Samsung Recall Notices Citing Burn Hazards: What the Official Records Say

Was Your Phone Part of a Samsung Burn Recall?

If the phone that burned you or a family member was a Samsung Galaxy Note7, it is the one product both notices cover. A recall is the CPSC's formal notice that a product poses a safety hazard, together with what owners are told to do, such as stop using it or follow a stated remedy. Each notice is on the CPSC's site:

• Samsung Recalls Galaxy Note7 Smartphones Due to Serious Fire and Burn Hazards, recall number 16-266, recall date September 15, 2016, about 1 million units.
• Samsung Expands Recall of Galaxy Note7 Smartphones Based on Additional Incidents with Replacement Phones; Serious Fire and Burn Hazards, recall number 17-011, recall date October 13, 2016, about 1.9 million units. The notice says this figure "includes the 1 million Galaxy Note7s recalled on September 15, 2016."

If you are trying to confirm where your phone came from, each notice offers the same identifying details: the manufacturer, "Samsung Electronics America Inc., of Ridgefield Park, N.J.," made in "South Korea and China," and sold through wireless carriers, electronics stores and websites from August 2016, for between $850 and $890. A receipt or carrier record that matches these details helps tie a particular phone to the recall.

Battery Injury Litigation Group is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Samsung. The name appears here only to identify the products readers ask about, and naming it does not imply wrongdoing. These notices concern one phone model during a stated period, not Samsung products in general. The site's broader Samsung battery fire information page covers the company more generally.

Which Note7 Phones Each Recall Covered

The two notices draw their scope differently, and the difference matters to anyone trying to place a particular phone.

Recall 16-266, dated September 15, 2016, "involves the Samsung Galaxy Note7 smartphone sold before September 15, 2016." The notice describes the phones as having "a 5.7 inch screen" in "black onyx, blue coral, gold platinum and silver titanium with a matching stylus," with "Samsung" printed on the top front and "Galaxy Note7" on the back. It explains that the phone's IMEI number, found "on the back of the phone or the packaging," could be entered at Samsung's registration site to check whether a phone was recalled.

Recall 17-011, dated October 13, 2016, is wider. It "involves all Samsung Galaxy Note7 smartphones." It states that it covers "all Galaxy Note7 devices received as replacements as part of the previous Galaxy Note7 recall on September 15, 2016 and any Galaxy Note 7 with a green battery icon, regardless of date purchased or IMEI."

In plain terms, the second notice reached the replacement phones handed out under the first one. So if your fire involved a replacement Note7, it falls within the second notice rather than the first. The scope of each recall is set by the CPSC notice itself, not by this page. If you still have the phone, its box or a receipt, the model name, color and IMEI number are the details that line up with these descriptions. The site's guide to lithium battery recall lookup walks through matching a product to a notice field by field.

The Burn Hazard Each Notice States

A lithium-ion battery is the rechargeable battery used in most phones, laptops and power banks. It stores a large amount of energy in a small space, which is why a failure can produce intense heat. Each notice states the hazard in nearly identical words.

Recall 16-266 states: "The lithium-ion battery in the Galaxy Note7 smartphones can overheat and catch fire, posing a serious burn hazard to consumers."

Recall 17-011 states: "The lithium-ion battery in the Galaxy Note7 smartphones can overheat and catch fire, posing serious fire and burn hazard to consumers."

People researching battery fires often meet a related general term. Thermal runaway is the condition in which a lithium-ion battery produces heat faster than it can release it, so the heat feeds itself and can lead to fire or explosion. It is not language from either notice, and it says nothing about what happened inside any particular phone. The site's page on Lithium Battery Burn Injuries explains burn injuries from battery fires in general.

Each hazard statement is the CPSC's public description of a risk for the products the notice names. It does not establish that a specific phone failed, that a specific person was burned by it, or that the firm is legally responsible. For a person who was hurt, it is a starting point about the product, not a conclusion about their own injury.

What Samsung Offered Owners Under Each Recall

A recall remedy is what the notice offers to people who own a covered product. For the original recall, Recall 16-266 states:

"Consumers should immediately stop using and power down the recalled Galaxy Note7 devices purchased before September 15, 2016. Contact the wireless carrier, retail outlet or Samsung.com where you purchased your device to receive free of charge a new Galaxy Note7 with a different battery, a refund or a new replacement device. Go to www.samsung.com for more details."

The expanded recall changed that remedy. Recall 17-011 states that "Consumers should immediately stop using and power down all Galaxy Note7 devices, including Note7 devices received as replacements in the previous recall," and that owners could contact their carrier, retail outlet or Samsung.com "to receive a refund or free exchange for a new replacement device plus incentives." It adds that "Consumers who purchased their phones from other sources should contact Samsung directly to receive a free remedy." Both notices list "Refund" and "Replace" as the remedy types.

Under the second notice, a new Galaxy Note7 was no longer among the listed options. Both CPSC pages also carry a line for people "experiencing issues with a recall remedy," pointing to a CPSC complaint form. The notice pages are the authoritative source for the remedy and its current status.

If you were burned, it helps to keep in mind that a refund or replacement addresses the phone only. Accepting a remedy is a separate matter from any injury or property damage a person may have suffered, and a conversation with our attorney can help sort out how the two relate.

What the Burn Reports in the Notices Mean for You

Each notice includes an "Incidents/Injuries" section stating what Samsung had received as of that notice's date.

Recall 16-266 states: "Samsung has received 92 reports of the batteries overheating in the U.S., including 26 reports of burns and 55 reports of property damage, including fires in cars and a garage."

Recall 17-011 states: "Samsung has received 96 reports of batteries in Note7 phones overheating in the U.S., including 23 new reports since the September 15 recall announcement. Samsung has received 13 reports of burns and 47 reports of property damage associated with Note7 phones."

These are reports Samsung received, stated as of each notice's date. The two counts are worded differently and cover different points in time, so they are not meant to be added together. A report is someone's account of an event; it does not establish what caused an injury, and the figures are not a count of proven injuries or a complete tally.

Federal law explains why these numbers appear at all. Under 15 U.S.C. § 2064(i)(2), a notice required under a CPSC order generally must include, unless the Commission finds an item unnecessary or inappropriate, "The number and a description of any injuries or deaths associated with the product, the ages of any individuals injured or killed, and the dates on which the Commission received information about such injuries or deaths." The listed content also includes, among other items, the model number, the number of units, the hazard, and the remedy.

If you were burned by a Note7, your experience may resemble what these reports describe, and that can make the records feel like confirmation. Whether a particular phone caused a particular burn is a separate question the records themselves do not answer.

What These Records Establish — and What They Do Not

A recall is not a finding that the product was defective in a particular case, an incident report does not prove what caused an injury, a lawsuit is not a finding of liability, and an allegation is not a fact.

For someone who was hurt, the question after "was it recalled?" is usually "could the maker be responsible?" That question belongs to product liability, the body of law that addresses when a manufacturer, seller or distributor may be responsible for harm caused by a product, and it usually turns on whether the product had a defect. A CPSC regulation, 16 C.F.R. § 1115.4, describes a defect for reporting purposes as "a fault, flaw, or irregularity that causes weakness, failure, or inadequacy in form or function." That regulation shapes when firms report to the CPSC. Courts apply their own state's product liability law. The same three categories still appear widely:

• A manufacturing defect is a flaw in how a particular unit was made, so it differs from the intended design.
• A design defect is a risk built into the design itself, present even in units made exactly to specification.
• A warning defect arises when the instructions or warnings were not adequate to address a risk.

Causation is the legal requirement that the product's defect, rather than some other cause, brought about the injury. Depending on the claim and the state, the law asks either for a duty, its breach, causation and damages, or for a defect and causation. Whether those elements are met depends on the facts of the individual case. A recall notice can be one piece of information in that picture. It does not decide it.

This is often where a person who was burned feels the gap between "the phone was recalled" and "what does that mean for me." A conversation with our attorney can cover how product liability, defect and causation work and what questions the facts of a particular fire raise.

Records a Person Hurt by a Recalled Device Often Gathers

If you were hurt, the records that usually matter connect the product, the event and the injury.

Medical records document the burn and its treatment, which bears on both causation and damages. Photos and video of the phone, the injury and any scorched furniture, car interior or room show what the scene looked like. The device itself, if it was kept, may be the most direct physical evidence of what failed. A receipt, carrier statement or order history ties the phone to its owner and its purchase date, which matters because the two notices draw their scope by date and by replacement status. Fire department, incident or police reports, where any were made, record what responders saw. The names of anyone who witnessed the fire can matter later. The recall number and date, 16-266 or 17-011, connect the phone to the notice that covers it.

Families gather these at different paces, often while still managing treatment and repairs, and some records simply no longer exist. A conversation with our attorney can help sort out which of these records bear on the questions above. If you would like that conversation, you can request a case evaluation.

Why Limitation Periods Matter After a Burn Injury

A statute of limitations is the period within which a legal claim generally must be filed. After it runs, the right to bring the claim is generally lost, whatever its merits. Some states also have a statute of repose, which sets an outer limit measured from a fixed event, such as when a product was first sold, rather than from when an injury happened.

These periods for product liability and personal injury claims differ from state to state, and no state's rule is the rule everywhere. Many states set a different period for wrongful death, the claim a family may bring when a person dies because of another's wrongful act or a defective product. When a period starts to run, and what exceptions apply, also vary by state, as do fault rules and damages rules.

That variation is why this page states no period. Which state's law applies, which period governs and when it began turn on the facts and the state. Those are among the things a conversation with our attorney can cover.