Warranty shipping costs
 

Why do guitar makers require that the owner pay shipping charges both ways for a warranty repair? I've read accounts of where Martin and Taylor both do this.

I've got a guitar in for warranty service due to a seam separation on the back. This isn't a cheap guitar as the street price is $3000. I sent it to the factory as instructed at my expense. I received a call a few days later and was told that it was obvious that the guitar was well cared for and humidified and that they were going to fix the separation at their exense. I asked why this occurred and was told that sometimes the glue doesn't take with exotic woods and that this sometimes happens, even on the best of guitars. Then I was told that they would call me when the guitar was repaired and let me know what the shipping charges would be to return it.

I'm afraid I don't understand the logic in this. The guitar is three years old, in beautiful shape other than fret wear where it has been played nearly every day, ding free and as clean as you can make one and still play it. It has never been out of my house, is cased when it's not being played, and is well humidified all year around. I've got an expensive hygrometer that I keep in the room with the guitar and humidify my entire house, so I feel I've lived up to my end of what is expected for the care of an expensive instrument.

I just don't understand how shipping could be my responsibility when the problem isn't due to something I did or didn't do.

Thoughts?

When you take your car in to the dealer for warranty work, do they pay for your gas there and back?

I am with you on this one. I was in sales in the furniture business for many years. When a consumer, or a dealer, had an issue with a piece and it was a manufacturing defect, we paid the freight for their return and the new piece or repair.

I reckon the flip side is that's why they have authorized service centers that are located around the country, to negate the need for shipping, but that does't always work out.

I must say, again, that Paul at Music Villa was awesome in helping me with this as well.

I've never had warranty service on a car, but the cost of gas to take it to a dealer wouldn't be anywhere near 5%-8% of the cost of the car which is about what shipping both ways will be for a guitar. And back to your original question--they should.

Would you be willing to pay 10-15% more for the guitar in order for there to be free shipping on warranties?

I've noticed this as well as I've sent several guitars back to Taylor for various warranty / service issues over the past ten years or so. I've also noticed the shipping rates they charge are pretty dang high. I own a small business and ship a couple hundred packages a week via UPS and receive pretty decent UPS discounts although nothing compared to what a large company like Taylor could command. Yet, when I'm billed for return freight the charges are always at least four times what my costs to sent the guitar in the first place. I realize they do include a new shipping box and packing materials, but even with that, the return freight charges seem exorbitant. Perhaps this is just their way of forcing the customer to use one of the Taylor "authorized" service providers.

The simple answer is that is what they offered to you as warranty service terms when you purchased the guitar. If you didn't feel that was a fair offer, you could have purchased a different manufacturers instrument, or simply not purchased this one. It really doesn't matter how other industries handle things - but if you think it needs to be changed, come up with an alternative and try to convince the manufacturers of its value. Of course, don't be surprised if it increases the price of your next guitar -

I have never bought anything, nor would I, with the knowledge that I would probably need a warranty repair or that it was expected to be returned for a defect within the warranty period.

I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you, but keep in mind that your local car dealer isn't usually half way across the country either. But the option (with regard to a guitar) would be to take it to the closest luthier for repair. I suspect that would overall cost as much or more than 5-8% the cost of the guitar and I believe I could just about guarantee the turn around time would be MUCH longer, at least given the work load and turn around times of my local luthiers.

I guess I'm just old school on this. I realize there are costs involved. I realize that different companies do it different ways. But at the end of the day, I also know that the value of your brand is dependent on your customer service.

The initial sale is one thing, the post-sale service is another. Getting the first sale is easy...getting return business after an issue develops is quite different. I guess if you have a large enough brand you can decide that you will do this much, and the rest is on the consumer.

But for me, if one of my clients had a problem, it was my job to take care of everything I could to make it right. It wasn't their doing that caused the issue, so if I wanted to keep their business, I tried to go above and beyond to make it right.

I'm sure I lost money on many deals, but I made it up with return business. Again, that's just me.

On warranty work you don't have the option of taking it to a local luthier. The warranty specifically states it must be returned to the manufacturer.

I just had warranty work on my D18 completed by an authorized Martin repairman. I think the gist of the "must be returned to the factory" is that Martin (or any manufacturer) must approve the warranty work prior to it being done.

In fact, on my repair, I called Martin and asked to send mine to the factory for repairs, but they said they were not taking any at this time and referred me to a repair center.

The price you paid for the guitar included a warranty without shipping. A warranty with shipping would simply increase the price of the guitars.

If a guitar company paid shipping, the number of guitars they would receive would go up astronomically because people would be sending in guitars for all sorts of minor/non issues. Making the owner pay shipping keeps the number of guitars repaired lower and helps to ensure that the issue is legitimate. Not only would the guitar maker be paying the shipping on inspecting and repairing more guitars, but then they have to hire more people to do this job. These costs are always passed on to the buyer.

This is a pretty clear case of "the manufacturer should pay the shipping"...so I totally agree with the OP.

Also, not only does he have to pay the shipping, but he has to pay whatever the manufacturer says the shipping is. I usually ship a guitar insured in the $2k range across the country for around $60-70...but the manufacturer might tell him its going to cost $150-$200...who knows.

The guitar company could have the owner pay shipping...and then re-imburse the owner if the issue turned out to be a valid warranty issue.