Really glad I bought the extended warranty
11I’m not even done paying for this troublesome Pixel and it woke up dead this morning. I don’t usually buy extended warranties but the Pixel was so expensive and so many bad things can happen to a phone that I decided to add it, and boy am I glad I did. Fortunately I kept my beloved MotoX with its sad shattered screen and was able to re-up for a month with Republic Wireless with no problems at all. Called Google, and they said “You are out of your Google warranty but within the Nexus Protect period.” They then connected me with the insurer, who is issuing me a new phone which should be here Friday for a cost of $9. Definitely the most painless interaction I have had to date with both Republic and Google. Now I will have two phones for a month, LOL. I think I am going to see if this warranty is extendable past the original period, which ends this November.
Anybody else have an extended warranty story to tell?
- 9 comments, 6 replies
- Comment
Just glad you your pixel will be replaced
Bought a Pioneer VSX-1121K back in 2011. Six years later, a weird error pops up (UE22). Found an AVS Forum thread on it. Turns out it was a TI chip that was failing earlier than TI rated it. So Pioneer offered a free refurb - even after their 3-year warranty expitem in 2014. Then they got bought by Onkyo. I thought it was a goner.
Amazingly, Onkyo continued the refurb offer. Even better, since the models were retired every year like cars, they offered an attractive discount to upgrade to refurbs (unsold inventory?) of recently retired models.
And their customer service rep was a rockstar in handling the warranty program.
So major props to Onkyo for honoring Pioneer’s voluntarily extending their warranty because of a bad chip from a supplier. Six years after the product was offered and four after it was discontinued.
I opted for the upgrade, since the new receiver supports 4K and BT, which weren’t a ‘thing’ back in 2011. And it’s smaller so it fits in my media center without having to dismantle it to fit the unit inside.
Although he’s no longer at Onkyo, if anyone runs across customer service rep Brian Ascanoa, he’s a total pro and customer-focused. I hear good things about the folks at Onkyo that took over after he left. So kudos to both.
+1 for Onkyo warranty service.
Many moons ago, I bought a 5-year extended warranty from Magnolia on a projector (mostly because it was about the same price as a new lamp, which it covered). Projector died a few months before it expired. There aren’t many of their stores left, but they honored it. (Maybe helped that I still had the receipt, warranty, and original box.) Manufacturer replaced the motherboard, fans, and lamp.
@walarney psst they are inside best buys.
I had a pixel go bad too. It was the worst. Once I saw it, it couldn’t be unseen. Stupid monitor.
I have a Hyndai Sonata from 2011, right at the launch of that design. Six years later and about 102K miles, the engine drops a rod 30 miles outside of Memphis on the Interstate. On a Sunday late afternoon. Towed to a dealer (no exit ramp gas station or even a nowheresville auto repair shop are good choices on a Sunday night) and they said they’d send it in as warranty and see what Hyundai says.
Good news, due to factory warranty/recall work I had done a few months earlier at the local dealer (who has serviced the car its entire life), Hyundai covered the engine for another year and 10K miles. It took a few months to get the engine in from the factory (everything had to be specified back to the 2011 model), the $5,000 engine replacement didn’t cost me a penny.
Except for the tow, a hotel for a night (dealer didn’t open until Monday), then a car rental to get back home to St. Louis, and then another rental to pick it up. So, $250 for a brand new engine on a 6-year old car. Sure, I’ll take that deal.
So, props to Hyundai and their extended engine and powertrain warranty.
I was told that Hyundai mainly covers the engines under warranty to ensure they can inspect the failure back at the factory to figure out exactly what went wrong, whether it is a defect or an opportunity to collect concrete data on an improvement discovery.
@mike808 that get the engine back to the factory to diagnose/improve the future thing makes way too much sense.
Most auto companies demand warranty parts returns because they don’t trust the fucking dealers.
@mike808 IIRC, there was a class action lawsuit on those engines. I had a Sonata, so I got one of those cards telling me about the lawsuit.
Last year LL Bean replacements my 17 year old boots because the wore out. Unfortunately that is now a thing of the past.
Part of the problem stems from it being a Pixel. Apple takes care of iPhone even if out of warranty for known or uncommon issues. Haha sorry I’m totally trolling.
@hammi99 I had one of the early big IPods. It was such a hothouse flower, always malfunctioning, with care instructions that said basically, “do not use”, that It was my first and last Apple product. Still have it someplace, but it was completely replaced by the incredibly tough little Sansa clips which would make it through the apocalypse still singing.
Due to reviews on the Dell Streak (the first 5" display smart phone; who’s laughing now?), I purchased protection for 2 years; it was replaced three times. Reviews said that while the Gorilla Glass front seldom broke, the LCD display behind it often did. Saved me several hundred dollars. Alas, vibe made it jump off of the counter just one week after the extended period, so I had to go with a new model. One week earlier, they would have replaced it with a Galaxy Note.
Saved my mac air. Three weeks before the apple care was up (a year and a half ago) the motherboard went out, the power thing (on the computer end, not the cable) was fried, needed a new battery…saved me several zillion dollars getting that fixed. Now I have a loose cable between the screen and computer and it is out of warranty so hopefully it will keep hanging in there as I can’t afford to do anything about that.