F1 TV stalls as Liberty forced to refund angry viewers

Liberty Media was left red-faced after being forced to issue a refund to customers of their new F1 TV Pro streaming service, after it ran into trouble during the Spanish Grand Prix. Viewers will be refunded two weeks' worth of their subscription after feeds failed to load during Saturday's qualifying session.

Fans were quick to take to social media on Saturday, sharing their frustration as the app would not load, while F1's customer service was also in for criticism.

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Three different browsers, two different devices, F1 TV Pro still not loading! It's either on initializing or buffering. And if it loads, it's for a couple of seconds. Awful service. @F1Help @F1 #F1TVPro pic.twitter.com/4EXLBEL61u — Raian #FA14 (@RaianLevy) May 12, 2018

Ey!! @F1 what happen with you F1 TV pro service? lots of cuts, buffering, initializing, there is no way to enjoy the show with very often cuts, I’m pretty sure isn’t my broadband. pic.twitter.com/Ccq13fUAc0 — Luku (@SoyLuKu) May 12, 2018

So, instead of helping, @F1Help is just copy-pasting the same reply to all F1 TV Pro costumers ... and not even noticing that reply doesn't fit the tweet characters limit... ????‍??#F1TV #f1tvpro pic.twitter.com/h5Bh3LDuIz — Luis Herrera (@luisrha) May 12, 2018

So @F1 app lets me pay for a F1TV subscription on iPhone, then tells me this after I've paid -> pic.twitter.com/VPoZTURr0T — Echeb Keso (@EchebKeso) May 13, 2018

Liberty had trumpeted their over-the-top service last year as a way of revolutionising F1 coverage in 2018, although the launch date was moved back from the start of the season to this weekend's race in Spain.

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However, it soon became evident that the kinks had not been ironed out, with some reporting issues during Friday practice before a bigger wave of viewers for Saturday's qualifying led to the service crashing in locations across the globe.

In a message sent to subscribers affected, F1 conceded that the problems would not be fixed in time for the race, prompting them to refund customers for the race in Barcelona.

@F1 communication and credit for challenging launch of #F1TV #F1 #SpanishGP pic.twitter.com/OsVjH7VyS0 — Negative Camber (@negativecamber_) May 13, 2018