Mind-boggling smartphone repair costs

This one is close to home for me. I’ve managed to keep up my self inflicted reputation of breaking phones (again).

This is the reason I refuse to spend more than £250 on a phone, as I know, I will 100% break it or lose it – I basically somehow, despite my best efforts, manage to do this.

One of my most recent victims is a Google Pixel 4a.

I bought this phone for a what I believe to be a very responsible £250.

Whilst out and about, I managed to drop it. No, I didn’t have a case or protector of any kind (I now use these, lesson learnt), so it hit the pavement and killed the screen. The screen did not smash or break, it simply stopped working (you get a small flicker in the bottom corner). I know the phone itself survived, as I could still access my messages and apps using the relevant web services which rely on the phone being on and connected to the Internet.

So, I thought, the easy solution here is to get the screen repaired/replaced… and this is where the bizarre world of economics and service kicks in…

I contacted no less than five local companies to get a quote for the repair/replacement screen… and not one of them responded! Working in customer service myself, I find this mind-blowing – not even an acknowledgement! 

So I started searching through ‘national’ companies instead, seeing as no local company (who I always put first, given I own one myself) was interested.

I found one price for the screen replacement… it was £230… now you don’t have to be a highly skilled mathematician to figure out if a phone cost £250 to buy, and a repair is £20 less than the phone itself, it’s probably not worth doing.

The issue I have here is that I really don’t like to be wasteful. I like the ‘right to repair’. I like to save things from landfills as much as possible, even if I sell them myself, so someone else can make use of them… but at £230 for a repair, I just can’t justify it.

A quick search on eBay reveals I can buy a used one, in decent condition for around £200… again makes no sense for the repair, if I can replace the entire thing for £200.

I really don’t want to landfill it, but I’m not paying the price of the phone itself to get it running again – economically, makes no sense at all.

Now, this morning, as chance happens, there is a small possibility that I’ve found another national company, who just might be able to do the repair for £80 – which makes way more sense – but I don’t have this confirmed, and I don’t actually know if it includes the parts. I’m aiming to speak with them later this morning to find out. At this price, I would proceed with the repair.

Going back to the local businesses who didn’t respond at all, seriously people, get a grip. It’s a tough world out there currently, and you have to at least respond to people. Personally, I still aim to quickly respond, even to the work which I know we can’t/wont’ do – because one day that same person may come back to us with something that we can help them with. It’s all about service, service and service.

Hopefully, I can save the Pixel from landfill, and I will update if I manage to do so – but I just feel we need economically easily repairable phones, which don’t cost a fortune in the first place as well.

Gavin Moorhouse is the chief smartphone breaker at Lucid Computer Solutions, an IT Support and Cloud Services business based in Redditch, Worcestershire.