When you are checking out at Best Buy, the clerk always says, “Would you like to get the extended warranty? It will protect your item in case anything happens to it.” Depending on what the item is, I almost always say no, but have purchased my fair share of them over the years.
Here’s a brief history of my luck with the Best Buy extended warranty:
1. Big Screen TV – Pay a couple hundred bucks for the 4 year extended warranty. Fail to renew the warranty after 4 years which would have cost about $50 bucks. About 1 year later something goes out on the TV and it costs me $450 to replace.
2. Countless small electronics like cameras, mp3 players, etc… pay random amounts for extended warranties and never use them for one reason or another.
3. Digital Camera – Figuring that it’s an item that I plan on carrying in my pocket and may end up seeing some damage, I opt for the $30 extended warranty. After about 6 months of use, I’m heading to the car in the morning with my hands full of several items. One of which is my camera. I need to run back in to the house for a second so I set a collection of items on top of my car. As I turn to walk away I get about 5 feet away and hear a noise that sounds like something sliding. I turn just in time to watch my camera slide off the car and hit the cement. I pick it up to find that the zoom no longer works and it’s throwing a nice error on the screen which makes it difficult to get to the menus and makes it impossible to shoot videos.
I take the camera back to Best Buy and head over to the Geek Squad. They take my camera and tell me they will send it out for repairs. I get a call from the repair shop a few days later letting me know that there is damage to the casing (duh, it fell 5 feet on to cement) and that this kind of damage is not covered with the warranty and it would cost me $196.00 for repairs. Luckily we received this information in the form of a voice mail or else I would have told that guy off right then and there. $196.00 to repair a $220 camera? Not to mention the fact that the NEWER version of the SAME camera is available for $199.
I then went and read through all the fine print of a Best Buy warranty. This warranty does not cover much at all. Damage due to wear? Nope. Water damage? Nope. Insect infestation? Nope. (and yes, I’m serious that it’s listed) Basically, what is covered is after some amount of time your camera just decided to stop working for some unexplainable reason, that would be covered. But, if there was an explainable reason on WHY it stopped working, it’s not going to be covered.
Oh, and if you don’t think I hold a grudge, I stopped shopping at Comp USA several years back because they chose to just out and out over charge people on every single item in their store. So, when I heard they were closing all the Comp USA stores, I drove over and went inside to take a victory lap.
Hey, Best Buy, suck my ass! I went over to Target and bought my new camera. I paid cash. That would have been your profit. Have a nice day.
Yea ,stick it to the Man , umm Men,,err Persons,,, well Best Buy,,,,YEA!
Target rules anyway.
There is a trend that is happening with cell phones and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it happening more in small consumer electronics. The trend is “cell phone insurance”, and its important to note that those aren’t warranties. The “insurance” is a monthly premium, doesn’t expire, and protects against wear and tear as well as malfunction. If I’m investing $600 for a new-to-market, and therefore unproven, cell phone this June 27th, then this is something worth looking into.
Cameras would seem like a likely candidate for such a insurance policy. It sucks that happened to you, and next time I have a BB warranty to call in, I’ll make sure to piss in the box before shipping the defunct product.