Local carriers dodge Samsung Note 7 bullet

Usually, the possibility to burn your house down is not a feature everybody looks for in a cellular phone.

With the Note 7’s figurative and literal explosive performance, Samsung was able to make a phablet that not only impressed the consumers, but also burn itself in the foot. Ultimately, Samsung halted production and sales of the Note 7.

Docomo Pacific brand manager Danny Daniels said in an interview with Saipan Tribune that due to the low number of Note 7 sales, the company was able to make a personalized effort in order to evade catastrophic consequences brought about by the phablet’s unusual feature.

“Here on Saipan, there were only two that were sold. We’ve made efforts to reach out to those customers so that we can either exchange their unit for something that they preferred so that they had options because we are no longer carrying [the Note 7] in our lineup,” said Daniels.

“Because it is such a low number, we were able to handle it based on what the customer wants. Our approach to that is a personalized effort for them to be able to [exchange their unit].”

In Guam, although more sales were made, the same efforts were put into place.

“In Guam, there was a good interest on the Note 7. What we did in Guam was we reached out to them personally again, so we were able to call them. We did a public service announcement using social media to just give us a ring if you’ve purchased one from us and we asked them to power down the device and call our customer services to understand how they wanted to move forward,” said Daniels.

Docomo Note 7 sales in Guam reached about 30 units.

There were no incidents of Note 7 units bursting into flames in Guam and in the CNMI.

IT&E executive director Robert Harrell said that they had a preorder sale in which six customers participated, but all were ultimately given refunds.

“IT&E did not distribute any Note 7 and canceled orders with our vendors. Once the problem started to surface we made a business decision to not take any chances with the product and issued refunds,” he said in an email to Saipan Tribune.

IT&E chief operating officer John Compton confirmed that they received shipment from their suppliers, but decided to return them as soon as problems started to surface elsewhere in the world.

“We never sold any Note 7s to any customer in the CNMI or Guam,” said Compton, also through email.

Samsung Korea has issued a press release stating that the deadline for Note 7 returns are up to Dec. 31, 2016.