Free Battery? What Free Battery?

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I was just wondering if anybody who ordered in a Solo directly from 3DR has received their free battery (assuming, of course that you have received the Solo)? My Solo was received on June 23rd as a drop shipment from the Chinese factory and did not include the "free" battery. It has been a good ten days since I sent my first inquiry to 3DR "Help" and have only received a "we are really busy" automated response. I just sent the third email to see if I can get some idea as to when to expect my free battery. I also do have the gimbal on order so I should qualify for the offer. I was just curious if anybody else has had a similar issue.
 
me too. I was told mid-July at the earliest (and I pre-ordered in April)
 
Call them instead. This is a customer service issue, not a support issue. Call them and you will get a quicker answer.
 
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I got mine :)

But I got it when my Solo bricked during an update. I just kept my batteries and the one on the Solo they sent and told them we are square !

Otherwise, no luck.

They told me when I called that they messed up and everyone should have got the free one with their order from 3DR. But oddly they could not tell me when or how it was going to be sent.

I think there is a serious battery shortage.
 
I contact them last week about it and Just received this email today from 3DR.

Hi, XXXXXX


Thank you for contacting and been interested in 3D Robotics products.

All the orders before the 15th of July are going to receive a free battery, at the time we are waiting for the manufacturer to send us a new batch of batteries so they can be distributed.

For further questions and information, please don't, hesitate to contact us, we will be glad to assist you.

Best Regards,

Owen Torres

Customer Advocate

Mon-Fri 8am to 5pm (PST)

855 982 2898
 
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That answers a lot of questions. Thank you all for the replies, as now I don't feel like 3DR is just picking on me. It sounds like they have a serious battery back log to deal with. I guess all we can do is be patient.
 
I preordered in April. I also ordered (paid) for an additional battery. They made mention that I would get an extra battery because of the delay. I got my Solo AND the battery I PAID for, but then I said well what about the free battery?

Their response was well that is back ordered. I told them (after several conversations and a supervisor) that just refund me the $150 for the battery I ordered and I will just keep the one they shipped me (the extra one).. They said no that I had to ship back the battery first and then they would refund me the $150 and in time I would get the extra (free one).

I said how in the heck does that make sense that I should pay for shipping back when people at Best Buy are getting a free battery now with their purchase, FINALLY a supervisor saw the light and let me keep the battery and are refunding me (via check mind you) the $150. Took over an hour and 3 people to understand how ridiculous that was.

All in all, I got my free battery, and I will get the other with my Gimbal (I hope).

Ryan G
 
I preordered in April. I also ordered (paid) for an additional battery. They made mention that I would get an extra battery because of the delay. I got my Solo AND the battery I PAID for, but then I said well what about the free battery?

Their response was well that is back ordered. I told them (after several conversations and a supervisor) that just refund me the $150 for the battery I ordered and I will just keep the one they shipped me (the extra one).. They said no that I had to ship back the battery first and then they would refund me the $150 and in time I would get the extra (free one).

I said how in the heck does that make sense that I should pay for shipping back when people at Best Buy are getting a free battery now with their purchase, FINALLY a supervisor saw the light and let me keep the battery and are refunding me (via check mind you) the $150. Took over an hour and 3 people to understand how ridiculous that was.

All in all, I got my free battery, and I will get the other with my Gimbal (I hope).

Ryan G

Same here I preordered in April told I'd receive a free battery but only got the extra battery I paid for. I just assume that the free battery would come the the gimbal. Thinking I should do the same as Ryan and get a refund.
 
Ordered April 16, B+H basically sent me a new invoice after calling them for the 4th time about the battery (first 3 times were me asking about release of Solo, which I received June 30th)
The item is still on pre-order, and the B+H operator said "They haven't released the batteries yet"
To which I replied, "Actually they have because I just bought one from Best Buy." And that was pretty much the end of the conversation.

I mean I want to yell at them, because as stated before, I specifically chose to buy from them because of who they are, and the fact that BB received Solos before April pre-orders (only 3 days after the product ANNOUNCEMENT) -- what burns me is, I chose Paypal 6 months interest free to pay it off, whereas if I chose Best Buy, I would have gotten 12 or 18 months to pay it off.

And let's not get started on where our damn gimbals are.
 
80.. make sure you talk to a supervisor.

Ryan G
 
Ordered my Solo from BestBuy.com on the release date....didn't get it till June 18. On the website, it said free bonus battery. When the Solo delivered, no battery. Called BB customer service, told them no free bonus battery was included...so they expedited it.
 
I preordered in April. I also ordered (paid) for an additional battery. They made mention that I would get an extra battery because of the delay. I got my Solo AND the battery I PAID for, but then I said well what about the free battery?

Their response was well that is back ordered. I told them (after several conversations and a supervisor) that just refund me the $150 for the battery I ordered and I will just keep the one they shipped me (the extra one).. They said no that I had to ship back the battery first and then they would refund me the $150 and in time I would get the extra (free one).

I said how in the heck does that make sense that I should pay for shipping back when people at Best Buy are getting a free battery now with their purchase, FINALLY a supervisor saw the light and let me keep the battery and are refunding me (via check mind you) the $150. Took over an hour and 3 people to understand how ridiculous that was.

All in all, I got my free battery, and I will get the other with my Gimbal (I hope).

Ryan G

Wait a min. People are getting free batteries from best buy. I got mine from there.... But no free battery. I actually pre-ordered from 3dr and just cancelled the order.
 
Wait a min. People are getting free batteries from best buy. I got mine from there.... But no free battery. I actually pre-ordered from 3dr and just cancelled the order.
Call them and mention the free bonus battery that it states on the website
 
I went to BB to purchase the Solo as a walk in customer. They had one in stock, but no spare batteries.

The supervisors at BB couldn't figure out how to get me a spare battery (nor an extra that I wanted to pay for) as none of their systems would allow them to purchase one, order one, get one dropped shipped to me, or anything else they could think of.

Our final solution was to drop the price of the Solo by $150 to compensate for the missing free battery. This worked for me at the time (but I would still like a couple of batteries, especially since the Solo charger is AC only).
 
Wait a min. People are getting free batteries from best buy. I got mine from there.... But no free battery. I actually pre-ordered from 3dr and just cancelled the order.
You would have had to ask for it when you bought it. I forgot to ask and had to go back with the receipt and show them the website. Funny thing was they were having trouble getting it to go through and at one point the manager said, "I think it is only free if you buy online." To which I said, "really? How do you do that since it specifically states online Unavailable to ship, store pick up only," That shut him up pretty quick and he magically found a way to do it.

I am sorry you did not get the battery you were entitled to. But at this point, since they have removed it from their website, I think you would have a difficult time getting the people at the store to believe it.
 
I did not receive my free battery either. I sent an email and got the following back 2 days later. I'm satisfied with their response as it seems reasonable to me.

25s0x91.jpg
 
I sent logs into 3DR and followed up with a phone call. The phone call seemed to get my ticket escalated quicker than just sending the ticket it. I actually ordered my Solo from Dronefly (who didn't actually start shipping until last week) but was in Boston on business and was bored, hoped on BB website to check availability and saw they has one. I bought it online for store pickup and the battery auto added to the cart. When I got the BB store both Solo and the battery were waiting for me.
 
so, how is it that we are all having to await our backordered batteries, but they had enough to re-stock Best Buy yesterday?
 

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