Agent Orange
Veteran Member
Every once in a while things seem to work out. I have a sunroom, 10' x 16' with an attached deck at the rear of the house, and we spend a considerable amount of time there. About a year ago, last November, I bought a new tv for the sunroom, a 41" Vizio smart unit. The tv had excellent picture quality and the built-in wi-fi was a plus. Somewhere along the line the Vizio did an 'update' and for a while everything seemed okay except when I went to 'closed caption', which now appears to microscopic. There were apps to change the font, style, and size but none of this worked.
One day as I was shopping in the local Costco store, I stopped by the office and explained to one of the managers what happened. The tv had a 1 year manufacturer's warranty and the store always adds an extra year. The manager said that because over 90 days had elapsed, I would have to deal with Vizio, and they provided the phone number. I went through all of the levels and finally was able to talk to someone in engineering. I explained that the set works really well with the exception that the closed captioning was AFU, and also that the set would turn itself on and off at random times. Further, if I happened to be streaming, it would suddenly jump to off-air. The tech guy said they would schedule a local tv repairman and they would call me for a convenient time.
The repairman arrived with his tools and 2 cardboard boxes which were the new tuner and mainboard. He had the set apart in minutes, installed the new boards, and the set worked perfectly. He said "we need to due an update" and upon completion the closed caption was very small again. He then called Vizio and told them that it could not repair the set because of a faulty update, packed up and left.
From here on out it bordered on bazaar. Vizio assured me that they would standby the product and "not to worry". The first offer was to replace the set. I tried to explain that the tv was probably okay and the the download was faulty. The Vizio lision rep couldn't believe that their engineering folks would send out a bad firmware package and it absolutely had to be something in the tv. He further said that they would ship a "refurbished" set and I said no way, and that I didn't want someone else's problem child. We went around and around about that point and he countered with "how about we just refund you the store's wholesale price". I said that was out too. So, as it turned out, Vizio sent a NIB and I dropped the original into the shipping box and they had UPS pick it up at the house. The new set worked perfectly until the update and then I had the original bad closed caption feature.
I had a good inside number with "Ben's" extension, and he seemed to be right on top of things. He wanted me to run the tv for 4 or 6 weeks to see if another download would fix the problem. I told him that was okay with me and that's the road we took. Somewhere along the way "Ben" disappeared and no new download ever seemed to be forthcoming.
Cut to last Wednesday. I had all of my receipts and email correspondence as well as the Costco "consigliere" case number with me as I went to the Costco office searching for the store manager. After as short wait, I found him, and he seemed to be a very knowledgeable and pleasant fellow. I briefed him on what had transpired since the original purchase date and made mention that my previous encounter with the Costco store people was just a handoff to Vizio. He said that it was all bs and uncalled for. He told me to go home, grab that tv, bring it back to the store, then get a full instore purchase card for the full price that I paid.
So, I arrived at the store and no less than 3 manager types met me and escorted me through their tv inventory. I wound up with a 43" Roku which actually had a smaller footprint than the 41" Vizio. I can't say enough about the service - I really didn't expect this sort of outcome or the decent way that I was treated. Bottom line is I'm okay with my local Costco.:thumbsup:
One day as I was shopping in the local Costco store, I stopped by the office and explained to one of the managers what happened. The tv had a 1 year manufacturer's warranty and the store always adds an extra year. The manager said that because over 90 days had elapsed, I would have to deal with Vizio, and they provided the phone number. I went through all of the levels and finally was able to talk to someone in engineering. I explained that the set works really well with the exception that the closed captioning was AFU, and also that the set would turn itself on and off at random times. Further, if I happened to be streaming, it would suddenly jump to off-air. The tech guy said they would schedule a local tv repairman and they would call me for a convenient time.
The repairman arrived with his tools and 2 cardboard boxes which were the new tuner and mainboard. He had the set apart in minutes, installed the new boards, and the set worked perfectly. He said "we need to due an update" and upon completion the closed caption was very small again. He then called Vizio and told them that it could not repair the set because of a faulty update, packed up and left.
From here on out it bordered on bazaar. Vizio assured me that they would standby the product and "not to worry". The first offer was to replace the set. I tried to explain that the tv was probably okay and the the download was faulty. The Vizio lision rep couldn't believe that their engineering folks would send out a bad firmware package and it absolutely had to be something in the tv. He further said that they would ship a "refurbished" set and I said no way, and that I didn't want someone else's problem child. We went around and around about that point and he countered with "how about we just refund you the store's wholesale price". I said that was out too. So, as it turned out, Vizio sent a NIB and I dropped the original into the shipping box and they had UPS pick it up at the house. The new set worked perfectly until the update and then I had the original bad closed caption feature.
I had a good inside number with "Ben's" extension, and he seemed to be right on top of things. He wanted me to run the tv for 4 or 6 weeks to see if another download would fix the problem. I told him that was okay with me and that's the road we took. Somewhere along the way "Ben" disappeared and no new download ever seemed to be forthcoming.
Cut to last Wednesday. I had all of my receipts and email correspondence as well as the Costco "consigliere" case number with me as I went to the Costco office searching for the store manager. After as short wait, I found him, and he seemed to be a very knowledgeable and pleasant fellow. I briefed him on what had transpired since the original purchase date and made mention that my previous encounter with the Costco store people was just a handoff to Vizio. He said that it was all bs and uncalled for. He told me to go home, grab that tv, bring it back to the store, then get a full instore purchase card for the full price that I paid.
So, I arrived at the store and no less than 3 manager types met me and escorted me through their tv inventory. I wound up with a 43" Roku which actually had a smaller footprint than the 41" Vizio. I can't say enough about the service - I really didn't expect this sort of outcome or the decent way that I was treated. Bottom line is I'm okay with my local Costco.:thumbsup:
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