Suunto depth sensor failures

[TheScubaBOB]

This is ridiculous. According to you, warranty expectation is value dependent. What nonsense. Following your logic, your house will then outweigh your car, so simply toss your car out after warranty expiry because your house costs more. What a joke.

Actually even though you're reading WAY TOO much into it that is correct to an extent.

My house is 20 years old (even though it's only been mine for 3 years) and I do expect it to outlast my cars (one is currently 12 yrs & the other is 2 yrs old) by many years.

And yes the current value of anything does actually effect how much a reasonable person would spend to repair it. My SUV has a current used car value of like $18,000 and I owe $15,000 on it. If it is damaged and the cost to repair is $20,000 my insurance company won't fix the car they'll pay the remaining balance and cut me a check of the $3,000 in value I have lost. That's similar to what Suunto has offered.

Buy another brand computer and see if that manufacturer will honor the warranty after the warranty period has expired.

 

[Hatul]

The reality of it is, a warranty exists only for a set period of time and this period should be known before you buy the product. Once that period lapses, one has no right to claim poor practice if the company does not repair something under warranty because it is NOT under warranty. If the warranty is for a period of 2 years (just an example) and it breaks at 2.5 years, then why would the company fix it? I am sure there have been exceptions made by Suunto but if we can not live with the rules, then buy something else. If you had a car that broke down after 10 years even though you only put 5,000 miles per year on it, you would not expect the auto manufacturer to step up would you? Why should Suunto be held to different rules?

My old Oceanic Prodigy, I noticed, after the warranty ran out, that the unit was not displaying the tables properly as per user's manual. There was some problem with the software and it was not giving the correct non deco times. I was advised to send it in and they replaced it with a new one.

It's only good business practice as it's very bad publicity to have defective products out there that are the company's fault. And it protects them from liability. If you have a dive accident because of this even after the warranty runs out you can still sue the company for damages.

Adam

 

[ScubaSteve]

My old Oceanic Prodigy, I noticed, after the warranty ran out, that the unit was not displaying the tables properly as per user's manual. There was some problem with the software and it was not giving the correct non deco times. I was advised to send it in and they replaced it with a new one.

It's only good business practice as it's very bad publicity to have defective products out there that are the company's fault. And it protects them from liability. If you have a dive accident because of this even after the warranty runs out you can still sue the company for damages.

Adam

What you people seem to expect is that the companies should offer a lifetime FULL replacement warranty for every product out there that has ever been manufactured. No offense but there is only one word for that concept...ridiculous (well there are other words but they might have upset the MODs here ).

 

[TheScubaBOB]

If you have a dive accident because of this even after the warranty runs out you can still sue the company for damages.

Adam

You can sue for anything, winning is another story though.

As a person of reasonable intelligence who is properly trained you should be able to determine if your gear is in proper working order. Further, you Scuba training should have given you the skills to return safely to the surface in the even of any piece of gear failing you (especially if you are diving with a competent buddy).

You would need to prove that the manufacturer did something wrong not that the item they built failed.

Ford lost the Pinto-Bomb case because they knew about the defect, did the math and gambled that paying for claims arising from the defect was cheaper than correcting it AND (this is the real clincher) the lawyers for the class action suit found internal Ford documents that confirmed this.

 

[lord.harshil]

Heehee I was laughing when I read the bit about the house.

What ScubaSteve said is right. At the end of the day, manufacturers are capitalists out to make money. If making a decent dive com that lasts 2 years makes them more money than making hardcore ones that they can warranty for 10 years without the bosses losing any sleep at night, then they will go with the method that makes them more money.

Having said that, I would be mighty pissed if they promised me gold and sold me crap and expected to live with it. Which is why I despise PADI for all their fancy (and useless) Boat Diver Cert and Peak Performance Cert crap. I'm also not a fan of Suunto who seem to expect you to pay US$100 (thats the cost in my LDS anyway) for a USB cable and interface when others like my UWATEC Tec 2G came with their own interface for free.

I bought myself a UWATEC because I met a guy who used his one for more than 15 years. I liked the durability and 70 dives in, mine is running perfectly. A little annoying on the buttons though but you get used to it. Suunto on the other hand, would make me pay through my nose everytime I needed a battery change and even then, I dont know if the technician buggered up that one batt change.

Long story cut short, I'm not a fan of Suunto and never will be but I love their sneaky customer undermining philosophy

 

[hammer5]

Just to add to my original post, Yes, the unit was out of warranty,but since the Cobra line was/is still being sold, I was also willing to pay to have the unit repaired. But Suunto only wanted to sell me a new unit. After reading other posts about similar units, I decided to see how many other people had this issue; If the issue was an isolated incident, then so be it, it would be a failure after warranty and toss the unit, but there does seem to be a trend with the depth sensor. As well as when Suunto returned my unit, after I had to demand the unit back, it was missing the battery and the cover. This is definitely something to think out when it comes to Suunto customer service

 

[ScubaSteve]

......But Suunto only wanted to sell me a new unit.......

So you spoke, personally to Suunto, told them clearly that you wanted to fix it and they told you your only option was to buy a new computer? Let's not forget that the LDS makes a decent margin on Suunto so I would not be at all surprised if they were the ones twisting words saying you needed to buy a new one (maybe just saying that because Suunto would "prefer" it). Just something to think about....may not be the case here, or it very well could be.

......but there does seem to be a trend with the depth sensor.........

A couple people does not imply a trend, There have been a number of people claim no issues....does that not also imply a trend? My second computer WAS NOT a Suunto, so I really have no loyalty to them but do not believe there is sufficient information present to call it a trend. I am not a mathematician though.

.............As well as when Suunto returned my unit, after I had to demand the unit back, it was missing the battery and the cover. This is definitely something to think out when it comes to Suunto customer service

In every single way, this is unacceptable behaviour on behalf of Suunto. Unless they are covering it under warranty somehow, there should NEVER be a discussion fo whether or not you get the comnputer back if requested. And missing parts or damaged......even worse.

 

[Stu S.]

A warranty is one thing. Customer expectations are another. Suunto is premium-priced and regarded as "best in class". We have high expectations for such products, and expect them to last longer than the warranty period.

Failure after the warranty period may not get a new item. Nevertheless, the product would not have met my expectations.

 

[ScubaSteve]

A warranty is one thing. Customer expectations are another. Suunto is premium-priced and regarded as "best in class". We have high expectations for such products, and expect them to last longer than the warranty period.

Failure after the warranty period may not get a new item. Nevertheless, the product would not have met my expectations.

This I agree with. BUT, I expect the cheap "non-premium" product to survive the warranty period....not just the premium product. The thing I take exception with is the expectation that any manufacturer MUST provide a brand new computer for free just because theirs failed outside of warranty. That is what some here are expecting. Some manufacturers will go above and beyond.....I bet some people out there have heart warming stories about Suunto and how they went above and beyond.....this is just not one of those stories (yet).

With some of the new information, I do agree that somebody is not making a whole lot of effort to go above and beyond, but I do not place all this blame on Suunto either.

 

[Liquivision]

People here don't seem to understand how dive computers work. A dive computer can fail, even during the warranty period, even if there is nothing intrinsically wrong with it.

People have a belief that if the device fails, there was something terribly wrong with it to start off with. Not so.

Depth sensors, for example, have a tendency to fail. Every batch of depth sensors will have a failure rate, for example 10% (it could be 1% or 20%).

The manufacturer knows this, and has little choice. The sensor lifetime is still quite long in most cases, so there is usually no way for the manufacturer to determine the failure rate before shipping out a large production run.

People here will argue that the manufacturer 'knows' that some units will fail, and thus should replace them even before their warranty expires. Sure, but replace them with what? Another product that also has a 10% chance of a sensor failure, or another product that could even have a greater chance of failing? Think of the problem. 90% of the units will not fail. If you have a unit that has a 90% chance of surviving and you expect it to be replaced even though it never failed.... and you expect it to somehow be replaced with something that has a 100% success rate, a product which doesn't exist.



Eric Fattah
Liquivision Products