I'm the unfortunate owner of a Sharp R-653M microwave oven which cost me 80
quid.

Last year I switched it off for two weeks to go on holiday,and when I got
back home and switched it on again,the LCD display didn't work correctly,
though the machine did function if you pressed the right buttons and ignored
the jumbled up display. The machine was 15 months old at the time, and after
complaining to Sharp UK I eventually managed to wring a free repair out of
them. The repair took six weeks as the repairer said that there was a
shortage of the displaysas Sharp had been having problems with them and was
unofficially extending the guarantee period to 18 monhs or so.

I've just got back from this years two week holiday, and guess what - the
bloody LCD display has packed up again! What is it with these displays that
they fail while they're not actually switched on!!!

I think this *MUST* be a design fault, and I don't want Sharp to get away
with it, so before I complain to them yet again, does anyone have any info I
can use as ammo?

Thanks in advance

I'm the unfortunate owner of a Sharp R-653M microwave oven which cost me
80
quid.

Last year I switched it off for two weeks to go on holiday,and when I got
back home and switched it on again,the LCD display didn't work correctly,
though the machine did function if you pressed the right buttons and
ignored
the jumbled up display. The machine was 15 months old at the time, and
after
complaining to Sharp UK I eventually managed to wring a free repair out of
them. The repair took six weeks as the repairer said that there was a
shortage of the displaysas Sharp had been having problems with them and
was
unofficially extending the guarantee period to 18 monhs or so.

I've just got back from this years two week holiday, and guess what - the
bloody LCD display has packed up again! What is it with these displays
that
they fail while they're not actually switched on!!!

I think this *MUST* be a design fault, and I don't want Sharp to get away
with it, so before I complain to them yet again, does anyone have any info
I
can use as ammo?

Thanks in advance

In my previous job (just been made redundant), one of the products I
repaired were microwaves, and I did have to change the displays
occasionally. Some of them were easy, as they were plug in, the others had
to be wired to the control board which always meant replacing the two.

We did sell them by the bucket load, and the numbers we saw to repair were
not excessive. I can't give you any statistics unfortunately. We did not
experience any problems in getting spares.

Classifying something as a design fault is difficult. For that to be the
case, the manufacturer would have to have a higher failure rate than normal
for specific faults on that product. I don't personally believe that this
was our experience with these. Even though I did fix a few, the number
involved didn't warrant keeping the parts in stock. Therefore the failure
rate of these is probably not particularly high.

In my experience, when manufacturers have a problem, they usually look upon
customers complaints in a favourable way if out of warranty - often agreeing
to provide the spares for free, and paying the retailer for fitting. We are
talking about major brands here of course.

Bearing in mind that you have personally had it go twice now, both under the
same circumstances, their customer service department might be willing to
help, or maybe the retailer you got it from. The usual practice in these
disputes with most manufacturers was for them to provide the spares free,
but the customer would have to pay to have them fitted. However, a lot of
this depended on if the customer shouted or not, and if the person on the
end of the shouting felt sympathetic with the customer, or wanted to take
revenge for being shouted at!!

Good luck with it.

On Mon, 23 Aug 2004 01:28:35 GMT, "Sparky" wrote:

I'm the unfortunate owner of a Sharp R-653M microwave oven which cost me 80
quid.

Last year I switched it off for two weeks to go on holiday,and when I got
back home and switched it on again,the LCD display didn't work correctly,
Snip



I think this is the second post recently about a display going wrong
on a Sharp Microwave oven. I have a Sharp R-953M combination oven,
with the same problem. Until I saw these posts, I thought it was
possibly the result of a surge caused by a thunderstorm while we were
away (it wasn't switched off deliberately). Perhaps I had better
pursue Sharp now, instead of getting the local repairer onto it.

Regards, VivienB
-

"David" wrote in message
...

I'm the unfortunate owner of a Sharp R-653M microwave oven which cost me
80
quid.

Last year I switched it off for two weeks to go on holiday,and when I
got
back home and switched it on again,the LCD display didn't work
correctly,
though the machine did function if you pressed the right buttons and
ignored
the jumbled up display. The machine was 15 months old at the time, and
after
complaining to Sharp UK I eventually managed to wring a free repair out
of
them. The repair took six weeks as the repairer said that there was a
shortage of the displaysas Sharp had been having problems with them and
was
unofficially extending the guarantee period to 18 monhs or so.

I've just got back from this years two week holiday, and guess what -
the
bloody LCD display has packed up again! What is it with these displays
that
they fail while they're not actually switched on!!!

I think this *MUST* be a design fault, and I don't want Sharp to get
away
with it, so before I complain to them yet again, does anyone have any
info
I
can use as ammo?

Thanks in advance

In my previous job (just been made redundant), one of the products I
repaired were microwaves, and I did have to change the displays
occasionally. Some of them were easy, as they were plug in, the others had
to be wired to the control board which always meant replacing the two.

We did sell them by the bucket load, and the numbers we saw to repair were
not excessive. I can't give you any statistics unfortunately. We did not
experience any problems in getting spares.

Classifying something as a design fault is difficult. For that to be the
case, the manufacturer would have to have a higher failure rate than
normal
for specific faults on that product. I don't personally believe that this
was our experience with these. Even though I did fix a few, the number
involved didn't warrant keeping the parts in stock. Therefore the failure
rate of these is probably not particularly high.

In my experience, when manufacturers have a problem, they usually look
upon
customers complaints in a favourable way if out of warranty - often
agreeing
to provide the spares for free, and paying the retailer for fitting. We
are
talking about major brands here of course.

Bearing in mind that you have personally had it go twice now, both under
the
same circumstances, their customer service department might be willing to
help, or maybe the retailer you got it from. The usual practice in these
disputes with most manufacturers was for them to provide the spares free,
but the customer would have to pay to have them fitted. However, a lot of
this depended on if the customer shouted or not, and if the person on the
end of the shouting felt sympathetic with the customer, or wanted to take
revenge for being shouted at!!

Good luck with it.

These displays are the most common failure on Sharps they are made to a
price so you get what you pay for at £80 buy another.

Pete

Same thing happened to us on a much more expensive Sharp Microwave twice in
18 months...microwave still works but you dont know if your cooking or
defrosting something until you remove it.

These displays are the most common failure on Sharps they are made to a
price so you get what you pay for at £80 buy another.

If they won't play ball then yes, it's not worth paying for a repair - the
trade cost of the parts will be pretty high

"G3£wh)zZ@" wrote in message
...

Same thing happened to us on a much more expensive Sharp Microwave twice
in
18 months...microwave still works but you dont know if your cooking or
defrosting something until you remove it.


Thanks people. Wish me luck.

"Sparky" wrote in message
...

I'm the unfortunate owner of a Sharp R-653M microwave oven which cost me
80
quid.

Last year I switched it off for two weeks to go on holiday,and when I got
back home and switched it on again,the LCD display didn't work correctly,
though the machine did function if you pressed the right buttons and
ignored
the jumbled up display. The machine was 15 months old at the time, and
after
complaining to Sharp UK I eventually managed to wring a free repair out of
them. The repair took six weeks as the repairer said that there was a
shortage of the displaysas Sharp had been having problems with them and
was
unofficially extending the guarantee period to 18 monhs or so.

I've just got back from this years two week holiday, and guess what - the
bloody LCD display has packed up again! What is it with these displays
that
they fail while they're not actually switched on!!!

I think this *MUST* be a design fault, and I don't want Sharp to get away
with it, so before I complain to them yet again, does anyone have any info
I
can use as ammo?



Hello, Hello.

My wife tells me that she had a call today (Thursday) from a Sharp Customer
Services guy who really sounded as though he wants to help, which is poles
apart from their initial stance first time around.

Maybe they do have something to hide regarding the reliability of these LCD
displays?

A phone call later today should reveal all.

"Sparky" wrote in message
...



Hello, Hello.

My wife tells me that she had a call today (Thursday) from a Sharp
Customer
Services guy who really sounded as though he wants to help, which is poles
apart from their initial stance first time around.

Maybe they do have something to hide regarding the reliability of these
LCD
displays?

A phone call later today should reveal all.



Whoooohooooo. Result!

*This* Customer Services guy actually wanted to help, and actually agreed
with me that the LCDs packing up like that was unacceptable. Seems that
there was a batch of LCDs from China some time back which turned out to have
a high failure rate. At least this guy was honest enough to put his hand up
to the problem, which is all most of us ever want, to be treated fairly.

Whether this affected more than one model of microwave though, I couldn't
say.

Anyway, they've offered me another free repair, so lets hope I don't get a
chinese one :-)