this. Time to switch to a blackberry. I kicked and screamed, but finally got one. Now I love it and will never go back.

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