I was given an Amazon Kindle at the end of November and ever since have been a big and increasly growing, Kindle and Amazon fan. The device works. Its as simple as that. It doesnt pretend to be anything it isnt and does everything it needs to. The ebook purchasing process is slick and even software updates were handled as well as I’ve ever seen. Being an Android user I have felt the pain of going through poorly managed software updates and was extremely impressed by how Amazon handled their software update without a hitch.

To my surprise, my Kindle broke. I turn on the device and found that the screen was stuck showing a distorted screen saver. Seriously disappointed that my much beloved device was broken, I went on Amazon’s website to see what I could do to resolve the issue. As I expected there was lots of information that was easy to find and so I tried a few different things but none of them resolved the issue.

I was prompted to call or email Amazon. I decided I wanted this issue sorted quickly so decided to call. So clicked on the contact us where there was a call back option which I used. I entered my number and clicked the call me button and within a matter of seconds my phone rang and I was put through to an Amazon call centre. After a very short period on hold and I was put through to an agent, who although sounded a little robotic (VOIP issue maybe) was easy to understand and very helpful. She had all my details to hand, knew I had multiple Kindles on my account and was therefore able to ask which and then know the serial number of the product straight away. Unfortunately as I didnt have my kindle, she couldnt confirm it was indeed broken so I repeated the process a little later on in the day when I had my kindle to hand.

The agent talked me through the steps to do a hard reset, which invovles holding the power key for 20 seconds. Amazon had thought about everything, they even had a timer at their end so I didnt have to count to 20. Very clever. It turned out the device was indeed knackered so I was put through to a team who would arrange for a replacement to be sent. I was asked once, very politely, whether I had dropped my kindle, trod on or dropped something on it. I hadnt so they processed a replacement.

I was told I had to return my broken Kindle and had 30 days to do so. If I didnt return it I would be charged for it so they had to take credit card details. I knew my credit card on my Amazon account had expired so offered to read out new details. I was told that if I was in front of a computer it was safer and easier to add my new card details to my account and they could use them from there. I would have to do this anyway at some point so made sense. Sure enough as soon as I had entered the details the agent could see them and use the card for preauthorisation incase they needed to charge me.

Amazon sent me details of how to return the broken Kindle to them, at a time convinient to me and at no cost to me. My new kindle turned up a day earlier than expected and less than 36 hours after the call to Amazon. Impressed.

The processed reinforced my view of Amazon, they know how to do what they need to very well. Their site and back end systems worked well enough to enable Amazon to manage my issue quickly and efficiently.

This whole experience has made me a bigger Amazon fan than I had been previously, even though it was their product that broke. The key message to others… We know sh!t happens, its how well you deal with it that counts.

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