Viofo

No after-sales support! – Upon reading positive reviews, we purchased two Viofo A229Plus dashcams for our cars in late November 2024 and had one installed in early January, shortly after receiving them. Firstly, a manual is not available on Viofo's website for this model which makes it very hard to navigate through its intricacies. Secondly, the Viofo phone app does not connect with the dashcam which renders it useless, so I contacted Viofo support on support@viofo.com.au. I received a response asking for further info which I immediately sent. I then received an email apologising that due to a glitch with their email that afternoon, they may have not received my email reply. I replied again resending my email and didn't hear back, so I resent it twice again over two days. Still no response, so I sent another email this morning and this time got a system delivery failure from the server. I tried again and got the same automatic undeliverable email alert. Upon a closer look, it appears Viofo's email box is full. This is not good enough! Viofo is either not answering all of its emails in a timely manner and allowing its inbox to exceed limits, or it needs to address some other email system failure immediately.

Thirdly, Viofo doesn't have a phone number in Australia. The only number I was able to find is in China (0086 181 2363 1217). Their Australian website shows it displaying Support with a telephone icon, making customers believe they are easily reachable via phone. This is not the case! Without a functioning email address, there is not an easy way to seek tech support. The other dashcam will now not be installed as it remains in its originally packed box.

I will now have to contact PayPal about this and try to seek refunds on both cameras, as I have lost complete faith in this manufacturer, its product and its non-existent after-sales service. We have two new dashcams that are not fit for purpose and a company that is not helpful/reachable at all in resolving its products' technical issues.

Update: I phoned the number above (0011 86 181 2363 1217). After many rings, the automated reply was in Chinese and then a short English message saying the voice caller is not available and then disconnected before allowing a message to be left. Viofo obviously does not want to be reached by any means. PayPal has now lodged a dispute with Ianwell Trading, the name registered as trading under the Viofo brand and which processed our payment.

Further update: PayPal contacted Ianwell Trading and gave then 10 days to respond. No response. I also contacted Ianwell Trading via the PayPal message app and no response. PayPal has now processed a full refund. Meanwhile, I've noticed that Viofo is aggressively advertising on You Tube and Facebook.