Vodafone offers battery refreshes and lifetime warranties on new phones

UK operator Vodafone is rolling out battery replacements for three years and lifetime cover for manufacturer faults as part of its EVO contracts.

Vodafone says it’s the only ‘lifetime service promise’ in the UK, and it covers refurbished phones as well as new ones.

All phones purchased with Lifetime Warranty will be covered for warranty repairs for as long as customers have at least one Vodafone Pay Monthly Airtime Plan on their account. This means if customers upgrade to a new device and keep their old one as a back-up they are both covered for repairs.

If battery performance is sub-optimal, customers on the plan can use Battery Refresh Tool in the My Vodafone app which performs a little diagnostic and if it concludes it needs to be replaced, this can be done by sending it away from a Vodafone shop.

 Max Taylor, Vodafone’s UK Chief Commercial Officer, said: “We know that customers are now keeping phones for up to four years, so we are thrilled to be adding our new market-leading Lifetime Service Promise to Vodafone EVO. It gives our customers that extra peace of mind, knowing their phone is covered for as long as they choose to keep the device.”

The release quotes some research from CCS Insight which claims 45% of people want to repair a mobile phone rather than replace them, and the expected lifetime of a mobile phone is 4.2 years.  With cost of living crisis still very much in play, you can certainly see why there might be a growing appeal to mend rather than replace expensive smartphones where possible.

Batteries are often the first thing to go on phones too, so that’s quite handy. With regards to the repairs, it seems to be specifically related to manufacturer faults as opposed to self-inflicted damage – so presumably if you’ve got a shattered screen because you fumbled the phone and sent it promptly towards the pavement, then you’re on your own, butter fingers.

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