samsung company damage control for harassing burnt victim

Samsung handed lesson in damage control

ninemsn staff

 

10:13am December 10, 2013

 

December 10, 2013: A young US man who made and shared a video about his Samsung phone catching fire has made a second, even more popular clip after being threatened by the company via letter.

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Question. You’re an electronics giant and one of your customers buys a phone which then catches fire and they post a video complaining about it – what do you do?

 

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If your answer was anything other than “send them a long letter telling them off” you’re not cut out to work at Samsung.

The electronics giant were handed a valuable lesson in damage control after a US customer made a video about his smartphone catching fire and their attempts to quietly resolve the issue backfired.

YouTube user ghostlyrich posted a video earlier this month explaining how his Galaxy S4 had caught fire after he plugged it in to charge.

Samsung eventually agrees to replace the faulty phone but, with a huge list of conditions attached – including removing the clip – he returns to YouTube to blast the company in a video that had four times as many views as the first.

In his initial post, ghostlyrich goes into detail about the damage caused to the phone and how the resulting fire could have been far worse had the battery exploded.

The video was made after Samsung requested proof of the faulty phone, he says in the clip.

Soon after, the Korean electronics giant sent him an offer to replace the Galaxy, but with a hefty list of conditions.

Firstly, he was to remove the original YouTube video and not make any others.

“As a condition of exchanging the phone with a similar model, [name withheld] agrees to remove his Youtube video… or any other link or statement relating to these matters and refrain from making other videos or statements about or relating to the matters set out herein,” the settlement document – which ghostlyrich posted online – read.

The settlement also called for ghostlyrich to give up any option of suing Samsung in relation to the faulty product, now or in the future.

And in a move that could be seen as covering up a serious fault, asks that he “will at all times maintain the confidentiality of this settlement and will not divulge, either directly or indirectly, in any manner whatsoever, the terms, details, facts, or related discussions about this settlement to any persons for any reason whatsoever.”

Riled by the response from Samsung, ghostlyrich returned to YouTube in the new clip and unleashed on the company and its product.

“Once I start reading through this, it’s a whole lot of bulls–t,” he said.

After doing some research on the Galaxy S4, ghostlyrich says he learnt of an apartment burning down because of a similar issue and accused Samsung of trying to cover up a serious defect.

“One thing you have to do when you find out there’s a problem is let people know. Instead, this entire letter here is them saying I’m not allowed to tell you it’s a big thing,” he said.

He then issued a warning to other users of the popular product to “be careful of them if thing explodes.”

Source: YouTube, YouTube
Author: Dave Meddows. Approving editor: Simon Black.