Random: Nintendo Fixed One Man's Out Of Warranty, First-Gen 3DS For Next To Nothing

that's how a good customer service should look like !

Twice now I've sent in an out of warranty device (2 different 1st Gen 3DS-es) and Nintendo repaired them... Once for free and once for around $40. They're just great with customer service.
It seems to me that they consider your Nintendo account as well because I've had the customer service rep comment about my longtime loyalty and thank me for my loyalty, then had them explain the repair process.

I had trouble with my Switch going into handheld mode. The joycons would only connect one at a time, pretty annoying.
I sent it in on a Tuesday afternoon, and by Thursday night I got an email saying that it was sent to the postal carrier and would be delivered by Friday at 10am. I didn't believe it but it happened. My mail doesn't come until afternoon, and Nintendo had it across the country and in my house with, 4 new joycons, and the problem was fixed. It cost me 13 dollars in shipping, as I sent it though a private company.
They did well for me.

Nintendo actually doing the best possible thing and replacing the buttons and Circle Pad seemingly free of charge is just excellent. I mean, it makes sense, mainboard replacements require you to poke about in there anyway, so why not gain a little goodwill for the price of some plastic?

My original white Wii would not play Xenoblade Chronicles. The older DVD drives didn't handle dual layer discs very well so Nintendo repaired it for free. This was in 2012 so the Wii was 5 or 6 years old at that point and out of warranty.

On the flip side, if the components are that cheap to replace, Nintendo is clearly ripping us all off!

Had the same problem with my white wii but I used that as an excuse to buy a new black one.

I have called the Nintendo customer service number twice.

In 2015 I contacted Nintendo because my 3ds circle pad was broken. I forget the exact quote but at first they said it would cost something like $60 to fix. After talking with the rep for a few minutes and asking if there was any way to reduce that price he eventually found a way for me to get it fixed for nothing more than the shipping costs.

My second experience with their Customer service came just about a month ago when I bought a eShop card from Target. I got home and it didn't work. At first they thought I was typing in the wrong code but when they realized I wasn't they had me email them a pic of the card and the receipt. Like 10 mins after I sent the email they credited the amount to my account.

Both these times were painless and even pleasant experiences. As a result I have nothing but good will towards their service.

I’ve had 2 issues with Nintendo consoles. My GameCube was about a year out of warrenty, the laser broke, Nintendo paid fedex to pick up and return console, fixed, for free. My Wii about 3 years after launch, the disc drive started sounding like a small chain saw. Same story, fixed and returned for free. I either very lucky or something to do with how I had 100s of games registered with club Nintendo

Fan for life.

@Julien I already had a red Wii as well as the white one so I was able to play Xenoblade on the red one. I called Nintendo just to price the repair. Free was a nice surprise.

"It was out of warranty, but this is Nintendo, so it was worth a shot.", such a wrong statement. My Wii U's gamepad broke down after around 5 months of usage (it literally stopped charging on it's own - from one day to another), so it was still on warranty. I've sent the console to Nintendo to have it fixed, but got asked to pay over £100 for repairs, which was a ridiculous amount, considering I could buy a whole new console for double that. According to Nintendo it was my fault the gamepad broke down, but like I said it just suddenly stopped charging, I don't see how I could have broken it... Send it back to Amazon instead who gave me a full refund and bought a PS4 from them - no regrets

As much as I love playing Nintendo games, the company itself is rather horrible - they just don't care about their customers.

Who cares? People's stuff gets broken and fixed all the time. This isn't news.

@Crono1973 Don’t think the red Wii was an option when I got the black one

But I recently got a Wii mini from CEX for £28 which was a bargain as included a red wii remote plus and nunchuck.

When I needed a new battery for my original 3DS (it had swollen up so much it was noticeably bending the back plate) the customer service people were useless... they said they wouldn't replace the battery themselves and wouldn't provide me with a battery to do it myself... all they offered to do was to replace the console with a new one, but I'd have to pay basically full price for it and send them my old one so they could transfer the data over.
Instead I bought a third party battery online and got a New 3DS when it was released a couple of months later for basically the same price they were asking... and I now have two working 3DS systems instead of one.

The only other time I've used their customer service was when my Wii had the disc read error due to the faulty part... unfortunately the problem didn't show up for me until the console was out of warranty, so I should have had to pay to get it fixed... but when I got my Wii back a few days later it said on the receipt that they'd done it for free.

Nintendo products are so well made that they rarely ever break on me but I’ve had to send a couple things in. My Wii straight up died a couple years out of warentee which cost me $90 and my DS screen had a single dead pixel which they fixed for free. They got major props for having Americans on their customer service line though. I hate it when I get “John” from India.

Nintendo's repair service is very reliable but has the unfortunate reality of losing your save data every single time. Combine their fantastic repair service with a system having cloud saves and that's a win-win situation.

I wish their service was more consistent.

When I had issues with my DS, Wii and later 3ds they fixed it all quick and painlessly.

With the Switch however I had dead pixels and they didn't fix that but claimed they did and ask €120.

After second time they fixed it but the switch didn't start, 3rd time they fixed that and 3 weeks later my switch stoped working again.

I bought another switch, 1 month later the joy-cons kept losing signal so I sent that to them, when back they were still broken.

I send it again and they claimed my warranty is void because I opened the switch which I didn't...

Nintendo wanted $100 to repair the down direction of the d-pad on my New 3DS XL that had started going wonky and not always activating.

And now I have to send out my wife's 3DS XL because the A button is starting to do the same thing.

And I also had to send in my old 3DS XL twice because of the design flaw whereby the bottom bezel scratches the top screen.

And my old DS Lite suffers from the infamous cracked hinge. Never bothered to send it in since it was purely cosmetic.

Nintendo hardware quality just isn't what it used to be.

This is very sweet. I've never had such luck. I had to send my New 3DS into the Nintendo Service Centre and they kept it for 4 months from October 2016 to January 2017, then tried to charge me £80 for repairs despite it being in warranty (and me having sent them evidence of that). When I explained it was in warranty and so I shouldn't have to pay they agreed and I got my console back within a week, with confirmation that they'd repaired it. As it turned out they had not repaired it and it's still glitchy to this day.
I was pretty disappointed because I expected better from Nintendo.

I wish I can say the same. I had to send my Switch pro controller in after 7 months when it just stopped working properly. They originally charged me $50. I had to complain and speak to a supervisor to get a bit of a discount because I was a few weeks out of warranty.

@Julien In the US, the Red Wii Mario Bundle came out in November 2010. That's the one I have. https://www.wired.com/2010/10/marios-anniversary-brings-remote-plus-red-wii-and-dsi-bundles/

They fixed my launch Wii U for free last year when the internal memory corrupted. The guy said my warranty had never been activated. It seemed odd to me, but I'm not complaining.

I think it just depends on who you talk to when you call, and how much they're willing to help.

NINTENDO is amazing with customer service. My launch day Wii GPU fried after warranty. Called Nintendo and they fixed me up including transfer of games and such for about $60.

@Crono1973 Black Wii came out in May 2010. Red wii in November 2010 for The Holidays. (It was Smash that I was having problems with rather than Xenoblade but still due to the dual layer disc.) Lived in New York back then so I've a white and black American Wii. Also have a UK black Wii (that I bought for the parents and have recently inherited back from them) and a UK Wii Mini.

@mateq So you counter their article with a negative experience of your own, and yet somehow they are entirely incorrect?

Yes sent my joyccons in, back when they where one of many faults the switch had at launch, tho many other faults remain to this day.
The service was quick and painless.

Their customer service is second to none. Warms my heart to hear this kind of stuff, as trivial as it may seem.

They replaced my Switch that was bricked due to the recent dock issue, for free. Next-day air'd it to me, so I had a Switch back in my hands in less than a week.

That is very of them. I would like to mention that they also fixed my Wii after the warranty past by several month. In my case it was the GameCube memory card slot, which actually I never used in the first year of the Wii, When I used it, I noticed that it could not read my card. I contacted Nintendo, and they were very nice. They understood my situation, confirmed to them I used official accessories only, and they offered me to fix it for free, minus shipping charges. So that is what I paid, and shipped my Wii to them, and very quickly serviced it and I got it back within a week and a few days (this including shipping time on both directions)

I have nothing but praise for the customer service reps at Nintendo. Granted, I've had mixed results with the outcome, but the reps Ive spoken with have always been super friendly and professional.

Recently, I dropped the right joycon that came with the system, and the HD Rumble stopped working. I have a second set of Red/Blue ones, so I was just going to live on with one set being kind of wonky. But with the 1 year warrenty coming up, I went ahead and let them know. They gave me the mailing slip, I shipped it out, and within one week it was back and working good as new, and they even replaced the rubber pad on the analog stick that had come loose.

But like everyone else said... If you are able to, back up your save data before sending it back. Of course, if you're sending your system in for repairs, chances are you may not have that functionality working for you.

You’ll never get that kind of service in the UK

@SethNintendo sounds like Nintendo took the high road to appease a tantruming customer. Good for them.

I've had several consoles fixed at Bergsala (the Nordic distriputor for Nintendo) and i've only had great experiences. I've even had consoles fixed for free, despite the lack of warranty.

I have to send in two systems to get fixed. My Pikachu 3DS XL is acting up and my X & Y 3DS XL is broken in half. It’s going to cost me $200 to fix both of them I bet. But I have over 20 games on each system so unless I want to lose a couple of hundred dollars worth of games, I have to send them in.

when they repaired my left joycon they charged me 43 euros which is the price of a new one on amazon. hmmmm...

@Nintendoforlife so you counter my negative experience with a vague comment, implying that somehow I am entirely incorrect?

Someone had a great customer service from Nintendo, that's fantastic. I wish I was that lucky and had a similar experience. Unfortunately it never happened to me, and all my encounters with Nintendo customer service have been rather unpleasant, so obviously my comment in this regard will be negative. I've never said the article is entirely incorrect, I've just stated my opinion that Nintendo is not all rainbow and unicorns and, at least for me and based on my experience, behind cute and great games lies a money-sucking corporation that doesn't care at all about their customer. I'll still buy their systems and games, but they would have to work much harder to change my mind about the company itself.

Way, way back in the day I tagged along with my parents to replace the RF converter for my NES at the Nintendo of America headquarters. The receptionist went into the back and grabbed a new one and sent us on our way. Keep in mind the SNES had not launched yet.

Very cool. I dropped my N2DS at the airport security line last week - and my heart stop... 😣

No idea why - but now they asking to take out anything bigger than a Phone from bags.

@SonOfVon Really?... I had the disconnect problem on the left JC and they payed for everything. Even overnight shipping here in the US.

Nintendo has the best customer service. Heck, you can still send your Wii in to get fixed/replaced for free if it can't play Super Smash Brothers Brawl.

@Agramonte I had to send it to them twice. While it warranty was valid, all good, they paid for everything. The joycon later stopped working properly and I had to send it to them again, this time paying for everything because the warranty was void

The only problem I ever had with any Nintendo system (had them all besides NES, Gamecube and revisions) was a broken circle pad on my original 3DS XL.
Warranty was out of question and I just send it in without actually speaking to them beforehand, as you can do.
After a few days I got a bill, accepted it by paying, got my 3DS back.
All in about a week, with the price being some standard repair fee which wasn't cheap but not super expensive either (can't remember the exact price).

In the end they replaced the whole mainboard meaning I basically have a new 3DS apart from case, screens and battery.

So yeah, my experience with them was nothing special. Nothing to complain and I'd say that is the most important thing.

@SonOfVon Oh - that sucks. My warranty just ended in March also.

I got coke cola all over my 3ds a long time ago. They charged me 70 for a replacement the thing was brand new at the time so it seemed fair. I got a production line 3ds with better 3ds than the normal 3ds and almost as good 3d as the new 3ds now that's what you call customer service!.

I once got a chewed up GameCube controller sent in and repaired for what amounts to about €13.

I sent back my joycons for warranty repair. Nintendo UK had them two weeks and then sent me an email to say they were stocktaking and they'd take another two to three weeks. I'm currently joycon-less. True story bro.

Hm. My original 3DS got water damage, so after discovering it was out of warranty, I opened it up and did my best to dry everything out manually. So now it's sitting in my closet with a abnormally bright top screen, defective shoulder buttons, and I think rice in one of the slots. Maybe headphone jack. Perhaps I could one day have a go at sending it to Nintendo, see what they do with it.

PS: I HATE RIBBON CABLES!

I've had mostly great service from Nintendo over the years. I've had things fixed out of warranty but it wasn't that cheap...

@SuperWeird Can you not be a jerk? Getting stuff replaced for that low a price is noteworthy.

Recently I had to send in my NES mini to Nintendo to have repaired. It just stopped powering on. And here's the best part. It was a few days past my warranty. I called Nintendo and polietly talked to a rep and told them what was happening. The guy told me they would send me a shipping label to and to ship it to them and they would take a look at it and see what it would cost to fix. I shipped it and less than a week later Nintendo sent it back to me repaired free of charge. At least I thought it was repaired but in fact was a new NES mini. I realized it when I looked at the serial number. Thanks Nintendo!!!

I've normally had good service from them with my Wii and WiiU, but I recently sent my left blue joy-con off for repair because it kept losing sync in wireless and the thumb stick kept drifiting. It took them 5 weeks to repair it.

They initially tried to bill me even though I sent them the proof of purchase (which they lost), and they then made me send it again, even though the Switch hadn't even been in the wild for 12 months anyway so surely PoP was pointless... I wouldn't have been so bothered, but they lost my proof of purchase when I sent my New 3DSXL previously as well, so maybe the UK division are pretty loose. The whole experience has left a bad taste in my mouth...

Probably the main reason the service was this good was because it was in Japan. I think NoJ is better with direct responses and feedback than NoA and NoE. That's the case with many Japanese companies, too, which I understand.

That said, I've had only good experiences with NoA customer service. My O3DS had a virtually unknown critical issue. At some point while I was playing Devil Survivor Overclocked, after I fused Sarasvati early on in the game, an inexplicable system error suddenly occurred where the system suddenly stopped accepting multiple types of inputs, including touchscreen and face buttons. (Power button worked, and I think L/R and Start/Select buttons still worked, though... Never encountered anyone else who had heard of the issue I encountered.) This was on an official firmware circa 2011, and no physical damage had been done to the 3DS. It was within warranty, so I sent it in... Whatever Nintendo's repair techs did to reset the motherboard or other components, it worked, and the system was back to normal. No charge, all expenses paid. I would have liked to know what caused the issue, but I guess only Nintendo knows...

Other than that, I once tripped and fell onto wood tile flooring with the edge of my left hip. I was completely uninjured, because my O3DS had broken my fall. The shell and inner components were okay, but the screens were totally smashed. It was out of warranty, so I did have to pay for them, but Nintendo's repair service replaced the screens with no issues. The O3DS still works to this day. (Although I've since replaced the main battery myself, since the original one expanded/blew up and became unusable, but thankfully didn't leak or explode.)

I can't say how good/bad Nintendo's repair service is otherwise, because none of their other systems have failed on me over the years. (Minus the NES, which just needs it's 72-pin connector replaced.) Both the Wii and Wii U both still work perfectly fine, too. Going to need to replace the Wii Upad battery while they're still available, though... Unfortunately, someday, no one will be able to use their Wii U, since all the Upad batteries will eventually die, and I doubt any more would be made for such an unpopular, then decades old system. Even some of the older NES consoles will probably outlast all of the Upad batteries, in the end...

I greatly dislike NOA customer service. Their technicians are behind the curve when it comes to knowing how to properly solve hardware issues and half the time when they fix whatever issue my system would have, they sent it back to me with damage to my unit. Maybe I'm just cursed when it comes to Ninty customer support since everyone else seems to be fine with the service

The reason I replaced my OG 3DS because I managed to wear the A button out. Wonder how much it would have cost to send it in for repairs instead. Ah well, that was years ago, just before the N3DS came out.

I have an experience with it too. My Wii had been out of warranty for at least a couple of years. They sent me a box to send it in and charged me nothing. I was very pleasantly surprised. I was expecting to put down some cash, but nope, they hooked me up.

My story is totally different.
My Switch SD card reader was faulty.
Did not work at all.
Sent it in to Nintendo to fix.
They replaced the GAME READER SLOT NOT THE SD READER SLOT.
Sent in again after I realised what they had done.
They had it for 2 months!
2 whole months without my Switch, a brand new product.
It took a total of nearly 12 months to sort it out.

Finally got it back after they replaced it.
Asked for some sort of compensation since I was without my console for a minimum of 2 months.
Got told bad luck.

Nintendo Australia customer service absolutely sucks.
And I own every console and never had a problem until now.

@mgnoodle That's not entirely true. The UK was very limited in what they could do/offer. There were times where they would do such things, but not so often.

I had to send in my limited edition Pikachu 3DS XL because it wouldn't load up anymore. Cost me $100 and I lost all my streetpass data. Everything about the exchange hurt.

I needed my Nintendo ID removed from a WiiU that got gifted to my nephew (its complicated) and the Nintendo Australia staff were great. 😃👍

Yeah, 3DS launch system, cost me $100 to have the wifi antenna fixed like a week after the warranty expired and then it broke again soon after which would have been another $100. Good ol' Ninty.

only for joycon issue, playing gamecube last night, still fine, snes still works fine, clam shell GBA still turned on last night when I tried it, not been on a charger for 5 years by my count, they make good gear no doubt.

sent off joycon, got it returned free of charge with 'replaced parts' and a new warranty. A friend snet his in with the same issue got a new joy con back with new warranty. good guy nintendo

Had an issue where i dropped my Link Between Worlds 3DS XL in water so it wouldn't switch on at all (worst day of my life), bought the Majora's Mask New 3DS XL but couldn't transfer my games over. Called them up and answered a few security questions, bish bash bosh, account un-linked and was able to download all the games again!

A much better experience then what I had with UBI soft when i wanted to re-install Splinter Cell Conviction on steam but they wanted me to pay another €10 to have the install key even though I already bought the game. Needless to say haven't bought another UBI soft PC game since then.

@jomo32 There were a few good stories like this that came out of NUK CS while I was there.

That's good to know. I still only have a first-gen 3DS so I was a bit worried that if it stops working I wouldn't be able to get it fixed.

@PlywoodStick
Even if the Wii U GP batteries die, you could still use it with the charging cable? Or Pro Controller (Press Y to change the screen)?

The upper screen on my Hyrule Edition New 3DS XL stopped working awhile back for no discernable reason. I sent it off to Nintendo and they fixed the problem completely free of charge to me. All I had to pay was shipping to Nintendo.

Best customer service, ever.

Great for him. My only experience with Nintendo customer service was crap. I was told it'd be over $100 to repair my Wii U gamepad after the wireless range suddenly died. I had owned the console for 3 years, so of course my warranty was out, which apparently meant that despite being a lifelong Nintendo buyer, I was also out of luck. Guy on the phone even admitted it was a known defect.

@mateq I'm pretty sure Nintendo just didn't care about Wii U owners because they weren't making money off of us. That's what I'd call poor customer service.

That's nice to hear! Good for him!

I sent my Wii U Gamepad for replacement last year (left joystick was not playing nice) and the usual price for that repair is 100$ (CAD). I got it for half-price since a was a loyal customer!