7 ms·

Google nerfs Pixel 6a batteries following fire hazard

67 points by fffrantz 1y ago

pan69 1y ago
> The new July Android update adds "battery management features" that will make the phone unusable. I didn't get from the article how the update will make the phone unsable.
- clumsysmurf 1y ago
  If its like the 4A updates, your phone will charge rapidly and discharge rapidly. And half the time the phone is charged it will say 100% and then go to 5%.
unethical_ban 1y ago
If only there were a way to quickly swap out defective, used batteries for new, safe batteries without needing to return a critical device to the manufacturer.
- dmitrygr 1y ago
  Someone needs to first make replacement batteries in the right dimensions, voltage, etc...
  - homebrewer 1y ago
    It takes about five seconds after a new phone is released for Chinese factories to design and start selling all sorts of accessories, including batteries. High quality ones too. The average consumer needs to be able to swap it without doing deep surgery on the phone, and that's on the phone's manufacturer.
    - dmitrygr 1y ago
      The same factories that made the current battery that is a fire risk. yes. or maybe different ones, with no vetting for how dangerous their batteries are.
      - ghusto 1y ago
        Yes, in all likelihood the same factories. Which still make your choices a battery that needs replacing but can't be without voiding your warranty, or a battery that needs replacing that you can swap out easily. Am I missing something?
      - asadotzler 1y ago
        some goal post moving going on here.
        dmitrygr 1y ago
        Goalposts have always been the same: pocket/table/house not on fire
        luckylion 1y ago
        The same factories you wouldn't trust with the replacement also make the originals. So you wouldn't buy a phone at all?
        dmitrygr 1y ago
        Because a deep-pocketed company can be sued to recover the cost of my house - Samsung, Google, or Apple, and they take all possible precautions to make sure this isn't needed. Not going to successfully sue "big luck bright shine battery company of shenzhen"
- SideQuark 1y ago
  Pretty much any phone repair store swaps them out in store. I've done exactly a Pixel 6 recently.
- readthenotes1 1y ago
  I think it's sad and funny that most of the replies to this assume the difficulty of the non-replaceable battery. For years, it was the way things worked. Smaller battery, maybe a spare in your pocket. Then the iPhone:(
  - eddythompson80 1y ago
    I don't think it helps anyone to dismiss the difficulty involved in doing that in 2025 vs 2004. I'm not saying it's not possible, of course it is, but there is some friction and difficulty especially if you seriously want to compete with Apple, Samsung, Oppo, Xiaomi, etc. Fairphone exists[0]. Nobody is in the market for either a Fairphone vs Galaxy vs Pixel.
    - capitainenemo 1y ago
      There is also the Samsung XCover 7 pro. Waterproof, trivially swappable battery. You can even keep around a few batteries for quick recharge. https://www.samsung.com/us/business/mobile/phones/galaxy-xcover-pro/ https://www.samsung.com/us/business/mobile/phones/galaxy-xco...
- Terr_ 1y ago
  I hate this "tabs and adhesive" business. I've had to replace batteries way more often than I've benefited from it being a couple millimeters smaller or marginally better sealed against being dropped into a puddle.
AceJohnny2 1y ago
Reminds me of the iPhone throttling battery fiasco https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batterygate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batterygate What happened was: 1. Battery defects caused some of them to underperform, leading the battery management subsystem to shut down the phone due to voltage drop when too much current was drawn. 2. To work around the shutdown issue (very bad), Apple implemented throttling (IMHO less bad) in a new version of iOS, to prevent too much current from being drawn. They figured the throttling would be so light as to be unnoticeable to users, except... 3. Benchmarkers noticed the throttling, and all hell broke loose. Battery defects are unfortunate, but the decision to make them not user-serviceable leads to a host of bad downstream decisions. (Of course, making them user-serviceable also leads to a host of other difficult decisions, and I'm not just talking about opening the case. What happens to system design when you can no longer trust the battery's specs?)
- ryao 1y ago
  My recollection is different. The batteries were not defective. They simply got old in terms of cycle life and once they were old enough, they could not support the peak current needed by the phones causing crashes. Apple shipped an iOS update that throttled the CPU frequencies of phones with old batteries and called it a stability update without explaining anything. Phones stopped crashing, but started to become slower. Then 12-18 months later, people realized how the update worked and there was outrage because of how Apple handled it. Then Apple shipped an update to give customers visibility into this, published documentation and offered to replace batteries that were below 80% capacity for $29 for a year.
  - giingyui 1y ago
    > “We found that a small number of iPhone 6S devices made in September and October 2015 contained a battery component that was exposed to controlled ambient air longer than it should have been before being assembled into battery packs. As a result, these batteries degrade faster than a normal battery and cause unexpected shutdowns to occur. It’s important to note, this is not a safety issue.” Seems a defect to me.
maxglute 1y ago
First 4a, now 6a. At least they're giving 100 USD this time and 6a batteries not total dogshit like 4a and it won't turn into landline. Annoying 150 USD store credit can't go towards something like Youtube Premium. Or multiple 6a credits can't be stacked on 1 device. Cause I'm never touching a pixel again.
- luckylion 1y ago
  Yeah, while I liked the pixel 4a, I just upgraded to a 7a because of this nonsense (thankfully I did not go with a 6a!) If they come for the 7a next year, I won't choose a pixel again either. Sure, I could send it in for a battery replacement. and not have a phone for a week or two, and get my phone back or maybe not.
  - gruez 1y ago
    >Sure, I could send it in for a battery replacement. and not have a phone for a week or two, and get my phone back or maybe not. There's walk-in replacements in select countries: >Starting July 21, 2025 battery replacement will be available: >At walk-in repair centers in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, Singapore, Japan, and India. >[...] Additional battery replacement capability is expected in Japan, France, some other parts of Europe, and Australia soon.
    - luckylion 1y ago
      Yes, I'm aware. I checked when they killed the pixel4: there's no shop close to me. I wouldn't spend half a day to get to an authorized partner and back and have it repaired, it's not worth that much.
- kotaKat 1y ago
  I got told mine doesn't qualify. I'm now worried, will this mean it's going to blow up some time down the line and Google's gonna forget about me?
  - 1y ago
xnx 1y ago
> Pixel 6a owners can get $100 in cash or $150 in store credit. Alternatively, Google offers a free battery replacement with the same limits on phone condition. This seems very fair
- gruez 1y ago
  Yeah, most people would not mind getting a free battery replacement 2-3 years after they bought their phone.
- mook 1y ago
  From the article comments, that only applies if your phone is pristine (I guess because opening the phone stresses the screen, so if the screen has any damage it'll exacerbate the problem). Also linked in the article, getting the cash may be unreasonably difficult even in cases when they have a credit card on file that bought the phone.
  - Fripplebubby 1y ago
    I just filled it out for store credit, and it didn't matter at all the condition of my phone (it's in horrible shape), I just put in the IMEI number and that was that. It could be different for cash, though.
    - saltcured 1y ago
      Does the store credit have an expiration date?
      - Fripplebubby 1y ago
        Yes, 1 year
- eddythompson80 1y ago
  This might be a different program, but NEVER use Google's trade-in program. You might get lucky, but they use a third party to process the phones and they have ZERO oversight or control over them. It's extremely common to send in a perfectly working phone to get denied because it's DOA with whatever claim and google refuses to do anything about it because "it's an external partner"
kesslern 1y ago
I just ran into this on my wife's phone. I started removing the tempered glass screen protector to replace with a new one and the whole screen came up. The battery had started to puff up enough to lift the edge of the screen.
ChrisArchitect 1y ago
Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44447802 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44447802
- fffrantz 1y ago
  Sorry for double posting, missed it at the time!
lysace 1y ago
I get nervous when I see videos of people buying random Li-Ion/Po-battery powered crap from Teemu etc. My personal policy for buying anything with such a battery: the seller must have a meaningful presence in my country and sell for at least like $10M/year.
craftkiller 1y ago
Their website says I am "not eligible" but that doesn't tell me if my pixel 6a is impacted or not. It would be nice if Google would tell me if my phone is a fire hazard.
nickjj 1y ago
So here's a fun story on how Google completely ruined my Pixel 4a and will not help resolve it over the last 7 months. In January 2025, Google pushed an emergency Android update to Pixel 4 devices which completely killed the battery's life. They offered an extended warranty to get the battery replaced at any official Google repair center for free. They claimed a new battery would resolve the issue and your battery would drain at a normal rate. For context I live in NY and the official Google repair center I visited has ~500 4.7 star reviews. I'm not going to out them publicly because despite all of this nonsense the local store owner seemed genuine. --- VISIT 1: I went to their official repair center and they swapped the battery. It took ~2 hours plus ~45 minututes in travel time. The new battery was put in and it did help but it still drained faster than pre-any updates. However it was usable from a battery life perspective. After the repair I noticed my phone's display stopped turning on when I picked up and angled the phone towards me. I also noticed that more often than not if I got any type of notification (even an incoming call) the display would not turn on. Lastly, my phone would not unlock normally. Normally I would flick the bottom of the screen with my thumb maybe 1 inch and it would turn on and prompt me for my pin. Now I had to drag my entire finger up the whole phone like I'm 80 years old and it would only unlock 30% of the time. --- VISIT 2: I explained the situation to them, another ~3 hours of total time at the store. They replaced the display of the phone and it made little difference. There were still problems listed above which I demonstrated in front of the store owner. He went back and got some tools and they hooked up a diagnostics tool to my device in front of me and confirmed the proximity sensor was not functioning. The owner of the store told me it's unfortunately common for this to get damaged during a battery replacement. He said the best they can do is order a new motherboard but it will wipe everything. At this point I've already had a ~30 reply email thread with Google support where they kept saying they can't do anything except suggest keep going to the repair center I've been to. --- VISIT 3: They replace the motherboard, another ~3 hours of total time at the store plus ~3 hours to set everything back up again on my own Most of the issues went away, but the phone still doesn't turn on a lot when I get new notifications of any kind. However, the battery started draining quite fast again. We're talking losing 28% battery for a 2 hour phone / voice call with the display turned off. Just texting my friend on Whatsapp with 15 messages drained 5% battery. My phone at this point is very not usable with battery life. The battery life is ok if it's idling doing literally nothing but as soon as I do anything, it drains fast. There's ~50 replies to the Google support email and they said sorry, nothing they can do. I can mail the phone to them and they can try repairing it but it will cost me out of pocket and I'll be out of a phone for however long that process takes. --- VISIT 4: The repair center gave me a new battery At this point I told them I can't afford to keep going to the store and having my phone damaged on every visit and they said they can do the battery replacement at my apartment in their work truck. The store owner told me "changing the battery is the easiest thing in the world, it's safe to do in the truck". So their most experienced tech came and did the battery replacement. The tech told me the phone is good to go, quickly showed me the phone's display is turned on and I unlocked it with my pin like I normally do. He left. The store owner told me this is the last time they will service the phone and if there's any other problems to call corporate. Over the rest of that day and early morning next day I noticed the battery replacement made zero difference, it still drains at the same rate. My phone is essentially unusable and not dependable from a battery life perspective. However, I tried logging into my trading platform of choice which is 100% dependant on biometric 2FA and if the fingerprint fails it falls back to the pin. That app won't even let me attempt to login, it simply errors out saying biometrics is unavailable. My bank's app says the same thing. The phone itself has zero reaction to the fingerprint sensor. It's completely dead. I called them and let them know and he said sorry, it's really easy for the fingerprint sensor to be damaged during a battery replacement. He said he can order a new sensor and service it one last time but it might be a day or 2. I told him I'm locked out of my trading account with my life's savings actively in the market and if I can't execute a trade due to this, should I hold him or the corporate company responsible for any losses. He very quickly said to hang tight and 5 hours later he sent someone to do the repair because they found a different fingerprint sensor at a different store location (they have a few locations in a 30 mile radius). --- VISIT 5: They come with a new fingerprint sensor They used the truck again with the same senior tech who swapped the battery in visit 1 and visit 4. I ask the tech to do an exhaustive test in front of me at the end to ensure everything is in working order. The tech says he can't do any tests and told me basic things like turn the phone on, take a picture, etc.. It was up to me to walk him through my definition of an exhaustive check based on limited knowledge so I did everything I could think of and it all worked, except charging was very spotty which turned out to be due to his charging cable being bad, it worked fine with mine. The fingerprint sensor worked when I tried it a few times on that visit. However, after using the phone for a few days I noticed something really weird. The fingerprint sensor is literally moving behind the back piece of the phone. In fact, if I took my fingernail I could probably pick it up and lift it out. It does not feel normal. --- I called corporate and explained all of this. Someone was supposed to call me back yesterday but they never did. Now it's near end of day on Friday so I doubt I'll get a call back until next week. This whole ordeal has been like ~80 Google emails of which for the last 3 weeks, Google stopped responding to them. All of my responses are objective, asking for assistance, non-confrontational, non-emotional and completely reasonable. I just want a resolution where I have a working phone that I can depend on without me needing to buy a new one because a 2 trillion dollar company forcefully broke my phone. This whole experience has jaded me in ways I never thought was possible from witnessing a massive amount of incomptenance and complete lack of care towards someone who has been using Google products since Google was invented.

67 points by fffrantz 1y ago

> The new July Android update adds "battery management features" that will make the phone unusable. I didn't get from the article how the update will make the phone unsable.

clumsysmurf 1y ago
If its like the 4A updates, your phone will charge rapidly and discharge rapidly. And half the time the phone is charged it will say 100% and then go to 5%.

unethical_ban 1y ago

If only there were a way to quickly swap out defective, used batteries for new, safe batteries without needing to return a critical device to the manufacturer.

dmitrygr 1y ago
Someone needs to first make replacement batteries in the right dimensions, voltage, etc...
- homebrewer 1y ago
  It takes about five seconds after a new phone is released for Chinese factories to design and start selling all sorts of accessories, including batteries. High quality ones too. The average consumer needs to be able to swap it without doing deep surgery on the phone, and that's on the phone's manufacturer.
  - dmitrygr 1y ago
    The same factories that made the current battery that is a fire risk. yes. or maybe different ones, with no vetting for how dangerous their batteries are.
    - ghusto 1y ago
      Yes, in all likelihood the same factories. Which still make your choices a battery that needs replacing but can't be without voiding your warranty, or a battery that needs replacing that you can swap out easily. Am I missing something?
    - asadotzler 1y ago
      some goal post moving going on here.
      - dmitrygr 1y ago
        Goalposts have always been the same: pocket/table/house not on fire
        luckylion 1y ago
        The same factories you wouldn't trust with the replacement also make the originals. So you wouldn't buy a phone at all?
        dmitrygr 1y ago
        Because a deep-pocketed company can be sued to recover the cost of my house - Samsung, Google, or Apple, and they take all possible precautions to make sure this isn't needed. Not going to successfully sue "big luck bright shine battery company of shenzhen"
SideQuark 1y ago
Pretty much any phone repair store swaps them out in store. I've done exactly a Pixel 6 recently.
readthenotes1 1y ago
I think it's sad and funny that most of the replies to this assume the difficulty of the non-replaceable battery. For years, it was the way things worked. Smaller battery, maybe a spare in your pocket. Then the iPhone:(
- eddythompson80 1y ago
  I don't think it helps anyone to dismiss the difficulty involved in doing that in 2025 vs 2004. I'm not saying it's not possible, of course it is, but there is some friction and difficulty especially if you seriously want to compete with Apple, Samsung, Oppo, Xiaomi, etc. Fairphone exists[0]. Nobody is in the market for either a Fairphone vs Galaxy vs Pixel.
  - capitainenemo 1y ago
    There is also the Samsung XCover 7 pro. Waterproof, trivially swappable battery. You can even keep around a few batteries for quick recharge. https://www.samsung.com/us/business/mobile/phones/galaxy-xcover-pro/ https://www.samsung.com/us/business/mobile/phones/galaxy-xco...
Terr_ 1y ago
I hate this "tabs and adhesive" business. I've had to replace batteries way more often than I've benefited from it being a couple millimeters smaller or marginally better sealed against being dropped into a puddle.

AceJohnny2 1y ago

Reminds me of the iPhone throttling battery fiasco https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batterygate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batterygate What happened was: 1. Battery defects caused some of them to underperform, leading the battery management subsystem to shut down the phone due to voltage drop when too much current was drawn. 2. To work around the shutdown issue (very bad), Apple implemented throttling (IMHO less bad) in a new version of iOS, to prevent too much current from being drawn. They figured the throttling would be so light as to be unnoticeable to users, except... 3. Benchmarkers noticed the throttling, and all hell broke loose. Battery defects are unfortunate, but the decision to make them not user-serviceable leads to a host of bad downstream decisions. (Of course, making them user-serviceable also leads to a host of other difficult decisions, and I'm not just talking about opening the case. What happens to system design when you can no longer trust the battery's specs?)

ryao 1y ago
My recollection is different. The batteries were not defective. They simply got old in terms of cycle life and once they were old enough, they could not support the peak current needed by the phones causing crashes. Apple shipped an iOS update that throttled the CPU frequencies of phones with old batteries and called it a stability update without explaining anything. Phones stopped crashing, but started to become slower. Then 12-18 months later, people realized how the update worked and there was outrage because of how Apple handled it. Then Apple shipped an update to give customers visibility into this, published documentation and offered to replace batteries that were below 80% capacity for $29 for a year.
- giingyui 1y ago
  > “We found that a small number of iPhone 6S devices made in September and October 2015 contained a battery component that was exposed to controlled ambient air longer than it should have been before being assembled into battery packs. As a result, these batteries degrade faster than a normal battery and cause unexpected shutdowns to occur. It’s important to note, this is not a safety issue.” Seems a defect to me.

maxglute 1y ago

First 4a, now 6a. At least they're giving 100 USD this time and 6a batteries not total dogshit like 4a and it won't turn into landline. Annoying 150 USD store credit can't go towards something like Youtube Premium. Or multiple 6a credits can't be stacked on 1 device. Cause I'm never touching a pixel again.

luckylion 1y ago
Yeah, while I liked the pixel 4a, I just upgraded to a 7a because of this nonsense (thankfully I did not go with a 6a!) If they come for the 7a next year, I won't choose a pixel again either. Sure, I could send it in for a battery replacement. and not have a phone for a week or two, and get my phone back or maybe not.
- gruez 1y ago
  >Sure, I could send it in for a battery replacement. and not have a phone for a week or two, and get my phone back or maybe not. There's walk-in replacements in select countries: >Starting July 21, 2025 battery replacement will be available: >At walk-in repair centers in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, Singapore, Japan, and India. >[...] Additional battery replacement capability is expected in Japan, France, some other parts of Europe, and Australia soon.
  - luckylion 1y ago
    Yes, I'm aware. I checked when they killed the pixel4: there's no shop close to me. I wouldn't spend half a day to get to an authorized partner and back and have it repaired, it's not worth that much.
kotaKat 1y ago
I got told mine doesn't qualify. I'm now worried, will this mean it's going to blow up some time down the line and Google's gonna forget about me?
- 1y ago

xnx 1y ago

> Pixel 6a owners can get $100 in cash or $150 in store credit. Alternatively, Google offers a free battery replacement with the same limits on phone condition. This seems very fair

gruez 1y ago
Yeah, most people would not mind getting a free battery replacement 2-3 years after they bought their phone.
mook 1y ago
From the article comments, that only applies if your phone is pristine (I guess because opening the phone stresses the screen, so if the screen has any damage it'll exacerbate the problem). Also linked in the article, getting the cash may be unreasonably difficult even in cases when they have a credit card on file that bought the phone.
- Fripplebubby 1y ago
  I just filled it out for store credit, and it didn't matter at all the condition of my phone (it's in horrible shape), I just put in the IMEI number and that was that. It could be different for cash, though.
  - saltcured 1y ago
    Does the store credit have an expiration date?
    - Fripplebubby 1y ago
      Yes, 1 year
eddythompson80 1y ago
This might be a different program, but NEVER use Google's trade-in program. You might get lucky, but they use a third party to process the phones and they have ZERO oversight or control over them. It's extremely common to send in a perfectly working phone to get denied because it's DOA with whatever claim and google refuses to do anything about it because "it's an external partner"

kesslern 1y ago

I just ran into this on my wife's phone. I started removing the tempered glass screen protector to replace with a new one and the whole screen came up. The battery had started to puff up enough to lift the edge of the screen.

ChrisArchitect 1y ago

Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44447802 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44447802

fffrantz 1y ago
Sorry for double posting, missed it at the time!

lysace 1y ago

I get nervous when I see videos of people buying random Li-Ion/Po-battery powered crap from Teemu etc. My personal policy for buying anything with such a battery: the seller must have a meaningful presence in my country and sell for at least like $10M/year.

craftkiller 1y ago

Their website says I am "not eligible" but that doesn't tell me if my pixel 6a is impacted or not. It would be nice if Google would tell me if my phone is a fire hazard.

nickjj 1y ago

So here's a fun story on how Google completely ruined my Pixel 4a and will not help resolve it over the last 7 months. In January 2025, Google pushed an emergency Android update to Pixel 4 devices which completely killed the battery's life. They offered an extended warranty to get the battery replaced at any official Google repair center for free. They claimed a new battery would resolve the issue and your battery would drain at a normal rate. For context I live in NY and the official Google repair center I visited has ~500 4.7 star reviews. I'm not going to out them publicly because despite all of this nonsense the local store owner seemed genuine. --- VISIT 1: I went to their official repair center and they swapped the battery. It took ~2 hours plus ~45 minututes in travel time. The new battery was put in and it did help but it still drained faster than pre-any updates. However it was usable from a battery life perspective. After the repair I noticed my phone's display stopped turning on when I picked up and angled the phone towards me. I also noticed that more often than not if I got any type of notification (even an incoming call) the display would not turn on. Lastly, my phone would not unlock normally. Normally I would flick the bottom of the screen with my thumb maybe 1 inch and it would turn on and prompt me for my pin. Now I had to drag my entire finger up the whole phone like I'm 80 years old and it would only unlock 30% of the time. --- VISIT 2: I explained the situation to them, another ~3 hours of total time at the store. They replaced the display of the phone and it made little difference. There were still problems listed above which I demonstrated in front of the store owner. He went back and got some tools and they hooked up a diagnostics tool to my device in front of me and confirmed the proximity sensor was not functioning. The owner of the store told me it's unfortunately common for this to get damaged during a battery replacement. He said the best they can do is order a new motherboard but it will wipe everything. At this point I've already had a ~30 reply email thread with Google support where they kept saying they can't do anything except suggest keep going to the repair center I've been to. --- VISIT 3: They replace the motherboard, another ~3 hours of total time at the store plus ~3 hours to set everything back up again on my own Most of the issues went away, but the phone still doesn't turn on a lot when I get new notifications of any kind. However, the battery started draining quite fast again. We're talking losing 28% battery for a 2 hour phone / voice call with the display turned off. Just texting my friend on Whatsapp with 15 messages drained 5% battery. My phone at this point is very not usable with battery life. The battery life is ok if it's idling doing literally nothing but as soon as I do anything, it drains fast. There's ~50 replies to the Google support email and they said sorry, nothing they can do. I can mail the phone to them and they can try repairing it but it will cost me out of pocket and I'll be out of a phone for however long that process takes. --- VISIT 4: The repair center gave me a new battery At this point I told them I can't afford to keep going to the store and having my phone damaged on every visit and they said they can do the battery replacement at my apartment in their work truck. The store owner told me "changing the battery is the easiest thing in the world, it's safe to do in the truck". So their most experienced tech came and did the battery replacement. The tech told me the phone is good to go, quickly showed me the phone's display is turned on and I unlocked it with my pin like I normally do. He left. The store owner told me this is the last time they will service the phone and if there's any other problems to call corporate. Over the rest of that day and early morning next day I noticed the battery replacement made zero difference, it still drains at the same rate. My phone is essentially unusable and not dependable from a battery life perspective. However, I tried logging into my trading platform of choice which is 100% dependant on biometric 2FA and if the fingerprint fails it falls back to the pin. That app won't even let me attempt to login, it simply errors out saying biometrics is unavailable. My bank's app says the same thing. The phone itself has zero reaction to the fingerprint sensor. It's completely dead. I called them and let them know and he said sorry, it's really easy for the fingerprint sensor to be damaged during a battery replacement. He said he can order a new sensor and service it one last time but it might be a day or 2. I told him I'm locked out of my trading account with my life's savings actively in the market and if I can't execute a trade due to this, should I hold him or the corporate company responsible for any losses. He very quickly said to hang tight and 5 hours later he sent someone to do the repair because they found a different fingerprint sensor at a different store location (they have a few locations in a 30 mile radius). --- VISIT 5: They come with a new fingerprint sensor They used the truck again with the same senior tech who swapped the battery in visit 1 and visit 4. I ask the tech to do an exhaustive test in front of me at the end to ensure everything is in working order. The tech says he can't do any tests and told me basic things like turn the phone on, take a picture, etc.. It was up to me to walk him through my definition of an exhaustive check based on limited knowledge so I did everything I could think of and it all worked, except charging was very spotty which turned out to be due to his charging cable being bad, it worked fine with mine. The fingerprint sensor worked when I tried it a few times on that visit. However, after using the phone for a few days I noticed something really weird. The fingerprint sensor is literally moving behind the back piece of the phone. In fact, if I took my fingernail I could probably pick it up and lift it out. It does not feel normal. --- I called corporate and explained all of this. Someone was supposed to call me back yesterday but they never did. Now it's near end of day on Friday so I doubt I'll get a call back until next week. This whole ordeal has been like ~80 Google emails of which for the last 3 weeks, Google stopped responding to them. All of my responses are objective, asking for assistance, non-confrontational, non-emotional and completely reasonable. I just want a resolution where I have a working phone that I can depend on without me needing to buy a new one because a 2 trillion dollar company forcefully broke my phone. This whole experience has jaded me in ways I never thought was possible from witnessing a massive amount of incomptenance and complete lack of care towards someone who has been using Google products since Google was invented.