[On the pre-production status]

Brief Christmas update.
 

A small batch is shipping out this Friday, if UPS keeps its promises. It was meant to arrive today, but our staff availability is limited in the UK right now. No stock assignment letters for this one, as we are shipping them a little differently to avoid extra delays. Some of you will have tracking info on Friday. 
 

The big batch which should make a lot of you happy is expected to leave the factory in the 1st week of January, which is also when we expect you’ll have the tracking details. We would like to thank everyone for their patience.
 

Merry Christmas from me!

Erik

[Selling my Pro1]

As someone who never had a keyboard smartphone before the Pro1, I would say it very much matters what you are used to. The QWERTY layout on the Pro1 might be shifted a bit, but it’s nothing different to simply getting a new keyboard for your PC. There always will be a learning curve. I find the Pro1’s keyboard much more functional than the compared devices above, particularly for the spacing on the Pro1 keyboard.

Give it a week, and you’ll see how much faster and accurate you are, especially in the technical tasks such as using terminal. I will not accept disputes on this subject at all, having moved from an iPhone.

P.S I’ll allow myself to confirm there have been a few cases of instant regret after selling their Pro1. Not all were mentioned here. To some people it’s too much of a change going from basically every other phone to the Pro1, and that’s fine. We are doing something no one else risks doing, it’s always easier to follow the model of what sells.

[FX Tec response time on emails requesting a refund.]

1 hour ago, Zamasu said:

More that they were too impatient, and thought they were ignoring them. 24 to 48 hours to get a reply isn't fantastic, but it's definitely not bad in my opinion. I would get worried about not getting a reply after 48 hours, or possibly a week if it's not urgent. Which does not seem to be the case here.

So, just misinformed. Clickbait to me implies that they knew the title was wrong, i.e. a lie.

It’s typically within 24 hours, but it’s the busiest time of the year for everyone.

[On the pre-production status]

2 hours ago, Rob. S. said:

I wonder why they didn't close it the minute it was opened. It is their forum, they don't have to take abuse and slander. It's a strong point for them and their honesty that they don't immediately delete (not just close) such threads.

The community is for use by the community - it is unstaffed and it’s ran by the community. I am here out of personal interest only. We keep speech as free as possible.

On a side note, we have a perfectly fine help desk where everyone gets timely and personal answers. The community forums are not a place to reach out to us, or to request official help, even though the forums are under our domain. We mostly monitor it without intervention, unless if something is terribly wrong.

 

 

[Lies don't travel far.]

I am now going to close this thread as there is no point in bumping it additionally. Click the link below for my explanation.

 

[Lies don't travel far.]

13 hours ago, D1ggs said:

There's a reseller in Switzerland that has a bunch in stock. However, they only ship to Switzerland and Lichenstein. 

Bastard Alpine people 😛

Yeah I checked Clove, can't believe I missed their stock by an hour or two. Bummer!

That's not true. A partner retailer in Switzerland expected stock by the end of this month as everyone else did, but they're not getting stock until the end of January - again, like everyone else.

They have been accepting pre-orders, but they are not shipping anything until general availability by the end of January.

Given the previous misinformation, we completely understand, and in a way, expect your doubts about your orders, and us in general. However, as mentioned before, retailers such as Clove and Dragonbox have been in discussions with us since MWC before any of the pre-orders were placed. The amount of devices Clove and Dragonbox had was extremely small, and is nowhere near comparable to what we have shipped to our pre-orders, and what we still have to ship. Our pre-orders are our first priority.

 

On 12/18/2019 at 8:16 PM, PanicBrothers said:

Ok Guys,

I have ordered my Phone in Feb. 2019..and I pay 30 minutes after I got the payment mail. Pre-order and best fx-customer and of course you will get first and bla bla bla.

I'm with you all here in the Forum and wait for my device, because it is a good Idea and I'm thankfull somebody did it and produce this.

After long wait and a lot of sorry here and sorry there and Screen issues with batches and warehouse excuses.

Let me tell it now, this are all "lies".

I order today at a german reseller Shop at around 14 pm German time with UPS express and I got now my tracking number and tomorrow before 12am I will have my phone.

Of course I pay little more and now I will refund my pre-order and fx-tec can be happy only to refund my order and not pay interest for the 6 month.

All make sense now.

To send direct produced phones to reseller and use the hype on the phone will generate new money. The Reseller will order new phones and so on.

Pre-Order people like me and all others here are a piece of shit and we finance the first production without interest...better like a bank 😄 😄

@Adrian and Chen...

You are good freaky business people and I hope you getting fine with the road you started. You took us all at our nose around the arena...fuck and this happens to me at my age. I hope sometimes I learn that only money rules.

But in fact...who cares about fx...I will get my Phone...is here any shit Smilie 😄 😄 😄

 

 

 

Please find my response on the matter below. Lucky you for being one of the few to manage to get Draongbox or Clove devices. 

 

[FX Tec response time on emails requesting a refund.]

5 minutes ago, gfragkistas said:

I have the same problem. Please advise how many days we should allow to get a response and our money back into our account 

Everything is up to date for the last 24 hours right now as far as I know. If you have a ticket that's been open for less than 24 hours or just under, it will probably be answered in the next working day - tomorrow.

[FX Tec response time on emails requesting a refund.]

21 minutes ago, ckb1985 said:

I pre-ordered this phone eons ago and paid for it several months ago back in summer. I previously spoke with Fx Tec about a refund a couple of weeks ago but decided to give them till the end of December. Then the most recent update comes out stating that they may not get me a phone until the end of January. I no longer have confidence in Fx Tecs ability to deliver me a phone so I sent over an email last week requesting a refund given the current update. I have followed up on my request now twice and not received a response. This is super poor customer service and I'm annoyed that I might now how to involve my credit card company to get this taken care of.

 

10 minutes ago, Jon said:

I have similar situation. I requested refund on Sunday and they have not replied back anything.

 

The team is going through them all, we are not ignoring anyone. Please be aware that replying to unanswered tickets will bump it to the end of the queue. That's how all help desks work from the back end, including the one we use - Zendesk. If you keep replying periodically without us having had a chance to check it, we will never get the message. Give it some time without replying and we'll get to your request. This is implemented to keep it fair for everyone - queries are answered from the oldest to the newest. A reply to a ticket, whether it's ours or yours, qualifies as an update, therefore it goes to the end of the queue in our list.

[On the pre-production status]

2 minutes ago, FlyingAntero said:

Thanks @Erik! I hope that you got public availability soon after CES and maybe win the voting competition for greater publicity. Any news about 3rd batch?

Very small batch shipping to the UK this week, and a large one covering 3/10ths of the full number will be in transit next week. 

[On the pre-production status]

We want to explain why a very small number of retailers have the Pro1.

Firstly, they have approached us since we first announced Pro1 at MWC in Feb and we've been in discussions with them since. They have also promised to help with success of the Pro1 in the market place which is important for us. We have only given them a much smaller number of units than they asked for because of all the customer pre-orders. Our pre-orders are our most important customers. For us to be a strong company for you, we also have to build a sustainable business and if we turned those retailers away we would have lost their business going forwards.

Our priority is getting devices to our pre order customers, this has not changed.

[Where did my virtual keyboards go?]

4 minutes ago, MickH said:

Received my Pro1 today, and just trying to get used to it......not having much success though.
The biggest issue I'm having is getting a virtual keyboard to show up on screen. For example- tapping the search bar in Firefox brings up the Google Voice assistant. No matter what I do I can't close the assistant at all, and there's no way of displaying a virtual keyboard. Nothing in Settings either.

Any advice or ideas welcome

TIA😉

Please make sure that the "show virtual keyboard option" is off.

[Got Your Pro1, Tracking Number or "Stock Assigned" message? POST HERE!]

I know some orders were shipped to EU today, with more to follow on Monday. Let’s see if it included anyone on the forums 🙂

[On the pre-production status]

Just now, Swond said:

Woow, thats interresting message. Thanks for the update and sneak-peek pictures. It has to be difficult to check everything again and again.. I know this from our build construction inspections.. Until you are not behind every worker there (and all the time) , then you can always expect something wrong..

Hope things will get better 🙂

Well, they are probably going to be off for the Chinese New Year, but we hope to have most, if not all devices made by then.

[On the pre-production status]

I am not posting this in the main news thread as this is a relatively tiny update.

EU stock arrived in the warehouse today. We are just waiting on the warehouse to ship them out now. Tracking will be sent any minute today, or on Monday if the warehouse is too busy.

I am not sure what's happening with the new stock assigned letters, but we know stock is on the move regardless of this. In the worst case newly assigned orders will be shipped pretty much immediately after they are assigned.

Liangchen is back in the factory and he's inspecting the freshly made units and components personally, as we are now making a lot more devices simultaneously. The factory is not getting time off for Christmas, but I want to warn our logistics partners might be off during the holidays.

A PR-crafted update with more details is being written too I believe, and it should be in your email boxes today or early next week.

[On the pre-production status]

12 minutes ago, cmar said:

 

Yes Erik had mentioned in his latest update that the stock assignment for the 3rd batch would happen early this week (so at the latest today).

It seems to me that it is time for another update by Erik or fx tec officials to explain this latest change of schedule.

 

 

6 minutes ago, FlyingAntero said:

I believe that it is just a small delay this time. It happens. People should soon receive tracking numbers from 2nd batch ja stock assignment mails from 3rd batch. 

 

As far as I know it's on the move, we just haven't sent the stock assignment emails yet. I am checking with Liangchen who is China right now to see if there's a change.

[On the pre-production status]

33 minutes ago, matf said:

Thanks Erik, your reply is really appreciated. Please keep us few EU customers in the second batch informed when the truck drivers knock at your warehouse door!

Scheduled for arrival in our UK warehouse tomorrow, but the team in the warehouse will probably take an additional 12 or so hours to book the stock in and then ship it out. It's moving!

[On the pre-production status]

1 hour ago, matf said:

Any other EU customer with stock assigned in the second batch? The message arrived on Nov. 29th but I don't think it has entered the UK warehouse yet (at least no tracking code yet, though the support thought the phone would likely be delivered before Dec. 10th), I hope the freighter didn't sink on the way to the Southampton port. 😮

On a more serious note, I'm just hoping there is no significant blocker behind this small delay, and that parcels can be shipped to arrive by the end of this week so that I can play all week-end. But my hopes are getting thinner!

 

1 hour ago, anonim001 said:

I'm from Poland, no tracking code yet... 

 

Not in Europe yet, but still in transit to us with Fedex. Could be tomorrow, but could also take until Friday :). A little bit behind schedule, but really it's not major this time. At least it's not stuck like the 1st US batch.

Edit: It is actually in Europe, UK arriving in the warehouse tomorrow.

[Pro1 Pre-Orders Updates]

Hi everyone,

A brief, honest informal update as promised.

The US/APAC shipment from the 2nd batch has now been fulfilled, and some of you should have already been contacted by your couriers to confirm your delivery date. In the meantime, the 1st US batch is still stuck somewhere in a US customs office sorting hub awaiting to be shipped back to our main warehouse in Hong Kong. Customers from the 2nd US batch will be contacted by FedEx for their customs payment, as we have now decided to ship devices directly from Hong Kong in an effort to save time and avoid further foreign importer complications. This is subject to change, but for now, we will, of course, refund the state sales tax that our US customers had to pay for. If we haven't contacted you and your US order has already been delivered, please email [email protected] to receive your state tax refund.

The EU stock from the 2nd batch is also in transit and it's due to arrive in our UK-based warehouse early next week for all of those who received their stock assigned notices. There are slightly less EU devices with the 2nd batch, as the 2nd batch is compensating for the still stuck 1st US batch.

Our 3rd batch is leaving the factory this week on its way to our Hong Kong logistics hub, and I expect that customers from the 3rd batch will receive their stock assigned letters early next week. This new batch will have more EU QWERTZ devices, even though that won't cover all of our QWERTZ pre-orders just yet.

We are now expecting new batches to leave the factory every single week. These batches are relatively small, which allows for orders to be shipped weekly, instead of them being delayed additionally whilst waiting on a larger quantity to be shipped altogether. This is the less cost-effective method for us, but it allows for the Pro1 to be shipped as soon as manufactured.

Despite the increasing negativity in the forums, due to delayed shipping, the bigger picture is more positive than it ever has been. Devices are now being shipped every week, and each batch covers between 1-2 / 10ths of all of our pending pre-orders.

The ones who received their devices, please don't forget to brag on our forums and online 🙂

We understand you are all eager to get your hands on the Pro1. Me and the rest of the team are doing our very best in our powers to avoid further delays (and complaints).

Erik

[On the pre-production status]

I was late with the update yesterday, we've been quite busy lately :). I am noting your questions, and I'll make an informal update on the news thread today.

[On the pre-production status]

5 minutes ago, _DW_ said:

So it will take between 5 and 10 weeks to complete all the pre orders then I guess.

If we are pessimistic, yes. We've had 2 batches shipped already, and the 3rd one is on the way.

[On the pre-production status]

38 minutes ago, matf said:

Thanks Erik. As a EU customer with a unit assigned in the second batch, should I expect getting the tracking number this week?

Some will, but I can't confirm that on an individual basis, there may or may not be a lot of people in the queue before you. Each batch now covers between 1-2/10ths of all pre-orders.

This might disappoint some, and we understand this given how much all of you had to wait for the device, but the bigger picture is positive - we are producing and shipping devices a lot more frequently now that we addressed production and logistics related issues that were slowing us down.

[On the pre-production status]

4 minutes ago, agent008 said:

That is good news. Any stock assignment emails to be sent soon? That way I can keep hopes up that mine is contemplated in the next round. Order in the #150XX's.

Thanks

We are now having batches leaving the factory every week, another one is expected to be in transit between the warehouses by the end of this week, so technically another batch of "stock assigned" letters should be going out early next week.

I will provide more detailed info on this today once I get some time :).

[On the pre-production status]

Tracking details were emailed to our APAC and US/CA customers to those with stock assigned letters. The EU stock is in transit with a courier to our EU warehouse right now. I will write an update on the news thread later today when I get a chance.

[On the pre-production status]

 

[On the pre-production status]

1 hour ago, KingOfTerrible said:

@Erik can you give any more details about what the US Customs issue was with the first batch that was sent to the US?  I'm wondering how "choosing a different shipping method to comply with US customs regulations" bypasses whatever problem was encountered.  I'm not part of that first batch, but I am very much hoping that I'm part of the second US batch with an order in the 52xx and paid July 31st, about 50 mins after receiving the notice that you were ready for payments.

I am no expert in logistics, but the US has specific requirements when a foreign importer as ourselves imports a mass shipment into a US warehouse for general sale. It's not as simple as sending something with Fedex and it landing at your door the next day. Not when we haven't traded in the US before. 

I will try to get a response from one of our directors in charge of US logistics. The issue has been resolved already for our new batches.