The Galaxy Note 7 has harmed people and caused tens, perhaps even hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage to users’ property. It burned furniture, floors, cars and even a house. The phone has officially been recalled and discontinued, with Samsung warning all owners that they should power down the device immediately and return it to a local retailer at once. There has never been a more serious problem with a smartphone in the history of the industry, and yet many people refuse to turn in their handsets and insist on putting themselves and those around them at risk.
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There is absolutely no question that, battery defect aside, Samsung’s Galaxy Note 7 is the most spectacular phablet the world has ever seen. We said as much in our Galaxy Note 7 review this past August. The phone features a stunning design, the best display the world has ever seen, and a camera so good that it’s hard to believe it’s stuffed into a smartphone. But the phone is unsafe, and has therefore been recalled and cancelled.
Samsung has certainly made a few mistakes along the way — the company has allegedly been slow to make pay for damages, and one person claims the company tried to bribe him to keep quiet — but full refunds are available to anyone who returns their Note 7 phones. According to a new report out of South Korea, however, more than a million people are still using the Note 7 despite all the warnings.
Korea JoongAng Daily reports that in South Korea especially, many users have refused to return their Galaxy Note 7s because they like the phone so much. Many more have also said that the return or exchange process is too much of a hassle to deal with.
“The process seemed complicated and with my current workload, I simply didn’t have the time to do all that,” one man told the news site. “I might buy the Galaxy S8 that is supposed to be released next year. But before then, I don’t really want to downgrade.”
Another Note 7 owner said he had to wait in line for an hour to exchange his original Note 7 for a “safe” replacement last month, and he refuses to go through the trouble again. “I’m not willing to go through that again,” he said. “The phone isn’t bad at all in terms of functions, so I just decided to keep it.”
More than 1 million people have yet to return their potentially dangerous Galaxy Note 7 phones, according to the site’s sources.
