Maker of IoT garage door opener disables customer's device after leaving bad review

[midian182]

If you’re going to put out a product, you have to be prepared for some negative reviews. But not everyone takes criticism well: one company reacted to a customer’s comments so badly that it decided to remotely disable the complainer’s device.

Garadget, a startup that makes a $99 cloud-enabled door opener for garages, more than doubled its $30,000 target during an Indiegogo campaign last year. Its Wi-Fi device, which uses Particle’s Photon module, lets owners remotely operate the door, and check if it’s open or closed, from any location around the world using the mobile app.

Last Saturday, one unhappy customer, “R. Martin,” took to the Garadget community board to report that he was having problems with the iPhone app. “Just installed and attempting to register a door when the app started doing this. Have uninstalled and reinstalled iphone app, powered phone off/on - wondering what kind of piece of shit I just purchased here...” he wrote.

Having received no response to his first message, Martin took to the Garadget Amazon page to vent his frustration. The device currently has 83 positive reviews, but an irate Martin added to the (now 33) critical ones with a 1-star rating. He wrote: “Junk – DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY – iPhone app is a piece of junk, crashes constantly, start-up company that obviously has not performed proper quality assurance tests on their products.”

Hardly the most offense online review ever written, but Garadget founder Denis Grisak didn’t take criticism of his company’s product well. Martin was banned from the forum until December 27, 2019, and had his device disconnected from its servers, essentially bricking it.

Martin,

The abusive language here and in your negative Amazon review, submitted minutes after experiencing a technical difficulty, only demonstrates your poor impulse control. I’m happy to provide the technical support to the customers on my Saturday night but I’m not going to tolerate any tantrums.

At this time your only option is return Garadget to Amazon for refund. Your unit ID 2f0036… will be denied server connection.

Grisak has since admitted to The Register that his actions were a “bad PR move,” and Martin’s server connection has since been restored. "The language wasn't too bad for some venues, but Garadget enjoyed a very civilized community so that was a departure from baseline," Grisak said.

"It wasn't the review either – the negativity happens (deserved or not) and Amazon makes sure the vocabulary is clean there. The customer was in the very first stage of setting up his account and was already hating it. It didn't look like salvageable relation. As now learned, cutting the losses there didn't really end the losses."

A message was also posted on the community boards.

Ok, calm down everybody. Save your pitchforks and torches for your elected representatives. This only lack the death treats[sic] now.

The firing of the customer was never about the Amazon review, just wanted to distance from the toxic individual ASAP. Admittedly not a slickest PR move on my part. Note taken.

A quote from a random guy.

PS: Anybody has Streisand's phone number?

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/68811-maker-iot-garage-door-opener-disables-customer-device.html

 

[Uncle Al]

Looks like a clear case of ALL parties involved not thinking through before firing off messages. That is the ONE biggest problem with the online services ... disappointed users tend to fire off messages and eMails that they probably would not send if they really sat down and thought things through. I think all of us are guilty of that at one point or another ... but it's not a good excuse. In this case the mfg. should step up and be the bigger man, call the disappointed customer and try to resolve the issue. In any case he should NEVER denigrate the service or cut it off; that is immature and sends a terrible signal to the buying customers, which will only hurt him in the long run.

I have found a few companies out there that stand by the old Sears motto of "Satisfaction guaranteed or your money back" and I always am sure to promote that outstanding policy. Their product may have disappointed me, but understanding their obligation to the customers carries the day every time in my book!

 

[insect]

Also sounds like a product for people that don't do their research. You can get an actual cloud-connected garage door opener from Chamberlain for <$200 on sale that allows for more fine-tuned control and information.

 

[Skjorn]

I think I would only use this if I forgot to shut the door or someone I know is at my house and I can let them in. Other than that seems kinda pointless.

Both of these are extremely rare cases. To me this is as gimmicky as the wireless door locks etc.

 

[davislane1]

Pretty thin skinned on both sides here. Dude must not have a lot of experience with the general public. People will make a federal case out of just about anything. In fact, I was in a store just the other day where a customer demanded to speak to a district manager because the store manager wouldn't let her use a coupon more than a month past expiration. Stormed off claiming that the company was providing terrible customer service.

 

[Skidmarksdeluxe]

Tough luck. If some people want to haul out their phones to try impress their buddies with their fangled smartphone connected door opener, that's their problem. To me it's far simpler just to press a button on my key fob to get the same RELIABLE result.

 

[Daithi]

What part of remotely bricking a customer's device did he think constituted good impulse control. Not only was it poorly justified over toxicity, what kind of message is he sending to prospective buyers if they find out they could end up with a $99 paperweight because the creator was in a bit of a mood. Hopefully he might learn something from the backlash but that doesn't seem likely since he just put it down to "cutting his losses".

 

[Camikazi]

I will never use an IoT device that phones home, unless I can use it without having it talk to a third party (and yes, home servers are third party since I don't control them) I won't buy them. IoT devices are not in anyway necessary so why would I buy something that I don't need and is at the control of a third party?

 

[Kibaruk]

I'm sorry but if:

Just installed and attempting to register a door when the app started doing this. Have uninstalled and reinstalled iphone app, powered phone off/on - wondering what kind of piece of **** I just purchased here...

is enough to be tiled of as toxic and be left to rot, the company is in for a bumpy ride.

All it was needed was someone to actually approach the rightfully disgruntled customer and lend him a hand. If it didn't work, offer a refund and that's it, 0 handle of customers.

If I get a piece of feces that doesn't work, will look for support, and probably leave a bad review as well, the time spent trying to make something that should've worked out of the box to actually work is not something I'm looking forward to, and if the support is good and helps me work through whatever issue it was, if it had been my fault I will change that bad review. If not, I will probably give one more star in amazon saying customer support was awesome, yet the issue was still there where it shouldn't to begin with..

 

[Emexrulsier]

Oh the irony "poor impulse control". He saw a couple of negative reviews, he raged and banned the unit and sent a flame reply . Once he calmed down he changed his mind.


Damn if the hardware around my home could be shut down remotely due to bad reveiws, 50% of it would be expensive bricks by now (from big companies aswell like Nvidia, Samsung and Onkyo and LG). I do feel nowadays so much hardware is pumped out with aims to aid directly to the bottom line very little QA is actually done.

 

[insect]

I do feel nowadays so much hardware is pumped out with aims to aid directly to the bottom line very little QA is actually done.

It's a bit of a side topic, but actually product reliability is higher than ever, especially for everyday things. See example: http://www.nola.com/business/index.ssf/2012/02/cars_have_improved_quality_rel.html

There are a few reasons for why this is, but namely bad news travels faster. It's super easy to research a product now and see what buyers are getting and what they think. However, public perception is that products are getting worse. Generally, this comes from two things: bad stuff sticks out in our minds and technology moves faster than most people learn. For example: Granny buys a new car and wants to do something simple, such as turn on the radio to 101.1 FM. It used to be a physical button and a physical dial. Now its either all touch-screen or voice controlled - neither of which she is comfortable with. Rather than admin she doesn't know how to use and didn't bother to read the manual, she posts a negative review that the "radio doesn't work". Generally - any product you buy today, unless it's super-cutting edge niche market stuff that's semi-beta, is better than the product you bought yesterday in terms of quality.

 

[OcelotRex]

I'm sorry but if:

Just installed and attempting to register a door when the app started doing this. Have uninstalled and reinstalled iphone app, powered phone off/on - wondering what kind of piece of **** I just purchased here...

is enough to be tiled of as toxic and be left to rot, the company is in for a bumpy ride.

The article appears to indicate that the post in the user forums occurred on a Saturday night and the amazon review was posted minutes after the forum post. That's an unrealistic expectation for support unless it's a company like EVGA that has staff on hand 24/7 365 (I think they have Christmas staff).

The owner wanted to force the individual to return the product instead of offering support which is within their right to do so even if it's a bad PR move. If other customers are not having issues with their app it could be the irate users phone that was the issue, something the company could do nothing about.

 

[Darius Moon]

I think the owner made more passive aggressive statements (and actions) than the customer, so why folks are very much on the customers side. (In this case)

 

[ddferrari]

"Ok, calm down everybody." THIS is how he starts his statement that was supposedly meant to put out a fire? Sounds like a condescending attitude all the way around.

 

[ddferrari]

I'm sorry but if:

Just installed and attempting to register a door when the app started doing this. Have uninstalled and reinstalled iphone app, powered phone off/on - wondering what kind of piece of **** I just purchased here...

is enough to be tiled of as toxic and be left to rot, the company is in for a bumpy ride.

The article appears to indicate that the post in the user forums occurred on a Saturday night and the amazon review was posted minutes after the forum post. That's an unrealistic expectation for support unless it's a company like EVGA that has staff on hand 24/7 365 (I think they have Christmas staff).

The owner wanted to force the individual to return the product instead of offering support which is within their right to do so even if it's a bad PR move. If other customers are not having issues with their app it could be the irate users phone that was the issue, something the company could do nothing about.

Said the guy from Garadget...

 

[Makson]

This is typical of of current society's 'Gadget Madness', as Skid wrote, relating to a button on a key fob. That is a huge improvement on stopping the vehicle, taking the keys to the garage door, unlocking ..... then the reverse scenario.
The overuse of 'gadgets and apps' is replacing common sense in many people.

 

[lazer]

I once bought some shoes on line. They were so bad but since I waited too long to return them I was stuck with a really low class uncomfortable cheap quality pair of shoes.

So I went to their website and told everyone my low opinion of their shoes. Mine was the first and only review of their shoes at that time. They contacted me first asking nicely for me to take down my review or modify it; I noticed that there were several that extolled the blessings of these crappy shoes, obviously written by inhouse people.

Finally they refunded my money and took down my review. So that ended well for me, but poorly for the next sap who buys from them.

Since then I always discount much positive ratings on web sites.

 

[hkhan1989]

I had a similar issue with a Google App developer for "Mobius USB Tools".
Much like here the developer would only respond once an angry review had been written.

The developer banned my google account with his license authentication server and refunded my money (did not refund my previous purchases, but that's another issue).

My point, as a developer, customer service is very important, the customer has purchased your product, if it is not working as advertised, then they have a right to complain.

Work with the customer to resolve the issue - it just looks terribly unprofessional when developers get in a hump about ONE customer review. It only leads to techspot writing articles about your customer service instead of your product iteslf!

Reviews aren't written in stone, if developers can rectify the issue, a review can be updated.

 

[Darius Moon]

Since then I always discount much positive ratings on web sites.

Same. As an E business, I received calls from companies that could post x good reviews/likes for $. Even some of the Rip off branded websites that would offer services to minimize or remove bad posts.

 

[Wytefang]

Owner sounds like a douche

 

[Wytefang]

Owner sounds like a douche

I should say the company owner/founder/President sounds like a massive douche.

 

[Kibaruk]

This is the first time I read someone quoting themselves...

 

[Kibaruk]

This is the first time I read someone quoting themselves...

Let me make it a second time... see how it reads? see it? get closer to the screen! Yeah, that's how it's seen...

 

[Makson]

Let me make it a second time... see how it reads? see it? get closer to the screen! Yeah, that's how it's seen...

Look closer and read again, slowly and carefully, the comment was re-quoted in order to add stronger words.

Let me make it a second time... see how it reads? see it? get closer to the screen! Yeah, that's how it's seen...

Without prejudice, the quoted comment above has several serious mistakes, easily seen, and yet you have the gall to pick on another person’s correct comment.