Sudden charging problem w brand new FP3

Hi there, after trying to search around I wondered if anyone might be able to help with a fix so I don’t have to go through the long process of send-off and repair…

Basically, all was well for a week or two, then one day I let my phone run down til it’s virtually out of battery. I plug it in, leave it for a while, and…it goes up by about 1% in an hour. Damn. So, I turn it off and try charging then - the red light blinks a few times, the fairphone screen starts up, I see the screen saying it is charging on 2%…and it reboots. It stays in this cycle of rebooting. I get another cable - the same.

Now, I think what happened here is I turned it on, because it had enough charge left, and then it started charging reeeeeally slowly. I’d leave it on all night and it would maybe just hit 30%. So I’ve been doing this for a week while talking to customer service, who said maybe my charger isn’t up to spec (it worked for the first few weeks??). I get another. Same thing. Customer service send a list of approved chargers, and my mid-range one ain’t on there. So I get a fairphone one, thinking this seems unlikely - surely a phone can’t be that fussy? And it’s not - no change. Only this time the battery has gone properly flat, and I can’t turn it on. Just the cycle of rebooting.

Customer service say I can send it back for repair - but I had hoped to avoid this, as it’ll mean not having a phone for a week. More than that, I’ve got photos on there, and I’d like to get them off before sending it away and having it return presumably wiped. To be honest, having seen these forums I’d hoped that customer service might actually help me troubleshoot the phone, as it is meant to be self-serviceable, but I feel like I just got a lot of generic advice about chargers.

Anyone had the same thing? Is there any way I can get enough charge in it to boot up and get my data off it at least? Would really appreciate any advice - once I’ve got to grips with my fixed FP3 I’ll try to pay it forward!

You could charge the battery with an external charger …

If you happen to have fairphoneangels with Fairphone 3 expertise and parts in your vicinity, apart from lending a battery to get your data off the phone perhaps a module swap could identify a hardware culprit for the issue (e.g. bottom module).

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Thanks for the idea - I can’t bear to buy more plastic stuff off the back of this phone though! A few of my friends have the FP2, but I can’t find any hookups for a FP3 battery sadly. I must say, after such an immediate problem with a new phone, I can’t say I’d be recommending the 3 to any of them :frowning: Thanks for replying

I’m having this problem constantly - have had to send it back for repair about 3 times now. I find it extremely ironic that Fairphone says ‘we don’t include a charger because we want to reduce waste’ and at the same time suggest you test your phone with THREE chargers as part of their troubleshooting for charging problems. All my old chargers are for USB not USB-C, so if I really followed customer service suggestions I’d have to buy extra chargers just to check a problem I know is not charger related. I’m happy to keep repairing rather than chuck the phone - but I have to use an old phone inbetween and if that goes then I’ll have to buy a new phone just to use as a backup for my Fairphone, again, not very eco friendly. This seems to be a common and recurring problem so it would be nice if there was some kind of answer as to what the problem was even if there is no solution to it.

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