FTC Says 'Warranty Void If Removed' Stickers Are Bullshit, Warns Manufacturers They're Breaking the Law

[asus killer]

1 hour ago, Drak3 said:

Because he decided to take the repair, and thus the responsibility of repair, upon himself, relieving the manufacturer of that responsibility.

 

of course he should assume the responsibility for the repair (it may not be a repair, cleaning or changing thermal pastes are really not repairs but ok) but that should not invalidate the warranty, why should it if what is wrong with the product has nothing to do with what the owner did?

 

Just because you change thermal paste the gpu is no longer under warranty for example. What kind of twisted reasoning is that?

 

Or if you just remove some stupid sticker to access the inside and clean it. Why should that void the warranty on something completely unrelated?

[ARikozuM]

1 hour ago, Drak3 said:

A warranty claim costs more than the price of material. Quite a bit more.

In this case, I should be allowed to send it to them for a TIM change for free with shipping paid by them. You offer a warranty, you provide it fully. 

[Dylanc1500]

30 minutes ago, ARikozuM said:

In this case, I should be allowed to send it to them for a TIM change for free with shipping paid by them. You offer a warranty, you provide it fully. 

Most manufactures will cover it under warranty if the TIM causes the device to not perform as intended. If there is an issue with application or the material itself, and it hasn't be affected by the user, then they will cover a replacement or they will fix the device as that falls under a "manufacture defect".

[Drak3]

39 minutes ago, asus killer said:

Just because you change thermal paste the gpu is no longer under warranty for example. What kind of twisted reasoning is that?

 

Or if you just remove some stupid sticker to access the inside and clean it. Why should that void the warranty on something completely unrelated?

Removing the heat sink on a gfx card reveals bare die, and it's pretty easy to crush that die when reattaching the heatsink. It's a problem that plagued CPUs.

But GPUs should not need repasted during warranty. If it does, RMA it or accept the responsibility that comes with fixing/upgrading it yourself.

31 minutes ago, ARikozuM said:

In this case, I should be allowed to send it to them for a TIM change for free with shipping paid by them. You offer a warranty, you provide it fully. 

Provided you didn't attampt to fix the issue by dissecting the product prior, I agree. It's when the consumer decided to do it themselves and then want someone else to bear the burden that I have an issue with these pro idiot laws.

[ItsJosh18]

Super happy about this

[Dylanc1500]

19 minutes ago, ItsJosh18 said:

Super happy about this

You won't be if the cost of products goes up to cover the overhead of repairs made under "warranty", that may not legitimately be the fault of the manufacturer. Which @Drak3 has alluded to previously.

[ItsJosh18]

@Dylanc1500 I mean yeah that's possible but 9/10 times people will send it to the manufacturer anyway with the general distrust of 3rd parties. There are very few people who repair their own stuff.

[79wjd]

5 minutes ago, ItsJosh18 said:

@Dylanc1500 I mean yeah that's possible but 9/10 times people will send it to the manufacturer anyway with the general distrust of 3rd parties. There are very few people who repair their own stuff.

However it does mean that people will be less afraid to try their luck since they have a fall back if they fuck up.

[ItsJosh18]

1 minute ago, djdwosk97 said:

However it does mean that people will be less afraid to try their luck since they have a fall back if they fuck up.

Thats IF they want to take that chance. My parents are pretty set in their ways and I still have a hard time convincing them to let me fix their electronics.

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

1 minute ago, ItsJosh18 said:

Thats IF they want to take that chance. My parents are pretty set in their ways and I still have a hard time convincing them to let me fix their electronics.

Then you have people trying to file a warranty claim and if they get rejected, start bad mouthing on this forum about how terrible their experience was. 

[mr moose]

I'm not too sure why anyone would pay a 3rd party to repair something that is under warranty.  Maybe I missed something here?

[Castdeath97]

Surprised some people think the FTC is in the wrong here if I change my car's rims I shouldn't be refused service for my car's AC. Think the 3rd party or I broke it during service and not due to defects? Prove it!

 

8 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I'm not too sure why anyone would pay a 3rd party to repair something that is under warranty.  Maybe I missed something here?

A couple of reasons I can think of:

1. Price, some OEMs overcharge for the sake of it
2. Options and potential upgrades (e.g. say your RAM broke and you decided to upgrade it as well, 3rd party options are cheaper)
3. Availability (e.g. a better 3rd party service might be available nearby)
4. Convenience (e.g. battery is dead and is an easy replacement). 

 

[Drak3]

2 hours ago, Castdeath97 said:

Price, some OEMs overcharge for the sake of it

Warranties mean you don't pay for the repair, only shipping if applicable. Manufacturers are fixing something they're at fault for.

2 hours ago, mr moose said:

I'm not too sure why anyone would pay a 3rd party to repair something that is under warranty.  Maybe I missed something here?

For most people, ignorance.

[79wjd]

2 hours ago, Castdeath97 said:

Surprised some people think the FTC is in the wrong here if I change my car's rims I shouldn't be refused service for my car's AC. Think the 3rd party or I broke it during service and not due to defects? Prove it!

 

A couple of reasons I can think of:

1. Price, some OEMs overcharge for the sake of it
2. Options and potential upgrades (e.g. say your RAM broke and you decided to upgrade it as well, 3rd party options are cheaper)
3. Availability (e.g. a better 3rd party service might be available nearby)
4. Convenience (e.g. battery is dead and is an easy replacement). 

 

A car is very different from a small electronic device; not to mention the fact that the average idiot is probably more likely to mess with a computer then a car. But back to my first point, if you replace the rims you're highly unlikely to damage the engine/suspension/electronics. Alternatively, everything is so densely packed in a computer and far more fragile that you could pretty easily damage something while doing something as simple as unscrewing the drive or removing/inserting RAM. 

[Castdeath97]

6 hours ago, djdwosk97 said:

A car is very different from a small electronic device; not to mention the fact that the average idiot is probably more likely to mess with a computer then a car. But back to my first point, if you replace the rims you're highly unlikely to damage the engine/suspension/electronics. Alternatively, everything is so densely packed in a computer and far more fragile that you could pretty easily damage something while doing something as simple as unscrewing the drive or removing/inserting RAM. 

That doesn't mean that a repair isn't possible nor does it mean they can't prove that a particular repair did or didn't damage a thing.

[Castdeath97]

6 hours ago, Drak3 said:

Warranties mean you don't pay for the repair, only shipping if applicable. Manufacturers are fixing something they're at fault for.

For most people, ignorance.

Could be an upgrade or to repair accidental damage, however. 

[79wjd]

48 minutes ago, Castdeath97 said:

That doesn't mean that a repair isn't possible nor does it mean they can't prove that a particular repair did or didn't damage a thing.

One of the screws that holds the cpu heatsink on in my laptop snapped off the motherboard, and it's been like that since it was first taken out of the box. Now there is ZERO way for any manufacturer to know whether that was a defect or if I broke it. In many instances there is no reliable way for a manufacturer to determine the cause of damage no matter how much you'd like to pretend that there is.

[mr moose]

1 hour ago, Castdeath97 said:

That doesn't mean that a repair isn't possible nor does it mean they can't prove that a particular repair did or didn't damage a thing.

And there in lies the problem for most manufacturers.  When you force them to warrant a product after someone else has worked on it,  you force them to warrant other peoples work.  I do have a problem with that.   I really think manufacturers should be made to make it easy to repair your own device sure, but I don't agree that they should be forced to honor a warranty if there is no clear evidence the defect was theirs to begin with.

[Neokolzia]

Understandably this is just stickers, but I imagine the concept of opening something up should be fair game as well by this notion.

 

Least as much as I understand.

 

Does this mean companies like Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, etc are unlawfully denying service to individuals who install watercooling blocks to GPU's? for instance.

(Some companies like EVGA/Nvidia, and some others are fine with this for instance)

[Castdeath97]

12 hours ago, djdwosk97 said:

One of the screws that holds the cpu heatsink on in my laptop snapped off the motherboard, and it's been like that since it was first taken out of the box. Now there is ZERO way for any manufacturer to know whether that was a defect or if I broke it. In many instances there is no reliable way for a manufacturer to determine the cause of damage no matter how much you'd like to pretend that there is.

Not all cases are that non obvious

[laminutederire]

On 11/04/2018 at 6:59 AM, ARikozuM said:

Unless the item is broken beyond doubt by the owner's hand, warranty should still apply. Any company that puts a product out, and derives profit from it, should be able to fix things without charging exorbitant amounts of money (i.e. Asus wanting $90 just to replace a BIOS chip, not including the actual installation). 

You may still be conflicted because if I were Microsoft or Sony I'd still keep the stickers in place and have a policy of return which does not really take it into account. The reason being that those are toys that children can have, and it's an effective way to deter anyone not able to search on a website to open it. Same goes for a lot of things I'd say. If they update their policy on their website, the sticker should stay. For them it's also a way to keep out people who do not know what they are doing to harm their tech without needing to.

[asus killer]

On 4/12/2018 at 3:55 PM, Drak3 said:

Removing the heat sink on a gfx card reveals bare die, and it's pretty easy to crush that die when reattaching the heatsink. It's a problem that plagued CPUs.

But GPUs should not need repasted during warranty. If it does, RMA it or accept the responsibility that comes with fixing/upgrading it yourself.

that's my point, you shouldn't need to do anything on a product under warranty, but also if you want to that should be up to you. And in those cases you are the one causing the damage it becomes you're responsibility.

People do this with cars or bicycles for ages, you either repair yourself or go to a 3rd party and that in no way voids warranty, and when a warranty claim is made the manufacturer/retailer sees that someone made a bad repair then it's up to you to face the consequences. But there are no stickers or claims that you can't repair or can't send to a 3rd party for repair. It works and apart from the crazy claim this causes no trouble for anyone.

 

if you crush the die it's easy to see what is the problem and that you voided the warranty, but not by breaking a sticker.

 

 

On 4/13/2018 at 10:45 AM, mr moose said:

I'm not too sure why anyone would pay a 3rd party to repair something that is under warranty.  Maybe I missed something here?

imagine that you are the cause of the problem, drop the graphics card and break the fan, only the fan the rest is fine. You could either have to deal with warranty delays, shipping costs, a much more expensive repair (like 10 times the cost or more) or you can go to some store next to you that repairs that really cheap on the same day. He may have to remove warranty stickers.

Should that void the warranty for the rest of the card? even if you break a damn sticker?

 

[79wjd]

4 hours ago, Castdeath97 said:

Not all cases are that non obvious

You're right, not all, but many cases are nearly impossible to determine the source of the problem, and that's a very big problem.

2 hours ago, asus killer said:

that's my point, you shouldn't need to do anything on a product under warranty, but also if you want to that should be up to you. And in those cases you are the one causing the damage it becomes you're responsibility.

People do this with cars or bicycles for ages, you either repair yourself or go to a 3rd party and that in no way voids warranty, and when a warranty claim is made the manufacturer/retailer sees that someone made a bad repair then it's up to you to face the consequences. But there are no stickers or claims that you can't repair or can't send to a 3rd party for repair. It works and apart from the crazy claim this causes no trouble for anyone.

 

if you crush the die it's easy to see what is the problem and that you voided the warranty, but not by breaking a sticker.

 

 

imagine that you are the cause of the problem, drop the graphics card and break the fan, only the fan the rest is fine. You could either have to deal with warranty delays, shipping costs, a much more expensive repair (like 10 times the cost or more) or you can go to some store next to you that repairs that really cheap on the same day. He may have to remove warranty stickers.

Should that void the warranty for the rest of the card? even if you break a damn sticker?

 

So what happens when you were running on carpet in socks and touch the board without discharging yourself and frying something in the process?

[asus killer]

4 hours ago, djdwosk97 said:

You're right, not all, but many cases are nearly impossible to determine the source of the problem, and that's a very big problem.

So what happens when you were running on carpet in socks and touch the board without discharging yourself and frying something in the process?

sorry but i really didn't get your point. You can do that without removing any stickers so i fail to see the relevance 

[79wjd]

3 hours ago, asus killer said:

sorry but i really didn't get your point. You can do that without removing any stickers so i fail to see the relevance 

The point is that not all user caused damage is inherently obvious, and many of the warranty void stickers are on the hardware seals that you need to break to gain access to any form of board.