Scubapro Owners BEWARE!!

[jchance]

I live in a part of the country where there are very few Scubapro dealers but am one of their biggest supporters. I simply love the quality of their equipment and the near bullet-proof reliability of it. That being said, I currently own/maintain 9 SmartComs, 8 SmartZ/TECs and 2 Lunas for use by my family.

I recently sent in a single Smart TEC for service after a week of diving in Bonaire. It worked perfectly while on the trip but would not sync via IR with my computer. It had about 94% battery life remaining but simply would not sync. It was returned to me "bricked"!! Acording to Scubapro, it failed their calibration. They removed the battery and returned the unit. Now I have a dead unit with no way to even attempt further diagnostics or to see if I can retrieve the data manually; much less the fact that it worked well when sent in and had a high battery life remaining. NOW IT IS USELESS!!

According to Jules, that is Johnson's policy. If I had had any idea that this would happen, it would not have been sent as it worked for it's primary purpose. To make it worse, not only have they removed one of my kids units, I was not offered absolutely any recourse to purchase or exchange the unit for another unit of any level.

There are too many other units by other manufacturers out there of similar quality at a lessor price and more friendly customer service to accept this kind of treatment. I have worked with Scubapro's policies toward consumers for 20 years and they have NOT improved. They are difficult at best compared to most other currently popular manufacturers. As I said, my unit worked. It was not like I had sent in a non-functioning unit for repair. Now it is absolutely worthless except for the wrist bands that I can reuse on another if needed. This kind of service is absolutely unacceptable. If they had simply returned the unit with a note that if would not sync anymore would have been much more acceptable. If they want to "brick" my unit, at least offer some type of replacement at a fair cost!

Scubapro buyers be aware of their treatment!!

 

[Wookie]

Send it to Brass Anchor in Frederick, MD. They will put a battery back in it, but of course, they won't be able to help you with the failure to calibrate.

I am a firm believer in Uwatec products. I see no need to pay the premium for the big blue 'S'.

 

[Got2Go]

If it indeed failed calibration, I wouldn't want to use it even if it seemed to me that it still works...
(Tissue loading calculations might be off for one...then whats the point of using it)

Safety concern due to lack of accuracy trumps being able to retrieve logs in my book.

I think they did the right thing as they do not know if the user will use it anyway (even if they say they will just retrieve logs and not use it for diving) or if they will try and sell it to an unsuspecting user.

Just my 2 bubbles worth...

 

[Hatul]

If it's not safe, they should warn you not to use it, but the battery is not their property. They in fact stole it. Most companies would offer you a discount on a new computer and of course return your battery.

 

[jchance]

The question I ask myself is how did they even try to access or "calibrate" the unit?? I suspect that they tried to access it via the IR eye and when that failed, they locked it up. That is why I sent it in anyway. It tracked with the other diver's computers who were with us perfectly and there were no apparent issues with it's calculations. That was with 9 other divers in the group! I think that they couldn't access the IR either and their protocol is to disable it. If they do that when it was a perfectly functioning unit, then some type of exchange should have been offered. It appeared by all intents to function fine with 92% battery left. in fact it had had it's battery replaced only a few months earlier. As I said, I only wanted to see if they could fix the IR connectivity.

 

[buddhasummer]

Subscribed.

---------- Post added August 26th, 2015 at 01:45 AM ----------

If it indeed failed calibration, I wouldn't want to use it even if it seemed to me that it still works...
(Tissue loading calculations might be off for one...then whats the point of using it)

Safety concern due to lack of accuracy trumps being able to retrieve logs in my book.

I think they did the right thing as they do not know if the user will use it anyway (even if they say they will just retrieve logs and not use it for diving) or if they will try and sell it to an unsuspecting user.

Just my 2 bubbles worth...

All that maybe true but it's still pretty poor customer service.

 

[Long-John-Silver]

This thread is far more expensive that a new computer offered at a fair discount.
One of the poorest customer support I've seen.

 

[jdcpa]

I have had ScubaPro do the exact same thing on a SmartCom because "The temperature sensor failed".

Oddly enough, the temperature sensor was working perfectly before I sent it in to have the battery replaced.

Memory tells me somewhere along the way I was told that ScubaPro does not want many of the these computers out there because they are old and hard to service, so they are systematically making them obsolete. I don't know if that is true or not.

I agree that it is crappy customer service.

I have several complete sets of ScubaPro gear and love it other than the service problems I have. Every yearor every other year, after the annual or bi-annual service to keep the "Free parts for life" in effect, I have at least one regulator fail, but those are shops (multiple shops) related, not ScubaPro related. I now keep multiple back up equipment because of the failures, which usually occur outside the US since that is where we travel to dive.

I love the equipment and understand that customer service is poor to non-existent at best. I just accept the equipment failures and anticipate the bricking of computers.

Just a part of owning the equipment is how I look at it.

I will give Brass Anchor a try in the future.

---------- Post added September 21st, 2015 at 06:59 AM ----------

Have you heard anything from ScubaPro as a result of your post? Any further explanation?

Just curious?

 

[jchance]

I have sent them 2 contact requests via their website. I just returned after a week out of the US and will be sending them a certified letter and notifying the appropriate state consumer agencies this week. So far they have ignored my requests.