Update on shocking Fanatec Support and RMA.....Its worse

[Fat-Alfie]

Do you want me to pick up all of your toys for you?

 

[Metla]

The topic isn't about failure rate, We have no idea what that is, nor do I consider that any rational adult would believe that there isn't a failure rate factored into all production cycles.

In regards to that, Pointing out your gear didn't fail isn't a valid counter point, its quite meaningless unless its presented to give some form of context for further discussion.

The best you can say is you have no idea about the back up service due to never having to use it, which also doesn't invalidate someone's poor experiences. This also makes attacking the person due to their experiences a quite immature stance to take.

 

[Jason Mullin]

Ya it sure is nice having someone from the company aknowledge that the more stuff they sell the more that gets sent back. All companies have hiccups but I feel like fanatec responding is more a sign that their stuff is junk. Which it absolutely is!

Indeed my junk CSR Elite from 2011 has probably over 5000 hours and still performs flawlessly.
My sons CSL is a few years old, he spilled half a coke INSIDE the drive assembly and on the board. Cracked the case, cleaned and let it dry. Fired right up.
Absolute rubbish I tell you.

 

[ColinMac]

The topic isn't about failure rate, We have no idea what that is, nor do I consider that any rational adult would believe that there isn't a failure rate factored into all production cycles.

In regards to that, Pointing out your gear didn't fail isn't a valid counter point, its quite meaningless unless its presented to give some form of context for further discussion.

The best you can say is you have no idea about the back up service due to never having to use it, which also doesn't invalidate someone's poor experiences. This also makes attacking the person due to their experiences a quite immature stance to take.

The topic isn't about failure rate, We have no idea what that is, nor do I consider that any rational adult would believe that there isn't a failure rate factored into all production cycles.

In regards to that, Pointing out your gear didn't fail isn't a valid counter point, its quite meaningless unless its presented to give some form of context for further discussion.

The best you can say is you have no idea about the back up service due to never having to use it, which also doesn't invalidate someone's poor experiences. This also makes attacking the person due to their experiences a quite immature stance to take.

Good grief.

Actually It is exactly about failure rate. Pointing out that I have a higher than normal number of components with Zero failure rate is absolutely an better indication of quality, as opposed to someone with a lower hardware sample rate. And I think relevant, rather than an irrelevant immature attack.

I also have experience of their customer service system as I've used it in earnest.

I've a friend with a simucube pro which has a 'niggle' - he's having to ship it back to them and then wait for a repair or a replace. Is that better? How long will it take? Can he sim race for the potential weeks its away.

I'm not the internet police of course. Every day I see someone break something, and then complain endlessly about the "crap quality" via the internet. I do take issue with someone slating the entire company based on their experience though. *Thats* a 'attacking' 'immature' stance, surely.

Similarly, how many people breaking QR pins, are taking no care with their wheel swaps for instance, until they break a pin of course. Is it the best design? No, of course not. It was price let, at at time where no-one else was even making QR's. Is it the build quality? Is it the care taken? I can tell you I've swapped between my three wheels literally 1000's of times this last four years, with not a single issue.

Completely done with this thread now, so you lot can grumble on yourselves.

 

[Metla]

And that's how your type a lot of fluff without saying anything.

 

[ColinMac]

And how, *exactly*, have you contributed to this thread ?

Any information? Corrections? Additional points of note?

No?

Didn't think so.

Welcome to my ignore list. Stay a while.

 

[Metla]

Bye. No doubt a positive move for both of us.

Interesting series of events on some levels, I'd expect and understand an emotional response from people who have invested time and money into a product and then been let down in regards to support after the product fails.

No idea why some people respond with another clearly emotional response and try and belittle the person with the poor experience.

That aside, the sheer breadth of negative user experience we are seeing across multiple outlets must be doing some reputational damage which must be concerning to Fanatec.

Or perhaps not, They might be drowning in profits and the unhappy plebs might fit into the forecasting.

 

[RasmusP]

That aside, the sheer breadth of negative user experience we are seeing across multiple outlets must be doing some reputational damage which must be concerning to Fanatec.

Or perhaps not, They might be drowning in profits and the unhappy pl

That's an interesting question, which sadly won't ever get answered because we don't have the stats.

In my opinion and from my experience fanatec can be fantastic but can also be frustrating.
It's a mixed bag depending on your region, your luck with support and the products you buy.
The pricing vs quality of the products is the same "mix".

The csw 2.5, McLaren v2 rim and v3 pedals are better than what you can get from Thrustmaster or Logitech.
Anything better than these products is a lot more expensive.

Is the simagic alpha mini better than the csl DD 8Nm?
Yes I think so. But it's also way more expensive!

Are there better rims out there? Definitely but I have a 100% cad replica of a real McLaren wheel which is brilliantly ergonomic and has plenty of good reachable buttons.
For 200€....!

The Thrustmaster rims I touched were all flexing more, had rough glue/stitches on the thumbs, made cracking noises under load...
Their qr is a plastic screw...

Better value? Maybe, sometimes..

Is the play in the qr annoying? Yep.
Is there an alternative? Not really!

The wheelbase is brilliant too. Fans aren't loud, it's sturdy, smooth and strong enough for almost everything.
The 2 ts-PC bases I had (got the first replaced) both had really annoying coil whine when the ffb kicked in during cornering.

The t300 a friend of mine ordered was pretty loud and looking at youtube, that's normal.

Logitech wheels are rattling like crazy..


A bit much text but what I want to say:
Somehow fanatec has a pretty solid place in the market. Higher priced than the entry stuff but you can still stay below 1000€ and get happy for years.


I would guess that there are simply lower expectations for Logitech and Thrustmaster so if something breaks, it's not triggering the same anger, because it was cheaper.

And yeah, heusinkveld sprints are a lot better and you get better support.
But I paid 350€ for the v3's and the 3 sprint pedals + baseplate would be 775€.

That's not "pay a bit more and you'll get more bang for the buck" anymore...



Anyway, these are just my thoughts and possible reasons for the situation.
I'd personally would've liked to pay 250€ instead of 199€ for the McLaren v2 and get the metal qr included.

I'd also would've liked to have the csl pedals that are replacing the csl elite pedals and don't have the same design flaws anymore a few years earlier..

But it is what it is, I can understand the frustrations, but there's no real competition for the clubsport range.

 

[Bonobhoy]

Hi just to keep a few that asked about my update with Fanatec Support.

As some may know i bought about £2000 worth of Fanatec products last year. Everything was ok until the handbrake started having issues. After the Support messing about for nearly 2 months back and fourth from emails i finally got an RMA send away.

Item was posted and 8 days later the box appeared at my house.

Tried the Handbrake and exactly the same issue as before,not being recognised properly. Also the item was missing some screws on the side of the unit.

I decided i'd had enough and opened it myself (even though you have to to mount it to the shifter)
and noticed that the 3mm Jack port is faulty and still loose. When the 3mm wire is only plugged in slightly and at an angle the Handbrake is picked up slightly in games (still not in fanatec software though).

How Incompetent are they? To have an item sent to you and you don't even start with the basics.
Im actually starting to believe they didnt even look at that much due to the exact same way id packaged it and screws missing etc. Nothing in the box like information or this is how we fixed the issue...just the handbrake and a wire.

After asking to speak to Supervisors i'm getting patched and ignored now which itself is a disgrace.
I have been unable to enjoy my Hobby as much as i thought i would due to this issue alone and im starting to understand why i was told to avoid fanatec products before i purchased.

The only reason why im keeping at this is what if this was a direct drive unit or wheel at thousands of pounds? Im really disappointed in this whole saga now and had enough ( i guess that how they make you feel i suppose).

They are still running the excuses of working from home and to many problems with high amount of support and RMA issues (which alone should send alarm bells ringing)

Again i had an issue with a valve Index controller and contacted them...Within 2 days i got an email stating they were sending out a brand new controller and to send back the broken one when i have time...outstanding customer support.

So....ive finally had enough of this issue that im now gonna buy a Handbrake from another company and let this one go now.

I learned my lesson here with this company. There are more and more threads also appearing on Fanatecs website about issues and also threads being deleted also.

Shame on them.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

So....ive finally had enough of this issue that im now gonna buy a Handbrake from another company and let this one go now.

Just get HE Handbrake and live happily ever after, I would ditch their DD wheel as well for something like SC2.

 

[RasmusP]

Ouch... That really sounds bad!
Especially the "excuses".. If you're so overwhelmed by orders and growth that the support is lacking, just send out a new handbrake!

I was thinking about getting a D-shape rim with the universal hub as an addition to my McLaren rim and when the new quick release comes out, getting a 8nm csl DD.
But the McLaren qr has rotational play on my csw 2.5, had way more play with the tested csl DD, my v3's are lacking adjustability.

And now more and more stories are popping up about the "support".

Right now I only have v3, McLaren v2 and csw 2.5.

If this continues, I'll sell the pedals and base, get sprints + proven DD and convert the rim with a tight QR...

 

[Enzo Fazzi]

Of course they see a percentage of returns, which climbs the more they sell.

I hope the percentage doesn't climb with more volume though, sounds like a lot of work to me.

 

[ColinMac]

I hope the percentage doesn't climb with more volume though, sounds like a lot of work to me.

Not the percentage, of course I meant the number of returns.

I can't understand this variance in response - they responded and couriered a new PSU to me for my DD1 foc, and once I was happy, collected the old one (probably to send to Bonobhoy up there lol) and this only took one email support ticket on their portal. This is only less than 6 weeks ago, so really in the time frames perhaps being discussed here.

All completed in less than two weeks.

I'd love a Heus handbrake - I don't like the old design Fanatec one. But I don't think they're equivalent prices, so will stick for now.

 

[RedBull48]

I hope the percentage doesn't climb with more volume though, sounds like a lot of work to me.

Any plans for HE to develop their own wheel base? I would happily run an entire build of Heusinkveld equipment

You guys are the gold standard of quality and what competitors should strive for in terms of customer service in my opinion.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

I would happily run an entire build of Heusinkveld equipment

For that we would need HE H-Shifter first.

 

[Enzo Fazzi]

Any plans for HE to develop their own wheel base? I would happily run an entire build of Heusinkveld equipment

You guys are the gold standard of quality and what competitors should strive for in terms of customer service in my opinion.

Ehh no. That's not really something up our alley.

 

[DomB_Fanatec]

Hi just to keep a few that asked about my update with Fanatec Support.

As some may know i bought about £2000 worth of Fanatec products last year. Everything was ok until the handbrake started having issues. After the Support messing about for nearly 2 months back and fourth from emails i finally got an RMA send away.

Item was posted and 8 days later the box appeared at my house.

Tried the Handbrake and exactly the same issue as before,not being recognised properly. Also the item was missing some screws on the side of the unit.

I decided i'd had enough and opened it myself (even though you have to to mount it to the shifter)
and noticed that the 3mm Jack port is faulty and still loose. When the 3mm wire is only plugged in slightly and at an angle the Handbrake is picked up slightly in games (still not in fanatec software though).

How Incompetent are they? To have an item sent to you and you don't even start with the basics.
Im actually starting to believe they didnt even look at that much due to the exact same way id packaged it and screws missing etc. Nothing in the box like information or this is how we fixed the issue...just the handbrake and a wire.

After asking to speak to Supervisors i'm getting patched and ignored now which itself is a disgrace.
I have been unable to enjoy my Hobby as much as i thought i would due to this issue alone and im starting to understand why i was told to avoid fanatec products before i purchased.

The only reason why im keeping at this is what if this was a direct drive unit or wheel at thousands of pounds? Im really disappointed in this whole saga now and had enough ( i guess that how they make you feel i suppose).

They are still running the excuses of working from home and to many problems with high amount of support and RMA issues (which alone should send alarm bells ringing)

Again i had an issue with a valve Index controller and contacted them...Within 2 days i got an email stating they were sending out a brand new controller and to send back the broken one when i have time...outstanding customer support.

So....ive finally had enough of this issue that im now gonna buy a Handbrake from another company and let this one go now.

I learned my lesson here with this company. There are more and more threads also appearing on Fanatecs website about issues and also threads being deleted also.

Shame on them.

Hi Bonobhoy,

As I said earlier in the thread, your experience is not normal, and I would like to look into this case. I sent you a PM on May 27th but you have not replied.

 

[Neilski]

Hi Bonobhoy,

As I said earlier in the thread, your experience is not normal, and I would like to look into this case. I sent you a PM on May 27th but you have not replied.

Lest there be any doubt, I can confirm that @DomB_Fanatec's identity as part of the Fanatec team has previously been verified.

 

[crooksy]

Best thing to do is ditch the fantatec handbrake toy and build your own hydraulic handbrake, lots of fun and easy to do

 

[Durge Driven]

Worse issue is that latest beta driver firmware update has bricked some users wheels

Fanatec Driver 442 (Beta) for CSL, CSW and Podium WB (all wheels) - Page 15

https://forum.fanatec.com/discussion/comment/86806#Comment_86806 As for the McLaren wheels -- the bootloaderRecovery doesn't even seem to launch.

forum.fanatec.com