I now love service contracts

opus

I'll try and shorten this story up.

I thought that my 2 year old Hitachi LCD was not quite looking right lately and after talking to Hitachi on the phone several times I decided to find out how much a repair guy costs per hour to come to the house. I was lead to believe buy Hitachi that this was probaly a simple ($100-200) fix.
Well after getting into a "polite " arguement with the service center about whether or not I had bought an extended service contract, I strongly insisted that I hadn't and they insisted that I had, we agreed that they should send over a tech for free parts and labor
He walks into my house this morning and as he sees my TV he says "Oh my god, how long as it been like that". He calls a number and in 3 minutes has me scheduled for a new light engine in two weeks. That would be a total cost of $2325.00 for them and $0 for me

Pretty good day when that happens. And to this day my wife and I still swear that we refused the extended warranty. But who's arguing?
Just thought I would share some good news.


kevin

beardog03

glad to see it paid off..

I should have done that for my monitor, but I decided not to..this time...and now wish I would have..

Pixels are going bad right down the middle

madmax

I skipped it on mine too. They gave me a price and said I could buy it anytime so long as the one year warranty was in effect. Sooo.... after about 6 months I had the available cash and found out they wanted twice the price. Eff em... I'll have to take my chances.
madmax

janmike

You can usually negotiate on the price for an extended service/warranty period.

madmax

They wanted $750 for 5 years when I bought it. Not bad for a 10K panel. Now they want $1500 for 3 years. Checked at another store location and they want $750 for 3 years. Talk about not knowing what the standard price is. Too annoying for me to deal with.
madmax

opus

Wells boys and girls the long national nightmare is over.

I just brought home my new tv that I got when the "lemon policy" kicked in on my service contract. Give them credit, they fought hard but in the end they were done in by an out of stock light engine. If they can't fill the part order in 30 days they replace.

To make a long, long story short I recieved 85% of the purchase price 2 years ago. Pretty fair I thought. Their original offer was $700 less than what I got, which they said would buy a new model with 2 year old features. Anyway I now had enough to buy a new model. I debated on a 50" LCD vs 42" plasma with a cool power swivel feature. In the end I chose a Hitachi 50VG825 LCD which was on sale and I still have a generous store credit left. And I picked up $200 in free gas from some promotion they had running. I gotta tell you though that plasma was a sweet looking tv. Well I have 15 days to return if I want

fireshoes

That's a very nice tv. Hitachi's are usually reliable as well, your old tv notwithstanding.

McLoki

opus wrote:

In the end I chose a Hitachi 50VG825 LCD which was on sale and I still have a generous store credit left.

Great TV - Same one that I just got. (as you know) So, how does it look from your viewing distance?

Do you see thin vertical lines about 1/4" apart on light scenes? I see them all the time in mine and called Shermans and asked about it. They said it doesn't sound normal and are bringing me out another TV this Sat. I would hate for them to bring out a new TV if it is a normal issue. Then again - I should'nt see things like that from 14' away either.

Michael

opus

McLoki wrote:

Do you see thin vertical lines about 1/4" apart on light scenes?
Michael

Wow. What a hard question. Watch me tapdance around this
I too saw the lines on your set. But I have been in such a battle getting mine replaced and arguing with every service tech that they send out that I wasn't sure if it was just me. We are not quite at the point where I will walk into your house and see your new set and say " Boy that really sucks"

Through my whole process of getting a replacement I have wondered if perhaps I am being too critical and now I am just noticing these lines. Well I got mine home last night and hooked up and don't see them. I need a couple of days to run enough material to be sure but my inital thoughts are that in my room, at my distance and with my cables and gear I don't see the lines. I reserve the right to withhold judgement till then. I am basing this on a mostly HD signal. I hope you get yours worked out.

regards kevin

PRC

Congrats on the new TV. When are you inviting me over for movie night. hint hint...