never buying an open box camcorder again!

i was not in the market for a camcorder but my eye caught an open box hd camcorder at best buy. it was the sony hc3 high def. camcorder. it had an impact damage mark on it and a chip at another spot but everything worked on it so i bought it a great deal with triple rewards points, best buy bucks i got in the mail, and some other incentives. this was back in march of 2007. i made a fuss about the impact damage mark on the camcorder to see if they would reduce the price even more and they told me it still had the manufactures warranty on it since it was never sold before....i was sold.

the camcorder decides to malfunction right before the standard warranty is up. i did what everyone else would do, called sony to get it serviced under warranty. the work order has been created, camcorder under warranty comfirmed, and had me ship it to one of their repair centers.

the repair center denies the warranty due to the impact damage on it and quoted a repair cost of $511.00 dollars. i called sony and they said any open box item with any cosmetic damage is automatically void of it's warranty....great. they could not do anything for me. the only thing they suggest is to bring it back to best buy so they can repair it. "ok, so why would i ship the camera back to me, bring it to best buy only to have them ship it back to that same repair center?" she could not answer that. so i had their repair center ship the camera back to me and i bring it into best buy.

when the camera was at the repair center and got the bad news, i went into best buy before i had it shipped back to me to see what the hell they would do about it. manager said to bring the camera to him and it will get repaired under warranty. they will ship it to one of their own local repair centers. at this point i thought everything is going ok. i basically lost $32 dollars in shipping charges but i would have spent that anyway if the sony warranty was valid.

i bring the camcorder into best buy and manager says he cannot repair it because the warrany period is over. i argued that i took action before it expired and filed the work order number with sony so i have the reciepts and proof that i took action to have it serviced appropriately. he said i should have brought the camera to best buy when it malfunction instead of calling sony. i was confused now and told him that they never told me this when i purchased it. he said it is written on the back of the reciept (which was false as the reciept just writes generic terms). after i had him examine my reciept he could not locate his claim and then said it is written on open item tickets that best buy honors the manufactures warranty and that it is also written on "that" wall....lol. i told him that i basically lost a few weeks due to shipping the camera back and forth because your salesman told me "the camera has warrany from sony" and that i will not accept a no for an answer.

after some more bickering he agreed to rush the camcorder to their repair center but still could not assure me that it will be covered unfder warranty. so i am now waiting to hear from them.

i hooked up the camcorder to my father's high def. tv and we watched footage i took in high definition for about 2 hours. it was time to put in another tape but the one inside it would not eject while it was beeping and saying to re-plug the power source in the view finder. i tried doing that several times when it finally ejected the tape. but, now the eject mechanism will not close so i cannot load another tape while it still beeps but this time it gives an error code in the view finder. repair center said the mechanisim plate and top housing and related parts needed to be replaced.

yea, i wish i bought best buys warranty now. but still, i specifically asked if the camera did indeed have the manufactures warranty and was told it did (otherwise i would not have purchased it). salesmand even placed a small yellow card board warranty note from sony and told me to register the product. when i went to the register to make the purchase they offered me their best buy warranty which i declined....oh what the hell, it has sony's warranty and if anything i would get sony's extended warranty plan, not best buys....so i thought.

i am just glad the damn thing malfunction when it did and that i have a case. it felt that i was going to purchase a "new" product despite the cosmetic and impact damage. i will think twice before considering another open item for such a delicate piece of electronics.

update;

best buy shipped the camera to their repair center in texas. repair center wanted me to pay for the labor. i re-iterated my story to the technician who was kind enough to call sony himself and told them "best buy does not sell broken cameras". sony agreed to give the camera a second look so best buy repair center shipped it to sony's repair center in texas. sony fully repaired the camera under warranty and shipped it back to best buy's repair center, which in turn shipped it back to best buy store where i picked it up.

sony originally instructed me to ship the camera to one of their 3rd parties or some kind of outsource place called precision camera repair in new jersy or conneticut (somewhere out there) and they were the ones that originally voided the warranty and shipped it back to me. the best buy repair center technician said that place out east has a history of pulling the trigger at the slightest blemish or scratch or any kind of minor "abuse" and did not agree of voiding the warranty due to the small impact mark on the other side of the camera which probably did not cause the failure.