I bought a CF card from Crucial that came with a lifetime warranty quite a long time ago, and noticed about a year later that they had stopped selling them. Forward a few years and the card became unuseable - telephoning to ask for replacement under warranty the guy had never heard of Crucial CF cards. I sent it back and they sent me a cheque for its cost when purchased. (My order was still on their system.)
You actually have two separate contracts. One with Ebuyer for the supply of the goods and one, separately enforceable one, with Kingston for their warranty.
You can chose to use either but in the case of a claim against the supplier under the Sale of Goods Act you need to show the product was defective at the time of sale.
For a warranty claims for low value items although manufacturers prefer you to go through the supplier they will usually sort it out for you if that proves impractical.
The SoGA has no mention of 6 years and sets no limits on how long an item should last beyond the implied term of durability. The Limitations Act puts a limit of 6 years on any claim which can be made under a number of Acts, one of which is the SoGA. but that does not create any expectation of longevity.
Note that it is a 'limited' lifetime warranty. It sounds good without really meaning much. The actual wording is given here:
Colin Bignell
Well, Kingston have just emailed to say that the "product qualifies for an improved Returns service where we would not require you to return it back t o us. In order to fully approve this RMA, please provide us with evidence t hat you are the original owner ? this could be a copy of your receipt or pictures of the product itself."
I've just sent both so - if replacements drop through postie's slot in due course - I think that qualifies as excellent customer service..... the sort you don't get at MachineMart.
Or it would be if they hadn't given you the bum's rush when you first approached them. If you hadn't persevered when Ebuyer blew you off then you'd have nowt.
Or did I miss something?
I was referring to not having to send the stuff back as being a very reason able policy, but overall, given what people have said about the vagaries of who is actually responsible and how the system operates in actuality, I th ink a few polite emails constitutes a success. The "limited" lifetime warr anty could easily have been invoked to deny any redress and they didn't do that.
The only ones who've ever honoured it, in my experience, have been Snap-On, and that's largely down to the individual franchisee - I've heard of some who wouldn't.
Kudos to Kingston, then. I've bought Kingston memory several times in the past fifteen years, swayed by their 'lifetime' promise. Never had to take them up on it, though. Unlike SALTER, useless shower of wriggling bastards, who refused point-blank to honour their 15 year guarantee on a set of scales.
I once had an IBM man come to my house to repair a server that was under maintenance contract. Faulty memory - some Kingston memory that I'd added in. He replaced it with new Kingston memory, saying that Kingston had made an arranegment to do so!
IBM must have changed then. I once had the interesting situation where a Memorex disk was stuck on an IBM drive, in the days when disks were removable.
Try getting them to replace a cross head screwdriver. They'll say it's wear and tear.
n improved Returns service where we would not require you to return it back to us. In order to fully approve this RMA, please provide us with evidence that you are the original owner ? this could be a copy of your receipt or pictures of the product itself."
e course - I think that qualifies as excellent customer service..... the so rt you don't get at MachineMart.
Update.
Kingtson got back to me and asked me to provide info about what devices the product had been used in and how it was damaged --- information I'd alread y provided to them when they sent me a list of questions to get an RMA.
After that they decided that the damage wasn't covered by the warranty but they'd replace it anyway, but they wanted the damaged products back.
To this end the UK office provided a printable freepost label, addressed to Middlesex... but in French.
Cue puzzled look from bloke in Post Office as I asked for a receipt.
Replacement cards duly arrived today, upgraded because the old ones had bee n discontinued.
So, kudos to Kingston, even if the warranty procedure did turn out to be so mewhat Kafkaesque.
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