Joy-Con repair centers overwhelmed by repairs

Joy-Con repair centers overwhelmed by repairs

According to Kotaku, an unknown supervisor at United Radio, a Nintendo Joy-Con repair facility in New York, told the newspaper that they were always swamped with repairs for the Nintendo Switch’s distinctive controllers. The problem is with Joy-Con drift, which Nintendo seldom addresses and for which users have filed class-action lawsuits. Shuntaro Furukawa, Nintendo’s president, had to apologize to consumers in 2020:

Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa in a recent investor question and answer session;

We regret for any inconvenience given to our consumers by the Joy-Con,. We will continue to strive to enhance our products, but since the Joy-Con is now the subject of a class-action lawsuit in the United States, we would prefer to abstain from commenting on any particular activities.

Shuntaro Furukawa, Nintendo’s president, told investors

In 2022 the company’s headquarters in New York has just one native English speaker on staff and that the majority of the temporary employees are Vietnamese immigrants. The employees are either on work visas or are citizens of the United States, and according to Kotaku, some even celebrated passing their citizenship exams while working at the firm.

United Radio also has a very high staff turnover rate. According to the source who talked with Kotaku, working conditions at the company were “extremely stressful” owing to the large number of Joy-Cons shipped in for repair and the rapid turnover, which resulted in “a lot of” repair problems.

Kotaku quote

Customers who returned their Joy-Cons between 2017 and 2018 received fresh replacements, according to Kotaku’s source. This little fix helped relieve the strain for a time. However, after the first year, the shop’s employees were compelled to fix every set of Joy-Cons. Turnaround times were tight, and keeping up with the pace was challenging. Regardless matter whether the staffing provider provided them fresh personnel or not, the store was held to a requirement of mending 90% of incoming Joy-Cons within four days.