One-and-a-half-star Yelp average
- Lengthy, high-priced contracts (five-year average)
- Disorganized billing department (charges after cancelation, even out of contract, are a common occurrence)
- Incompetent technicians (often arrive late and fail to complete installation)
- Low-quality equipment (not aesthetically pleasing, failures are common)
- Lack of communication between technicians and customer service (each often make false claims contradicting one another)
Responded review source: “Vivint Smart Home” Better Business Bureau, https://www.bbb.org/us/ut/provo/profile/burglar-alarm-systems/vivint-smart-home-1166-4002276/customer-reviews. Accessed 3 Mar. 2022.
Supplemental reviews source: “Vivint” Yelp, https://www.yelp.com/biz/vivint-provo-10. Accessed 7 Mar. 2022.
Names have been changed to protect user privacy.
If I could put no stars, I would. Let me save you from the hell their customer service is. NO ONE knows what they are doing. I had someone scheduled to come out 2 days after the system was installed. No one showed. I call customer service, they tell me to please wait, the tech is running late. Another hour passes & I call again. That customer service person told me the tech was never coming. She reschedules my appointment for the next day. The next day comes and goes and again NO ONE shows up. So, at this point I call to cancel because if they can’t even show up to fix equipment, then how can I trust them to show up when someone breaks into my house. After fighting with 6 different customer service people for TWO HOURS, I finally am able to speak with someone competent. They offer me 3 free months of monitoring ($150 cool.) and extend my trial for 30 days. After I refused to pay their buyout for the equipment, considering I had only had it for 5 days. The customer service person schedules me again for supposedly a different technician to come out. The day comes where the tech is supposed to come. I call to confirm with customer service that they are coming to get the equipment & tell her that I also want the services cancelled. Apparently, it is not the same technician that removes equipment that services it. So, the customer service rep cancels my appointment (instead of having them come and fix it and then send someone else to pick up the equipment.) The customer service agent then reschedules me for Friday & gives me to the same technician that CONTINUES TO NOT SHOW UP. I ask for someone else. She says she cannot do it. I ask to be transferred to someone else. I go through another 3 people telling me they cannot put me with a different technician. I finally get transferred to a supervisor. She searches for a different technician to get me scheduled for removal of the equipment. Today is appointment number 4, and I get a call that my technician cannot work on my equipment. I didn’t ask for a technician to work on my equipment, I asked to have the equipment removed from my home. So here I am yet again being transferred around to no one that can actually do anything. They will reschedule my appointment for tomorrow, and we will see YET AGAIN if anyone shows up. For the amount they ask you to pay for their services, you would assume their customer service wouldn’t be complete garbage. If Ann H. is your technician there’s an 80% chance she won’t show up, at this point I don’t even know how she still works there.
Response from Vivint
Dear Mr. Zack,
Following protocol, I must address my letter with corporate cliché: “On behalf of all of Vivint, we are sorry to hear about your experience with us. Customer satisfaction is our #1 guarantee.” Now that my quota has been accounted for, I would like to explain why I am responding to your review in such depth, especially as I work 8-hour shifts with one 30-minute break. Allow me to introduce myself, my name is Harold Hawthorne, and I am a customer review moderator at Vivint. Have you ever wondered who is behind the corporate cliché that is used in response to negative online reviews? Well, that’s my job at Vivint. This morning I came into the office expecting another mundane day, but, I came across your review around 9:45, and it somehow hijacked my day. You bring up some disparaging claims—mainly regarding our customer service—that I would like to confute. That’s why I decided to dedicate the rest of my day towards writing this comprehensive essay in response to your one-star review.
To begin, I would like to contradict your claim that our customer service department is ignorant. Mr. Zack, I apologize in advance, but this is ignorance on your part. Every low-level department at Vivint is overworked. This may give the appearance that we are nescient, however, we have quotas to meet. In the customer service department (I was a CS agent before my promotion) quotas are based on daily call volume, not call quality. This is precisely why most of your calls were unhelpful. In fact, during my time as a customer service agent, I acted extremely rude and ignorant on purpose. My average daily quota was 20 calls per day! It paid off, as I got a promotion to my current job, which is of much melioration. Next time you call us, please remember this. You should just accept the fact that customer service will get you nowhere. They work long and hard, and are focused on getting a promotion, not helping the customer solve their problem.
Next, I would like to address the technician absence that you faced. This behavior was intentional, Mr. Zack. You must remember that every company’s goal is to make money, even if that results in a decline in customer satisfaction. In the beginning, Vivint was praised for its first-class customer service. This came at an extreme cost, however. A few years ago, as part of a five-year business plan, our executives decided to launch the SkyPanel, our first proprietary security system. (Our records show that you have this panel.) The closed-nature of the SkyPanel and its components helped lower our costs drastically by locking customers into Vivint. This allowed us to drop the quality of many of our departments, including customer service. If customers become dissatisfied with our service—even if they are off contract—they have two options: either have another company replace the entire system, which costs thousands of dollars; or stick with Vivint. In short, this is your situation, Mr. Zack. The technician didn’t show up because they didn’t have to. Even though your contract has not started yet (you should appreciate the 30-day trial extension, we rarely give those out), you still only have the two aforementioned options. Do you really think we would allow third-party companies to monitor our equipment, which we subsidize?
To continue, after you attempted to cancel, you stated that a customer service agent pushed you to purchase the equipment instead of scheduling an appointment for removal. You also mentioned that the technician who was supposed to remove the equipment was coming to fix it. Lastly, you said that the customer service agent told you that only certain technicians are authorized to remove the equipment, and you decided to cancel the appointment. I hate to admit, Mr. Zack, but you’re in the wrong here. As part of the aforementioned five-year business plan, we decided to push all of our customer service efforts in threat of a cancelation. If you had given us another chance, we could have fixed all of your problems! You could have been a happy Vivint customer, shouting “Vivint!” anytime someone in your near vicinity even just briefly mentioned the thought of home security. But you took a turn, Mr. Zack. You decided to cancel the appointment, and then chose to bash our company by adding to the already exorbitant assemblage of negative reviews. You worked your way through our business model, asserting through scare tactics, but passed up the opportunity to benefit from it. In fact, you put in more effort than needed, Mr. Zack. Taking no action—instead of calling back—would have resulted in a silver lining. You would not have written this review, and I would not have put my job in jeopardy through this work of writing.
At this point, you are probably thinking: “What is this guy going to rant about next?” Actually, you’d be incorrect. This sentence officially concludes my rant. I would love to offer you a promotion at this point, but my position lacks authorization to do so. Perhaps, Mr. Zack, you have been in the right this whole time. Perhaps I have been manipulated by the overlords, concealed in their lavish offices four floors above me. Perhaps your fresh perspective enticed me to do the right thing: expose the atrocious business model behind Vivint. Maybe we are being sued by the Federal Trade Commission for a reason, not just “premeditated propaganda”, as higher-ups are claiming. No wonder your review hijacked my day (it’s now 12:30). Overall, this should’ve been concluded a long time ago, Mr. Zack, as the writing is on the wall. My supervisor is making his rounds; once he sees this response and my lacking quota, he’ll look me in the eye and gently gesture towards the door. But perhaps it will be worth it. “Do the right thing, no matter the circumstances”, my grandmother always told me. You, Mr. Zack, are doing the right thing.
Rightfully Enlightened,
Harold Hawthorne
Customer Review Moderator
Vivint SmartHome (Provo)
Long story short, we referred 3 family members and friends to Vivint. 1st Family Member – I “assumed” with us being present and my sister specifically giving a “by name” referral, our referral discount would be honored. I had to contact Vivint for a different reason, during the phone conversation I asked was our bill ever discounted for the referral that we had sent to the company; it was not. Vivint wouldn’t honor the referral discount because they stated that I did not call within the required timeframe to inform them that the discount was never added to my account. 2nd Friend Referral – During the same phone conversation, not only did the person that we referred confirm that they told Vivint that it was us that referred them, it was also with the required timeframe. When Vivint checked our friend’s record, they claimed that a separate discount code was added to their account, so they could not honor that referral either. 3rd Family Member Referral – My cousin provided Vivint with the referral code and everything else that they gave us a hard time for not having before. I have contacted Vivint Customer Service 3x’s, I have yet been given the referral discount that they claim to honor. I WILL NOT REFER ANOTHER FRIEND, FAMILY, CO-WORKER, OR RANDOM PERSON TO VIVINT.
I have had an issue with my back door lock registering on my app as locked. It tells me the door isn’t locked while it is. I’ve been back and forth with customer service. The people answering have been very nice and tried different solutions, but nothing is different. They keep sending me equipment to help rectify the situation, but the issue doesn’t change. I’ve stated that I believe all it would take is a service technician to take a look at it, but they say they can’t do that. It doesn’t make sense to me. It seems like it would save them money in the long run for someone to just come and visually see the problems in order to get things fixed. I feel very caught in this situation because I would really like to cancel the service, but I’ve put too much money into the equipment. My initial experience with them was very positive, but that has certainly changed over time. To anyone thinking of putting in a security system, please be sure to check on what their follow-up service is like. I wish I had because I would not have chosen this company.
I have been misled and I am very upset. I just moved into my home less than 3 weeks ago from CA to GA and purchased a plan with ADT. A few days later, a sales rep knocks on my door with a deal and offers hard to pass up from Vivint. He offers to buy me out of my ADT contract up to $2000. My buyout contract with ADT is $1600 and some change. He explained that the max gift card was for $1000, and they will email him for authorization to send the rest in a second gift card for the $600 and change, once we cancelled and got a cancelation email from ADT. We got 3 cameras, a new panel, they used our door sensors and motion sensors and gave us a new door system the same day. I am thinking it’s a little more than ADT, but we are getting more also. We tried it for a few days as he said there was a 2-week trial period. He asked if we could wait until the following Friday to put in the claim as it would affect his paycheck. We agreed. I put the claim in, and now they are only giving me the $1000 as that is the max and offering me a deferment option waiving a service fee for 12 months, leaving me to pay ADT the remaining $600 and change. That was not the agreement, I am very upset and unhappy. ADT has my card on file and if not paid will charge me. This is very misleading and horrible customer service. I was just fine before getting hooked up with this service. They won’t help or return my calls.
This alarm system company has robbed me!
Financing the equipment you’ve incarcerated yourself into paying for equipment three-times it’s value . I paid the equipment off.
I paid the equipment off because they are not meeting their end of the deal! Originally I was told my payments would be half of what I’m paying with financing the equipment. I was also told I would be removed from the contract obligations -once the equipment was paid off.
Now I’m told…”I was informed incorrectly”.
They are however unable to provide the original contract with my signature. One representative says I’m no longer under contract. The other insinuates I have a 60-month contract!
In order to end the contract, I would need to pay the monthly cost for the remainder of the contracted months. Because I can’t get Vivint to send my original contract, I don’t know if it’s 0 or 46 months…no early termination fee option!
FYI: No law will accept a “typed” signature. ANYONE can type a signature!
The reason I’m trying to end the services. The features I have does not work, I can’t get the sensory devices to function, it has a huge delay…I was internationally traveling I could not get the equipment to function via my phone app; the alarm ended up malfunctioning. The representative offered to upgrade the faulty equipment! (of course I would pay for the “upgrade”) Trust issues—hard pass.
Encountered a guy in my neighborhood today that was going door to door soliciting business for this company. Our neighborhood has clearly posted “No Soliciting” signs at all entrances, and I wanted to make sure he had seen them. He was a total jerk to me, screamed yelled and cussed at me, and continued walking door to door after telling me he didn’t care what the county or city ordinance was that he was going to go door to door and didn’t care about any laws. Stay away from any company that uses these types of tactics and hires shady people like this to sell their products.
UPDATE**
The next day, he decided to come back through the neighborhood again and refused to leave a neighbor’s property until the police were called.
UPDATE 2
I responded to Vivint, and they have not reached back out to me