At what point does a warranty begin?

[nikkig]

First of all my apologies if this topic has already been discussed. I searched but couldn’t find anything. If there is information, please direct me to it.

On 20 June 2024 I ordered a Sandwich Maker from Innovations. It was mostlyl OK until a few weeks ago when it began to take a lot longer to cook the food and I also noticed that the non-stick coating was beginning to bubble up and peel off. I wrote to Innovations on 23 June to let them know. At that point I wasn’t even thinking about warranties, I just felt the product was becoming unsafe and they should know about it.

I received a reply 2 days later to let me know that the item had a 12 month warranty and as that 12 months was now up, by three days, there was nothing they were responsible for with regard to any of the issues I had raised.

I then did a bit of research and discovered that yes, I had ordered the sandwich maker on 20 June, however as I live in Tasmania, it didn’t actually arrive here until 6 July. I again wrote to Innovations to point this out to them. They replied that under Australian Consumer Law when an item is purchased online, the warranty period begins on the date the order is made. I checked into this, and yes, they were correct. What this meant is that my supposed 12 month warranty was actually 11 months and 2 weeks. A form of discrimination in a way for simply chosing to live in a particular part of the country.

When claiming on a warranty on goods bought in a store etc, a requirement for a successful claim is proving you purchased the article when you said you did. Surely the ability to be able to prove when an item was delivered would provide the same degree of proof. Because I do the majority of my purchasing online I have got into the habit of keeping records of when I receive the items. It’s not that onerous.

I would welcome any further thoughts.

[Gaby]

Hi @nikkig.
You have consumers rights under the Act which cannot be set aside by the retailer’s warranty limitations. When goods have been used according to the manufacturer instructions, good care has been taken with them, and it is unreasonable for a product to have a problem considering the price, quality, and age, there is no time limit for a remedy by the seller.
Have a read of the following:

You’re the only one who can decide if it’s worth pursuing. It could be that once they realise that you know your rights they might come around

[grahroll]

Part of that warranty is probably covering the device for delivery damage not just after you have received it. As pointed out by @Gaby, your protection under ACL does not have a fixed date of expiry. For a manufacturing fault this coverage may extend years. Fair wear and tear must be taken into account. ACL does cover delivery issues as well. Warranties are just extra promises made by the retailer/manufacturer in addition to your ACL rights and they cannot remove or replace your ACL rights.

If the item is faulty and it is either a minor or major fault covered by the ACL, the responsibility to fix the issue resides in the first place with the retailer (a retailer can also be the manufacturer). First step should be to write a letter/email complaint and send it to the retailer, this should set out what your complaint is and what remedy you expect. For a major fault, you can choose the remedy of repair, replace, or refund. If a minor fault the retailer/manufacturer can choose the outcome. On the ACCC site they do explain the difference between minor and major faults both for goods and also services.

If required to send back the item for inspection or return, the cost for items that are easy to mail is yours in the first place, if the fault is one covered under your ACL rights the retailer/manufacturer is responsible for refunding the cost, so keep your receipt/receipts. If the item is large or bulky then the retailer/manufacturer is responsible to collect the item at their cost. If an ACL covered fault is not found, then you are responsible to pay the costs they incurred.

There are templates for these complaint letters both on the CHOICE site and the ACCC site. If you search the Community, you will numerous links to these.

[phb]

@nikkig

When claiming on a warranty on goods bought in a store etc, a requirement for a successful claim is proving you purchased the article when you said you did. Surely the ability to be able to prove when an item was delivered would provide the same degree of proof. Because I do the majority of my purchasing online I have got into the habit of keeping records of when I receive the items. It’s not that onerous.

Unfortunately the manufacturer’s warranty (and consumer guarantees) commencement date is based on the purchase date. Such dates are recorded on the proof of purchase.

Trying to argue delivery date should be the start of manufactured warranty period won’t work as an argument to say the product should be within the warranty period, even though it is slightly outside it.

Assuming the sandwich maker wasn’t ‘very cheap’, a reasonable quality sandwich maker should last longer than 12 months plus 3 days, providing it has been looked after and not misused. I would be pushing for a resolution under the Australian Consumer Law.

If it was a ‘very cheap’ sandwich maker, arguing it should have a longer life than 12 months plus 3 days will be more challenging. This is because the ACL bases quality/longevity on the relative purchase price. Cheaper items, the consumer guarantee period is significantly shorter than for an expensive one.

[Gaby]

@nikkig

. They replied that under Australian Consumer Law when an item is purchased online, the warranty period begins on the date the order is made. I

That’s a totally made- up requirement by Innovations! Fact is that the ACL is not at all concerned with the sellers warranties (voluntary or extended). It is a ‘voluntary’ guarantee and sets boundaries and rules which are mostly nonsensical because consumers are covered by the ACL as far as faulty items are concerned. And the ‘extended warranties’ that charge for extra cover in case of faults which by Law should be remedied by the seller without any payments are especially misleading.

Change of mind conditions, on the other hand, depend entirely on the seller good will and can be read in their T&C. Can differ from one seller to the other and, again, it’s not contemplated by the ACL at all, the seller decides and as long as it doesn’t contravene the Act in general, it can stand. For example: charging for shipping, or for a restocking fee, can be a condition of a change of mind return. Also that of unopened packages.

Btw the Law is the same for items bought online as it can be seen below, except it might be more difficult for ‘overseas internet sellers’

[grahroll]

I certainly agree that the ACL does not set the start date of a warranty to a purchase date. I also fully support your statement that

@Gaby

consumers are covered by the ACL as far as faulty items are concerned and there’s no quibbles about starting (starts on purchased date) or ending dates.

@nikkig should consider complaining using their ACL rights to see if they can get a resolution in their favour.

ACL does allow the seller to set conditions regarding the warranty so the seller can set conditions on when a warranty starts and ends, and any other special conditions that need to be met e.g., serviced at abc defg hijk industries to meet the warranty terms.

Some warranty terms can add significant benefits to a consumer such as providing refunds for change of mind returns. Seagate offered data recovery for certain purchased computer drives if they failed (this recovery service could add up to hundreds if not thousands of dollars of savings compared to a normal paid recovery).

Things like cosmetic issues outside of ACL basic coverage may be covered, as an example it might cover a colour fade after some period of use, some may provide coverage of the item for the life of the initial purchaser no matter how long they live after the purchase. Some even cover for what would be fair wear and tear which ACL does not provide cover for. Raco would supply new nuts and washers for their pot lid knobs/handles if they were ever lost, this was part of their warranty and this cover extended beyond the life of any owner whether the original owner or not.

These warranty terms can’t reduce, replace, or remove ACL rights. Anything in the warranty that attempts to alter those ACL rights are void.

In Innovations Terms and Conditions they do make it clear that the warranty starts from the time of purchase “All products are warranted to be free of defects in workmanship and materials for a full one year from date of purchase except personalised items which have a 30 day Supplier’s Warranty”. So for warranty rights they are right in their statement and it does comply with ACL rights that the warranty period had been exceeded. If @nikkig had made their complaint just 4 days earlier, they would have retained the warranty rights.

If instead the warranty said that no refunds or repair were possible after x number of days, this would be illegal and so voided.

• Warranties are extra promises that a business makes about the quality of a product or how it will fix any problems with a product or service.
• Warranties apply in addition to consumer rights to a repair, replacement, refund or cancellation when there’s a problem with a product or service.
• A business must honour their warranties. They must include certain information in any warranties against defects.

In addition to consumer guarantee rights, businesses can offer warranties.

Warranties can’t replace, change or take away a consumer’s basic rights. These basic rights can last longer than a business’s warranty.

A warranty is a voluntary promise that a person or business makes when selling a product or service. Once the consumer buys the product or service, the warranty becomes a legal right. Businesses must comply with any warranties they have provided.

The terms and conditions of a warranty may require the consumer to do certain things in order to keep the warranty.

Example

A warranty requires the consumer to have a product serviced once a year.

If the consumer doesn’t do this they can no longer make a claim under the warranty when there’s a problem with a product.

But in this situation, the consumer still has their basic consumer guarantee rights, and can still ask the business to provide a remedy for a problem with their product under consumer law.

Fitbit had such an issue and were fined $11 Million for making the false representations about time periods when it came to faulty products. Their warranty terms could not and do not override ACL rights when it comes to faulty products (even replacement products).

ACCC%20v%20Fitbit%20LLC%20-%20Concise%20Statement.pdf

[AlanAU]

Tell them “Thanks, I’ll take it up with the ACCC” and see what they say.

[person]

@nikkig

At that point I wasn’t even thinking about warranties

Rookie error then from the supplier. If you didn’t mention “warranty” then I guess they also should not have, and instead just thanked you for letting them know.

@nikkig

the warranty period begins on the date the order is made

That is plainly unreasonable, particularly, for example, in a backorder situation.

However I doubt that the government would take any interest in that because, as other posters have already pointed out, the warranty only adds to the rights that you have under the ACL.

However, invoking the ACL is merely avoiding the question.

Let’s say we paraphrase the ACL as “you have the right to expect a lifetime of a product that is reasonable given the description and price” …

… at what point does that lifetime begin?

None of us is a lawyer so it is best only to answer that with a citation to / quotation from a reputable source.

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Another Innovations story: I bought a product from Innovations. The product was not defective, but it had a number of design deficiencies. After an adequate period of use I gave feedback to them about the design. (Again, I was not in any way seeking action under warranty.) Soon after that the product disappeared from their web site.

I was therefore somewhat disappointed to observe that a few years later, a completely different product but meeting the same functionality appeared on their web site, but the new product had most of the same deficiencies.

[nikkig]

Thank you for all your responses. When I first wrote to Innovations about the defects in the Toasted Sandwich Maker it wasn’t with the intention of making a Warranty Claim. I simply wanted them to know about the problems with it. This then escalated with the warranty issues and my surprise that the warranty period began on the date of the order and not when the product was received. I recognise that I could have taken the issues further, but to be honest for the sake of $62.00 I didn’t have the energy needed to fight it. These days I save myself for the really major things! As an aside, I have been having a few concerns re Innovations for some time now. As a long standing customer I am very familiar with their workings such as length of time before orders are sent and also their regular Sales. The Sales are becoming more and more frequent and the order fulfilment time longer. They are also no longer sending out as many catalogues as they used to. As I said, just wondering.

[grahroll]

Thank you for raising the issues. Often while we are responding to a particular user’s issues, we are also mindful that other people do visit looking for help with similar problems/concerns. So information that is provided in a topic is often not unique to one individual but benefits many.

[person]

@nikkig

but to be honest for the sake of $62.00 […]

I totally get that.

My opinion is that for a $62 item I would have the expectation of better than 1 year of life - but that doesn’t mean that it makes much sense actually pursuing it with the vendor.

My sandwich maker purchased from a mainstream bricks-and-mortar store got thrown out after about 5 years - as most of the non-stick surface was disappearing and hence it was becoming somewhat a “stick surface”. However that was a $20 item. $20 for 5 years is probably reasonable (i.e. not going to have the ACL on my side).

Really I would like items that last a long time rather than to be throwing things out so often even if it means paying more. And I guess this topic illustrates the difficulty of attempting to execute that strategy. That is, will a $62 sandwich maker actually last longer than a $20 sandwich maker?