What would you want in a warranty?

[Prince Vaillant]

Having read a few threads it seems to me that the warranty offers we get here int the UK are not in line with what is offered elsewhere.

[paul_h]

They aren't. It all started here with Email A/Cs offering 5 years back in 1997, everyone else followed to remain competitive.
Email = Airwell = no longer around, so obvisouly not such a sound business model anyway.
In fact the Emails first giving the 5 year warranty were made in the same place as Fujitsu which had a 2 yr warr. at the time, but eventually they had a 5 yr warranty, just like all the main brands (japan based) have a 5 yr warranty here, even later korean brands like LG and samsung have a full 5 yr warranty.
All a/c warranties are parts and labour here.
Refrigerators have a 5 year warr. on parts and labour to for the refrigeration system, ie you are fully covered for compressor burnout, leaks and blockages for 5 years.
The rest of the system (body, electronics, fans, heaters, PCBs, dampers etc) is a full 2 yr warr.

In my opinion 5 yrs is too long for a warranty, a car costing 10x as much doesn't have a warranty that long and has mandatory servicing unlike a/cs.
A lot of cheaper chinese a/cs only have a 2 yr warranty, and even the main brands only offer 1 yr for commercial applications.
Warranties are supposed to cover manufacturing defects, and surely they would show up in the first two years.

Most of the warranty claims I've seen that show up later than two years are normaly caused by:
Poor installation, eg small leaks through bad flares
Electrical problems like water getting into conduits, undersized isolators finally giving up, power surges.
Damage by fauna shorting out PCBs, or overgrowing vines blocking airflow or fans.
Lack of maintenance, eg blocked filters and drains etc.
Hardly any 3 yr old unit breaks down due to "manufacturing defect", so a two year parts and labour is generous as far as I'm concerned.

With fridges, compressor burnout is rare, as the units are piped up by the makers themselves and any leak or blockage would actually be caused by manufacturing defect (gone are the days of non frost free fridges getting stabbed by owners). So 5 years for the 'sealed system' is good and fair as those problems hardly happen and are fully in the manufacturers control, unlike the split manufacturer who might get an installer who can't do a proper flare, can't wire up properly, and doesn't evacuate the system.

The two year warranty on the rest of the fridge (heaters, motors, PCBs, sensors etc) down here is pretty good. Most other electronics has 1 year or less (computers, phones etc), most consumer goods have ~ 2 years (motor driven things like washing machines, mowers etc), so it falls in line with them. The frdige manufacturers provide a 5 yr warranty on the expensive stuff (compressor, leak repair), so at worst you pay a couple of hundred au$ for an electronics repair after 2 years full warranty has expired when the fridge goes wrong, so nothing too expensive to repair for 5 yrs.

edit: all warranties here are parts and labour.
"parts only" but the cutomer pays labour like in the other thread, exists only on extended 3rd party warranty sold by the retailers. For example you could buy a fridge with extended warranty for $100 from the retailer, and even though the manufacturer doesn't cover PCBs after two years, if you need one for your fridge under 5 years and you have an extended retailer warranty, the part would be covered, just the labour wouldn't.
Manufacturers don't do "parts only" here, only full parts and labour for the covered items for the covered period.

Why do we get this down here? Because the manufacturers pay some sucker next to nothing to repair all warranty claims. It's normally less than half of standard commercial rates so there's not many takers. Unless some refrig techs want to supplement their quiet times for low pay (low pay is better than nothing when it's quiet though), there's no chance of any manufacturer offering such an extensive warranty in the UK.

All it takes is one big manufacturer willing to bite the bullet to flog more units and offer a longer warranty than anyone else to raise the stakes with the competition, and a couple of large companies desperate to get any work to service that manufacturers warranty to get the ball rolling, that's what happened down here.

late edit: I've mentioned the down side to full manufacturers supplied 5 yr a/c warranties before. Any cowboy that's either a bad refrig tech, or not even a refrig tech, can install them and run away. The manufacturers service agent that supplies the warranty labour gets stuck with repairing the dodgey cowboys installation for low pay.

[Thermatech]

Thats the problem with giving full parts & labour warranty.
Very little insentive for the installation contractor to do a proper good quality installation.
A limited parts & labour allowance warranty puts some insentive for the end user to select a quality installer & pay proper money to get it installed properly & makes more insentive for the installation contractor to do a quality job that is not likely to have premature failure.

If you buy a car does the manufacturer send an enginner to your home to fix it when it fails during the warranty period ?

No you have to take it to the distribututor / agent & they fix it at the garage.

But with a/c the warranty obligation is part shared by the manufacturer who supplies the equipment & part shared by the installing contractor for installation & commissioning of that equipment.

At the end of the day contractors will always blame the equipment manufacturer for failures & the manufacturer will always be looking for the installing contractors mistakes & poor quality installation to blame for the failure.

A form of warranty which stops this ongoing conflict of interests & helps contractors & manufacturers to work together would be ideal.

[frank]

If you are unlucky to be the installer and service tech, as some of us are, is it a good idea to have long warranties?

Recently, we were unfortunate enough to have a problem with a failed compressor, due in part we think, to a failed inverter pcb.

Now, the manufacturer didn't argue, and he issued the replacement parts without fuss, but, here's the crux, how does a £100 labour allowance cover our costs?

We don't get paid anything by the customer, as he considers it is under warranty.
We have had to travel to site, spend time diagnosing the problem, ringing the supplier to verify the diagnosis, paperwork back at the office to order the parts, return to site, recover, replace the faulty parts, pressure test, recharge, re-commission and then pay for the scrap parts (& gas) to be disposed of.

From my point of view, the longer the warranty, the more I'm out of pocket

[Thermatech]

Thats why although manufacturers give a parts & labour allowance for 3 or 5 years lots of contractors dont pass this on to the enduser.
Some will give a full warranty for one year & then parts only for the rest of the warranty period.

The labour allowance is just that
an allowance
its not intended to cover the full cost of any visits to site to investigate or another to fit the parts.

Lots of endusers use the lowest cost contractor to do the install but only get 1 year retentions cover & then take out a service contract with another company who charge for all work & they claim the parts & labour allowance from the manufacturer but dont pass on to the enduser.
So they get paid twice.

There are mainy sides to this issue ;)

[Karl Hofmann]

As you are aware, the boiler manufacturers send their own engineers to repair heating boilers though the installer is the first port of call for the customer to check for obvious faults.

I gather Toshiba have provided a seven year warranty for a certain customer provided that the installers have been on their course and the commissioning sheets have been filled in....

[Thermatech]

And you can be sure Prince Vaillant has an aggenda regarding warranty issue.

[Thermatech]

An army of plumbers & some cheap splits from China might not be the best combination for low warranty costs.

[Prince Vaillant]

And you can be sure Prince Vaillant has an aggenda regarding warranty issue.

No not at all, everyone says they are unhappy with warranty setups, i was just wondering what would actually be the best solution.
Of course Vaillant do have a different warranty setup.

:p

[Greengrocer]

Best for who?

[Prince Vaillant]

Really the best all round solution, say Mitsi 5 year parts only warranty or Vaillants 2 year parts and fitting warranty?

[paul_h]

Parts only is useless, as labour often costs more than parts. And if it is a manufacturing fault, the owner shouldn't have to pay anything.
Like I said before, 5 years is excessive, even if it is parts only, as manufacturing defects don't take that long to show up.

2 years full (parts and labour), like the $400 budget discount store no name brand made in china generic a/cs have here is where both australia should drop down to, and where the UK should increase it's warrantys to.

The manufacturers there need to lift their game if they want customers to be happy with their warranty (ie pay installers more to cover full warranty, or hire their own employees or contractors).

edit: Just like here when the warranty jumped from 2yrs to 5 years, the first big brand there increasing their warranty to 2 years from 1 yr, might make a lot of sales despite all the current doom and gloom.
I could see it happening soon too with the current economic climate. Manufacturers looking to sell more units offering longer warranty to grab the sales, refrig techs desperate for any work offering to do warranty service at lower than normal rates, as I said before, that partnership and despearation for sales and repair work is all it takes.

[Thermatech]

Thing is ,,, in the UK alot of split systems are still sold to contractors by distributors.
The distributors tend to buy the warranty commitment with the equipment.
So the warranty is sold to the distributor & the manufacturer is not liable.

The contractor has to claim the warranty from the distributor who does not want to give it as this will cut into profit margin.

The distributor tries to claim as much as possible from the manufacturer as manufacturing defect.

The manufacturer tries to avoid any claim for manufacturing faults by never admitting that there are any manufacturing fault problems.

The distributor & manufacturer often find when investigating warranty issues that the actual cause is poor installation.

The cost of sending an engineer to site is more than the distributor profit margin on the sale of the equipment.

Contractor resorts to blackmail by offering to place a large order for the next project only if the current warrany issues are resolved other wise he will place the order with another distributor / manufacturer.

And so on & on & on & on.

It has to be said that some distributors are excellent & provide very good after sales support to the contractors warranty issues included.
But this results in higher overheads for those distributors & they will tend to be a bit more expensive.

So contractors tend to get what they pay for.

[sinewave]

" The warranty lasts as long as it takes for the Cheque to clear "



................. sounds good to me! :o

[l'robot]

Warranty will always be a problem if the manufacturer does not want to admit to a problem, the distributor does not have the resource to fault find and the contractor/installer does not have the skill to install correctly. Then there is the expectation from the end-user. Have they been misled by advertising, inadequate advice, or not reading the contract? How long is the equipment expected to last, with or without a service? There will always be a conflict between all the parties if the there is no clear understanding and working relationship. Things will always go wrong, but it is how the problem is dealt with, not the problem that is noted in the future.
Why have the barriers gone up, with no open discussion between manufacturer, distributor and contrator?
In one word – Trust.
The world has changed due to litigation, developed from the USA that it is always someone else’s fault and if I trip over there are ten lawyers come rushing in to sue the socks off the an inanimate object. Until everyone takes responsibility of their own actions and if they trip over the pavement when they were walking, the pavement was not at fault but it was the way they walking, then a true warranty claim will be a problem and the reality will not be seen.

A manufacturer sending another contractor or own engineer without the installing contractor to deal with a warranty could be seen in many ways. They could be hiding problems with their equipment, checking on the installation, or site testing.

Warranty claims are a problem when expectation does not meet with reality.

[Prince Vaillant]

A manufacturer sending another contractor or own engineer without the installing contractor to deal with a warranty could be seen in many ways. They could be hiding problems with their equipment, checking on the installation, or site testing.


Yes fair point, but surely if a manufacturer is willing to train individuals to deal with this and not charge the end user surely that has to be a better option?

[Karl Hofmann]

Yes fair point, but surely if a manufacturer is willing to train individuals to deal with this and not charge the end user surely that has to be a better option?

That's great in theory and works fine with the likes of gas boilers where there are minimum criteria to be met otherwise the installer could be made to met the required criteria, however, anyone can buy and install a heat pump, make a total pigs ear of it, take the money and run and Vaillant gets to put it right FOC.... What if it is best to take the unit out and start again?... Is this still covered by warranty? What if the unit should have been fitted with a condensate pump and the bodger just hasn't done this? is this warranty?

Not trying to pour cold water on the idea, just trying to get a handle on how far you would go..

[Prince Vaillant]

The warranty covers mechanical failure and is only offered if the unit is installed by qualified engineers.

[Karl Hofmann]

The warranty covers mechanical failure and is only offered if the unit is installed by qualified engineers.

Ok, Thats fine.. But to be qualified, does this mean simply a refrigerant handling cert or an in house certificate from a vaillant training centre?

If the compressor dies, would the warranty engineer be expected to replace the compressor only... with all the associated cleaning processes, or simply replace the condenser unit, which in many situations in the quickest and more straight forward solution, especially on the smaller units?