Trusted and major brands facing serious quality issues

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Long time smart home enthusiast here. New to Home Assistant and making my first post. Arrived here by way of Hubitat and SmartThings before that.

If you’re on the market for new z-wave switches, this post is for your considerations - it’s about my demoralizing experience with a particular brand and seller. Specifically, Amazon and Jasco (also branded as GE, Enbrighten, UltraPro, and Honeywell). I’m just sharing the feedback I already submitted to Jasco below (including the added dramatic effect). I’m also looking for solid alternative switches and reliable sellers in the replies - trusting only from recent experiences.

To Jasco:
I’m writing to express my growing frustration with the quality and reliability of the Enbrighten smart switches that has finally reached a boiling point. I’ve spent thousands of dollars on your products, having previously installed smart switches throughout my prior house. I was very satisfied then, even though I had to replace a few switches after a couple of years due to faulty z-wave radios. This generally positive experience led me to choose Enbrighten again for installation throughout my new house, which I totally regret that decision now.

Over the past several months, I’ve purchased dozens of z-wave switches for lights, dimmers, fans, and add ons, including both 500 and 700 series in both paddle and toggle designs in both white and almond colors. There’s been a myriad of various issues across the entire range of these products. Issues include boxes with missing components such as the required white wire and/or the interchangeable almond colored cover - even from boxes with the original sealed packaging. I’ve also received unsealed or unoriginal packaging with obviously used or refurbished parts within. The most frustrating issue by far is the number of defective switches I’ve received that are dead on arrival. In one instance, I received a defective replacement part for a defective original part. Maybe 1 out of 4 switches I’ve received are brand new, fully functional, and with all components included - 75% have quality issues which is completely unacceptable.

All of my purchases were shipped and sold by Amazon, who has so far handled things to the best of their capabilities. However, a conclusive resolution is mostly out of their control because Enbrighten is ultimately responsible for end user satisfaction through quality control and assurance in both manufacturing and supply chain. It’s your brand reputation after all.

The extensive issues have caused me to waste countless hours troubleshooting electrical wiring only to conclude that the switch itself is defective (then reinstalling existing switches afterwards). I now keep known good Enbrighten switches around to identify a defective switch with 100% certainty (as well as for spare parts when they’re missing from other boxes). I’ve also spent a painfully amount of time communicating with Amazon customer service to file complaints and to process replacements and refunds (I spent an hour of valuable time just writing this feedback for you). Furthermore, it’s been a heavy burden to make multiple trips and wait in line to drop off returns, driving 30 miles per trip while consuming unnecessary gas (I currently have 3 defective devices pending a return). I’ve anxiously waited many long days for replacement parts to arrive or refunds to be issued (even the original orders are repeatedly delayed in shipping).

At this point, my frustration and dissatisfaction have overtaken the joy and passion I receive from smart home additions. I’ve lost all confidence in your products, and I’m looking for alternatives to revive my enthusiasm - alternatives for products and sellers alike. I can no longer recommend your products to others and will openly share my negative experiences in product reviews along with my fellow smart home enthusiasts in the online community forums. I’m assuming Enbrighten issues also affect Jasco, Honeywell, GE, UltraPro, and whatever other brand names it’s currently being sold under.

That said, I’m anticipating a response to my feedback. If you have any explanation, resolution, or plan to address these issues, whether simply acknowledging it or by offering a gesture of goodwill - I’m giving you an opportunity to restore my confidence, regain my future business, and/or my continued support in the online communities.

Thank you for allowing me to vent, and I look forward to your response.

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If I recall right that was the one that Linus was getting pissed off when it comes to the support by the company for firmware updates to allow the switches he was using to be tested to see if it fix his issues with them.

It does not surprise me in the least that product quality is to put it mildly dogshite.

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I use Zooz, Aeotech, Leviton and Minoston products for zwave mains power applications.

I do have a few GE devices and they’ve worked for me. But I recently bought a Enbrighten zwave dimmer that was DOA. I returned it for another that was also DOA. I returned it and used Zooz. I probably won’t buy another Enbrighten device again.

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My experience has always been that GE, Jasco, and Enbrighten have been a crap shoot and, even when they work, they lack much of the device capabilities as higher end brands. They are cheap, both in price and function.

I now stick with almost 100% Inovelli for switches on both Zigbee and Z-Wave, but also buy some Zooz as well if I must. Inovelli’s are very high quality, they issue firmware updates regularly and their feature set is often many times more than any other brand.

For miscellaneous stuff I’ll do Aeotech and Fibaro, preferring Fibaro because it’s been highly reliable for me. Aeotech is decent too, but it’s a second choice.

I’ve bought many other Chinese “off” brands, like Minoston, that have been a crap shoot as well - but especially with Minoston I avoid them like the plague as they stole several Inovelli designs directly and have demonstrated that they are not only iffy manufacturers but extremly iffy business people.

My two cents.

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Anything below this line should just be regarded as pissing against the wind. You might get the attention of the dev who handled Jasco being integrated to HA, but I seriously doubt you’ll find any Jasco reps here on this forum.

I suggest you find their own forums and post it there, but do leave this post up as a warning to others.

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He said in the post that he already sent his feedback to Jasco and was simply sharing it with the users here.

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You’re right - I totally missed that!

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