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Nokia to Replace 43 Million Batteries

Posted by samzenpus on from the no-more-burning-phone dept.

mysqlbytes writes "According to a recent post on the BBC's website, Nokia has admitted to a problem in the BL-5C batteries made by Matsushita between December 2005 and November 2006. For some of us, it means longer battery life with a new lease of life and for some of us, no more burnt legs. You can check out the product advisory here."

17 of 72 comments (clear)

  1. Burnt Legs? by pete-classic · · Score: 5, Funny

    I understand that this is a legitimate recall. That said, if your phone is burning your legs while it's charging I'm pretty sure you're using it wrong.

    -Peter

    1. Re:Burnt Legs? by SpottedKuh · · Score: 5, Funny

      That said, if your phone is burning your legs while it's charging I'm pretty sure you're using it wrong.

      Oh, crap. I always wondered why I couldn't walk more than three feet from the wall while I'm charging my phone.

    2. Re:Burnt Legs? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I wonder seriously about this. I put in the code from the back of my battery and the site cheerfully informed me, "Your battery may be replaced". Great, I thought. I'll just pop in my contact info and they'll mail me a new one. Great, right??

      Uhm...next page says, "Your battery will NOT be replaced". Think they coulda told me that BEFORE I put in my contact (marketing) info?

      I smell a scam here. Or at least, scummy tactics.

    3. Re:Burnt Legs? by nacturation · · Score: 2, Funny

      Oh, crap. I always wondered why I couldn't walk more than three feet from the wall while I'm charging my phone.



      You think you have it bad? If the lid of a toilet I'm standing in front of accidentally slams down, I can't walk more *two* feet from it until I put the lid back up. Then there's the pain.

      Luxury. Why, in my day we didn't have seats or toilets. We used to have to lay it along the ground, six feet from where we were sitting, and hope nobody tripped over it while we went.
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  2. This site discussed on TheDailyWTF by willpall · · Score: 5, Informative

    Link to forum thread

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  3. Admitting? by glitch23 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "Admitting" seems a bit strong. There is no evidence yet of them denying the matter. It just takes time for reports to come in and see that there is a pattern forming and *realize* all those issues may not be coincidence. "Admitting" to there being an issue implies they were trying to cover up something. At least that's the way I view it. I don't see any wrongdoing, yet.

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  4. WTF Javascript by nytrokiss · · Score: 2, Informative

    Yes they have this massive WTF on there website script! http://forums.worsethanfailure.com/forums/thread/1 27881.aspx

  5. If you do have a BL-5C by 88Seconds · · Score: 5, Informative

    Go to the following URL http://www.nokia.com/batteryreplacement/en/ to check if you are affected

  6. Re:Forty. Three. Million. by timmarhy · · Score: 4, Interesting
    hardly. It's not your fault, but most people have a lot of trouble comprehending large numbers of things. I'd guess nokia will simply have all their dealers as collection sites, and have them send the boxes back to them where they will scan the bar code on the battery to mark it as returned and then ship the batteries off to a scrap metal recycler. 43 million would amount to a couple of road train loads.

    i'd be suprised if there was significant labour invovled in the process.

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  7. Oh no! by evilviper · · Score: 2, Funny

    Oh no, no... You've got it all wrong. I've seen countless PR people on TV and they all say the same thing... It's only cheap, off-brand batteries that explode, NEVER the manufacturer's own batteries.

    The news media, of course, never argues the point.

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  8. Re:Substitute "Dealerships" for "Workers". by jombeewoof · · Score: 3, Interesting

    But you're assuming 8 hour days, that's only 12 or so batteries an hour.

    I think it would be more like 1000 dealers doing at least 25 batteries an hour, for 11 hours a day 7 days a week.

    I'm too lazy to do the math, but it's a less than 86 weeks. It still is an incredible amount of labor, but at $9 an hour at the very best it's not really all that much money, they'll hire an extra worker or 2 in each shop it's not all that much in the grand scheme of things.

    *disclaimer.
    all numbers pulled out of nowhere, and probably mean next to nothing.

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  9. Re:Substitute "Dealerships" for "Workers". by nacturation · · Score: 3, Informative

    A thousand dealerships, each exchanging 100 batteries a day, in five day work weeks, for 86 consecutive weeks? I don't know where you live, but in my city alone there's easily more than 1000 retail stores you could go to buy a Nokia phone. And let's say there's 1000 such cities around the world. 86 weeks is 14,448 hours. With 1000 dealers in 1000 cities they could have this entire thing done in 14.5 hours or one to two working days. Or half an hour a day for a month.
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  10. Re:Forty. Three. Million. by Hognoxious · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'd guess nokia will simply have all their dealers as collection sites
    Thanks for pointing that out, it's completely different. So the dealers are entirely staffed by robots - who'd have though it?
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  11. Risky business by Taagehornet · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I bet Nokia's rather happy they didn't solder the battery onto the board, but opted for the replaceable solution.

    Considering that every month brings with it a new story of a major hardware manufacturer having to recall xx million devices due to faulty batteries, I'm impressed that Apple had the guts to go for non-replaceables.

    1. Re:Risky business by Zebedeu · · Score: 3, Funny

      Yeah, but Apple would never have this kind of problem because they get their batteries from reputable suppliers, like Sony.

  12. Re:26-CHARACTER PRODUCT IDENTIFICATION NUMBER by phozz+bare · · Score: 4, Informative

    You don't need to call anyone. If you had actually read the advisory you may have noticed that "if the battery identification number does not contain 26 characters, it is not subject to this product advisory".

  13. For those who don't know by postermmxvicom · · Score: 2, Informative

    Matsushita = Panasonic

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