Second hand drone, can't unbind drone

[msacco]

Hey, I recently bought a DJI Mini 3 Pro as my first drone, I bought it from someone that used it for just a few dozen minutes, which means they basically didn't use it at all.


Since they didn't use it much, they weren't very familiar with the binding thing, and since it's my first drone, I didn't knew about that thing.

When I received the drone and RC, both were connected to the same account, he just sold it to me like that since he didn't knew much about it. Unfortunately for me, since I didn't knew it either I first disconnected the account from the RC before unbinding the drone from the account, and now I'm pretty much stuck with the drone which I can't unbind.

I have talked to the guy I purchased the drone from, but they don't remember the account and gmail since they created it just for the drone, he says he'll try to recover the account, but I don't know if he'll manage to do that.

I tried to reach out to DJI, but their reply is "we'll try to contact the previous owner and try to resolve it", I don't know if they might do something useful since he can't remember both the gmail and account..They told me not to worry, but tbh I am worried, it sounds like I'm kinda f**cked with no solution possible.

1. Are there any suggestions? Any ideas what can I do now?
2. What are the consequences of not being able to bind the drone to my account? It seems like I can still fly the drone and it does register the info to my account..
3. Is there some unofficial way of unbinding the drone in a different way without the account?

Thanks for the help.

 

[Yorkshire_Pud]

There seems to be two 'levels' of "binding" possible.
The stronger is, I believe, available ONLY if the seller bought FLYAWAY insurance and bound things accordingly, i.e. bound the drone to their DJI-account/email-address AND bound the controller to the drone.
If the flyaway bindings are in place then they MUST be undone for the drone to be of use to you. If they are not undone then you will either be unable to fly the drone or WILL SHORTLY be unable to fly the drone. And there is NOTHING YOU can do about that.

The lesser binding, and to my mind it's pointless, is available to anyone with an applicable drone and it does NOTHING that I can see.
I have a mini 2, to which the lesser binding is applicable. I have NEITHER care refresh NOR fly away insurance and I was able to bind the drone to my account but, OTHER than perhaps, in certain circumstances, prompting a message saying that the drone bound to something, the binding did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING useful. I was able to swap controllers and DJI accounts willy nilly with no consequences. In the end since that level of binding served no purpose I unbound the drone.

With regards to flyaway "bindings", as far as I am aware ALL THAT YOU CAN DO is wait for them to undo the bindings or return the drone for a refund. You should, perhaps, see some of the email address that he created and it might be enough to guide him to the correct address.

I he can't remember it then was this bought via ebay?
If so, and if FLYAWAY bindings are in place, then, since it now probably will not fly OR shortly will not fly, because of those flyaway bindings, I would think it would be covered by sbay's "not as described" policy and you would be eligible for a return, at his prepaid expense, AND a full refund of the original purchase price INCLUDING the original carriage charge.
If it was via ebay then, from NOW on, all communication should be via ebay messages i.e. crate a 'paper trail'and you MUST CONFORM to the ebay time scales.
Since, if it was via ebay and "not as described" is applicable it may 'encourage' the seller to remember.
THEY DO NOT need the drone to unbind things, all they need is the app ( logged in of course ) and an internet connection. Once they log into their account and severe the bindings the app should, if connected to the internet, pass on that the bindings have been severed and you should be 'good to go', your app will need to be connected to the internet to be 'informed' that the bindings have been undone.
ALSO they MUST undo the/any binding between the controller and the drone, if they do not do that then I think you will be prevented form having more than 5 flights with any other controller.

 

[msacco]

There seems to be two 'levels' of "binding" possible. The stronger is, I believe, available ONLY if the seller bought FLYAWAY insurance and bound things accordingly, i.e. the drone to their DJI-account/email-address AND the controller to the drone.
If the flyaway binding is in place then it MUST be undone for the drone to be of use to you. If it is not undone the you will either be unable to fly the drone or WILL SHORTLY be unable to fly the drone. And there is NOTHING YOU can do about that.

The lesser, and to my mind pointless, binding is available to anyone with an applicable drone and it does NOTHING that I can see.
I have a mini 2, to which the lesser binding is applicable, I have NEITHER care refresh NOR fly away insurance and I was able to bind the drone to my account but, OTHER than perhaps, in certain circumstances, prompting a message saying that the drone bound to something, the binding did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING useful. I was able to swap controllers and DJI accounts willy nilly with no consequences. In the end since that level of binding served no purpose I unbound the drone.

With regards to flyaway "bindings", as far as I am aware ALL THAT YOU CAN DO is wait for them to unbind it or return the drone for a refund. You should, perhaps, see some of the email address that he created and it might be enough to guide him to the correct address.

I he can't remember it then was this bought via ebay?
If so, and if FLYAWAY bindings are in place, then, since it now probably will not fly OR shortly will not fly, because of those flyaway bindings, I would think it would be covered by sbay's "not as described" policy and you would be eligible for a return, at his prepaid expense, AND a full refund of the original purchase price INCLUDING the original carriage charge.
If it was via ebay then, from NOW on, all communication should be via ebay messages i.e. crate a 'paper trail'and you MUST CONFORM to the ebay time scales.
Since, if it was via ebay and "not as described" is applicable it may 'encourage' the seller to remember.
THEY DO NOT need the drone to unbind things, all they need is the app ( logged in of course ) and an internet connection. Once they log into their account and severe the bindings the app should, if connected to the internet, pass on that the bindings have been severed and you should be 'good to go', your app will need to be connected to the internet to be 'informed' that the bindings have been undone.
ALSO they MUST undo the/any binding between the controller and the drone, if they do not do that then I think you will be prevented form having more than 5 flights with any other controller.

Thanks for the comment, the binding is not with FLYAWAY insurance or refresh care.
I did not purchase it from ebay, I physically went to the guy to purchase it from, and I do believe him that he says he doesn't remember, he didn't look like a very technical guy, he bought it for his wife which was used for like 20 minutes and that's it.

They created a new gmail account for the drone, and created the DJI account. I did send them part of the gmail, but they say they can't remember, and that they will try to remember.
I don't think this was anything intentional, and I do think they will try to help, he also offered that if there's some paid 'hacking' service that allows to unbind it he will cover the costs, so it sounds fairly reasonable to me(does anything like that exists?)

So if I understood your comment correctly, since it's the 'light' binding, it doesn't actually matter? And I would be able to continue flying the done with no issues?

It's still pretty frustrating that DJI doesn't have a better system for that.
To begin with, perhaps I have missed it but when disconnecting from the account on the RC I don't remember any message saying "IF YOU PLAN ON CHANGING ACCOUNT FIRST MAKE SURE TO UNBIND THE DRONE" or something like that, it's pretty weird if you ask me, I also read about what to do when buying a second hand drone, but none said anything about that.

Next is that I find it super weird that DJI can't control the binding remotely, or at least recover the user with proper verification, and if that's not possible, I'm surprised there's no way to actually remove the binding by firmware by DJI themselves.

I guess that's the way it is, but it's just so frustrating that something so stupid is happening when there's not much I could find about it before the purchase during my research, I never imagined that logging out of an account before unbinding could cause so much mess over nothing.

I just hope I could somehow get this sorted out, it's such a small stupid thing.

Thanks.

 

[msinger]

I tried to reach out to DJI, but their reply is "we'll try to contact the previous owner and try to resolve it", I don't know if they might do something useful since he can't remember both the gmail and account..They told me not to worry

I've seen similar cases like this in the DJI forum. It looks like DJI support waits a few days for the owner to respond. If they don't hear back, they unbind the drone on the owner's behalf.

 

[msacco]

I've seen similar cases like this in the DJI forum. It looks like DJI support waits a few days for the owner to respond. If they don't hear back, they unbind the drone on the owner's behalf.

Really...from what it seemed during the conversation with them, it sounded like if they won't be able to sort it out with the previous owner, there's no way to unbind it.
I really hope that what you say is true, I didn't see something like that when I tried to search for similar cases on google, but I obviously didn't go through everything in existence.

I'll just pray that what you say is true, thanks!!

 

[msinger]

there's no way to unbind it

DJI can definitely unbind it. If someone at DJI tells you that's not possible, you should ask to speak to someone else.

 

[msacco]

DJI can definitely unbind it. If someone at DJI tells you that's not possible, you should ask to speak to someone else.

Well that surely gives me some hopes! If that's the case, I guess I can just bug them enough until they'll help me with that.
I have supplied al the details to them, and the previous owner seems pretty cooperative, so I have nothing to hide and can do whatever they ask me until I can assure them that this is the actual case that happened.

 

[Yorkshire_Pud]

So if I understood your comment correctly, since it's the 'light' binding, it doesn't actually matter? And I would be able to continue flying the done with no issues?

If it is the same level of binding I had with my mini 2 then, CORRECT, I had no issues. I swapped between DJI accounts and used various controllers with the drone and the original controller with various drones, all without restriction.

I also read about what to do when buying a second hand drone, but none said anything about that.

I suppose it would tend to show up in searches for "problems with a second hand drone" more than in searches "what to do when looking for a second hand drone"

, or at least recover the user with proper verification,

the problem with that is .......... what constitutes proper verification? The only thing I can think of is an email from the email address of the bound account say "yes, I have sold/given this drone to such and such" but that email account could be hacked. Copies of receipts etc. can be faked.

I'm surprised there's no way to actually remove the binding by firmware by DJI themselves

I would guess DJI can do that if they get their hands on the drone.....but......since one purpose of this cover is to prevent a drone that has flown-away from being recovered and flown by a 3rd party, they would still need to confirm with the registered account that the dorne has been sold etc

I guess that's the way it is, but it's just so frustrating that something so stupid is happening when there's not much I could find about it before the purchase during my research, I never imagined that logging out of an account before unbinding could cause so much mess over nothing.

I see your point to some extent with regards to logging out of the account but I would say your research was somewhat lacking. I am sure you have by now seen multiple threads concerning "they drone I just bought is bound to anothe account.
I would also point out another little tit bit that I recerntly read of, if an app is left inactive for a period of several months there may be an automatic log out, something else to watch for. lol

 

[Yorkshire_Pud]

It looks like DJI support waits a few days for the owner to respond. If they don't hear back, they unbind the drone on the owner's behalf.

Not arguing with you ...... but how do you know that it is DJI that have remotely undone the binding? Could it be that there email to the original owner was recieved and acted on by the original owner?

 

[msacco]

If it is the same level of binding I had with my mini 2 then, CORRECT, I had no issues. I swapped between DJI accounts and used various controllers with the drone and the original controller with various drones, all without restriction.

I suppose it would tend to show up in searches for "problems with a second hand drone" more than in searches "what to do when looking for a second hand drone"

the problem with that is .......... what constitutes proper verification? The only thing I can think of is an email from the email address of the bound account say "yes, I have sold/given this drone to such and such" but that email account could be hacked. Copies of receipts etc. can be faked.

I would guess DJI can do that if they get their hands on the drone.....but......since one purpose of this cover is to prevent a drone that has flown-away from being recovered and flown by a 3rd party, they would still need to confirm with the registered account that the dorne has been sold etc

I see your point to some extent with regards to logging out of the account but I would say your research was somewhat lacking. I am sure you have by now seen multiple threads concerning "they drone I just bought is bound to anothe account.
I would also point out another little tit bit that I recerntly read of, if an app is left inactive for a period of several months there may be an automatic log out, something else to watch for. lol

I can understand that it might be somewhat difficult to verify what is a legitimate account/owner, but I think that supplying logs, proof of purchase from the store(even by reaching out to the store by the previous owner), might be enough. Perhaps some other verifications like age, name(not sure if they ask for it tbh). But I do think you can verify that to some extent.

Regarding the research, I actually disagree, I did search for what you wrote too, in every similar search the whole first page is covered and I went over quite a lot of websites and all of them said the same, and none said anything about binding, I even checked that again after I figured out that I screwed up to make sure I'm not that stupid, but honestly NONE said anything about it. It only starts to show up when you look up for "unbound, unbind, binding" and similar keywords.

Anyhow, what's been done is already done. Crying about the past won't change that, don't know how common that issue is as I would assume that in most cases at least one of the parties has enough knowledge to know about it and that it needs to be done, which didn't happen in my case, I would hope for better warnings perhaps, but maybe it's just too rare for someone to care.

I guess my only option right now is to wait, so wait I shall.
Thanks

 

[msinger]

how do you know that it is DJI that have remotely undone the binding?

I found several threads on this topic in the DJI forum where DJI support was helping drone owners resolve this issue (where the original owner could not be reached).

 

[msacco]

I found several threads on this topic in the DJI forum where DJI support was helping drone owners resolve this issue (where the original owner could not be reached).

I would love to see such threads if you find, because all I could find was replies like these:

"Sorry for any confusion caused. We really try to help this out. Since the unbinding process involves the private information of the previous aircraft owner, we are unable to assist with this process. The users need to contact the seller for further assistance. Thanks for your understanding."

"I just want to update this situation for future reference, because I'm sure people with the same issue will find this thread like I did.

DJI support offered to contact the previous owner for me (who returned it to the webshop) to ask them to unbind the aircraft from their account. They asked me to wait for a response. After about 10 days they came back and told me there was no response and that's the end of it. The aircraft will be bound forever to this account now.

I specifically asked DJI what the exact consequences are for me. They said I can't get DJI refresh. There are no privacy issues, the previous owner can't see my flight logs. But when I prodded about what if the previous owner reports it stolen or lost, they were a bit more vague and told me I should keep my invoice as proof or purchase.

Considered keeping it, but: a) it's still kind of a bad feeling b) still slightly paranoid that previous owner might have it blocked c) it makes reselling the aircraft later a lot harder. So I'm returning it. Told the webshop the drone should probably be destroyed, because nobody is going to want this anymore...

DJI should really allow the account binding to be reset. If I can show proof of purchase and they contact the previous owner and ask them if it was lost/stolen or simply returned, then at that point there really is no reason to not unbind it at my request."

Which pretty much sounds like what I thought so before. All threads seems to result in similar case, so I hope to be wrong.

 

[msinger]

I would love to see such threads if you find

Here's one of them:

Bound to another account

Bound to another account

forum.dji.com

 

[msacco]

Here's one of them:

Bound to another account

Bound to another account

forum.dji.com

Guess there's still some hope. Thanks

 

[msacco]

Here's one of them:

Bound to another account

Bound to another account

forum.dji.com

Well, I called the local DJI support. Basically, they told me to go **** myself, there's nothing they can so on their side and the only way to solve it is by the previous owner magically remembers the credentials..
Yay.

 

[howardK]

i have 2 pre owned M1P's. if i go onto DJI GO4 and open flight records it has my name as well as the name/user names of the two previous owners. under my name it covers both drones

 

[retiredNH]

Obviously (at least to me?) DJI's caution here is because of stolen drones being sold. But this is yet another caution regarding the risks of buying used.

 

[msacco]

Obviously (at least to me?) DJI's caution here is because of stolen drones being sold. But this is yet another caution regarding the risks of buying used.

If someone is stealing both hand controller and drone, then there's no issue unbinding it as they should be connected.
If someone is stealing or finding only the drone, then they have no way to prove which hand controller should be matched to it, nor show receipt and proof of purchase by the original owner.
This doesn't make any sense to me. DJI can tell which drone and RC were sold together and which RC and drone were bound together, so if you have both RC And drone, the original box, proof of receipt, confirmation by the previous owner, how can it be stolen? It just doesn't make any sense.

As for caution of buying used, I've read a lot about what to check and what problems might be, I've never seen anyone say anything about this thing. When I disconnected the account from the RC, there was no warning at all.
"STOP, THIS ACCOUNT IS BOUND TO A DRONE, IF YOU SIGN OUT FROM THE ACCOUNT YOU MIGHT NOT BE ABLE TO UNBIND THE DRONE, ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO CONTINUE?

Is this really that hard to do? The RC was connected to the same user the drone was, I just didn't knew about this and thought I should sign out and connect to my own account.

 

[msacco]

Here's one of them:

Bound to another account

Bound to another account

forum.dji.com

So..........
DJI just blocked the comment you shared, this is super suspicious, guess they can help, but don't want to help.

According to them - it was a mistake by the support, so either a misunderstanding, or they did it when they're not allowed to.
So I guess we're back to the beginning, I'm screwed and DJI won't actually be able to assist.

 

[msinger]

guess they can help, but don't want to help

That seems to be the case.

I guess you should return the drone to the seller since they sold you something you cannot use.