On Tuesday, 31 July 2018 06:40:02 UTC+1, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 30/07/18 21:41, Jock Green wrote:


"bert" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Tricky Dicky writes
I never buy extended warranties but accept them if offered "free".
When we bought our last washing machine the model we wanted came with
such a "free" 5 year warranty. On arrival we found the programmer
control damaged and requested a replacement. The company were unable
to replace it as it was the last of an end of line product, they
offered a number of alternatives of a similar price and spec.
However, none of the alternatives came with an extended warranty and
to get them insured would have cost £90 if I remember correctly. I
argued with them that to me the so called "free" warranty had
monetary value and was an influence in my purchase choice to end up
paying a similar price for a machine with an extended warranty meant
accepting a much lower spec machine or forking out more for one of a
similar spec.

In the end they offered us a "free" warranty or an upgrade to a
higher spec machine to the value of purchasing a warranty. We chose
the upgrade and bought a Siemens which, and here comes the rub, came
with a free manufacturers extended warranty. So win win!

It did occur to me at the time that the extended free warranty was
obviously a sweetener to shift a number of end of line products but
at best it would only offer repairs as any machine could not be
replaced except by offering equivalents.

Incidently the machine never needed a repair over the period covered
by the warranty and it was only last year that I had to replace the
motor brushes.

Richard
If car manufacturers can offer 5 or 7 year warranties surely we can
make toaster to last the same time?

The problem is that hardly anyone is prepared to pay that much more for
that reliable a toaster, so they arent economically viable to make.

The other problem is that a toaster manufacturer that made an
everlasting toaster would soon go out of business once everyone had one.

That's commonly accepted. But the old Dualits were pretty indestructible, and the result is they have a good rep & thus sell more. I guess the question is do you really want to produce more than 100% of the market - if you do then making something that lasts could indeed be a problem. Otherwise it just gets you more market share.


NT