warranties on ecig goods

[Phantom Diablo]

would be interested to hear what vendors say about this in regard to e cig items, namely hardware. those products not deemed as persihables ( such as throway cleraos, replacement heads, obviously eliquids would not be included). im talking about, mechs, mods, and atomizers.
having worked in online retail for 8 years and spent 2 months doing legal training regarding distance selling actm, sale of goods act etc i have noticed on a number of sites no warranty information is provided or i see such things as 30 day warranty etc.
Under current EU law anything purchased in the Uk ( or EU) is covered with a 2 year warranty back to supplier ( and also manufacturer guarantee which can be anything from 1 year to lifetime) .

reason i bring this up is i had a piece of hardware that is essentially faulty and has been from the start. its not expensive and its no big deal tbh but my concern is certainly more from a buyers standapoint when it comes to there rights on goods that break within 3 months, 6 months or even a year after use and in some cases within weeks.
looking around i see many offering 3 months or 6 months warranty etc, and there was a case recently on here where another member had a faulty evic and the vendor stated it was only covered by 60 day manufacturer warrnaty and evic stated it was a fake as it wasnt one of there licensed vendors so the member invariably lost out around £80-100.

also of note the vendor is listed as VAT registered so its not like its someone working out of there garden shed and not telling the taxman either.

 

[clint]

When it comes to manufacture guarantee I think one of the things we're seeing at the moment is manufacturers arguing the fact that the product is not genuine. It may or may not be true but with so many clone products around, manufacturers can simply say it's not covered as it's not one of our products.

 

[KulrMeStoopid]

Under the consumer law, the Retailer basically becomes the manufacturer once they bring the product in for resale, the originating Manufacturer Warranty (which 9 times out of 10 comes from China and is around 90 days) pretty much becomes null and void.

ANY electrical item bought in the uk/eu is subject under the law to a 12 month repair, replace, or refund for faulty items (minus depreciation values) regardless of what the warranty says on the Vendors site or what the manufacturer says. If a vendor (cringe worthy moment here for me) tries to dick you around, make sure you know your rights.

I think this is probably one of my pet peeves when I see shoddy warranties and luckily for me, not something I have ever had to refer to with any of the vendors I have ever used.

 

[Phantom Diablo]

therin lies the difference though between manufacturer warranties ( which is with obviously the manufacturer) and the warranty that is supplied by the vendor/supplier which is seperate.
vendor in question btw is not listed as member on here but wont name .
selling counterfeit goods under the illusion of them being genuine is surely a whole new nest of angry wasps that im not even going to touch on. sure its fine when they state yes this is a clone . we know what we are getting , but when it lists product as genuine and you find its a fake you are by law still covered by EU sale of goods warranty

 

[Miss Pepper]

Add to that the EU law about 6y warranty and its a minefield

 

[VaperCaper]

As we understand it the law is that all items not perishable are covered by vendor warranty for 6 months.

If the item breaks in the first 6 months after receipt and the customer isn't abusing the device etc then the law automatically assumes the item was faulty.

After 6 months have passed it's down to the customer to prove that the item was faulty and the fault wasn't caused by the customer. Which is where it gets all several shades of grey.

We offer a standard 6 month warranty on everything we sell apart from e-liquids and atomiser heads. I've replaced several mods, quite a few eGos and some other bits and pieces in my time so far. We factor this into our prices and assume when we buy X that 10% of X is going to be duff.

Some of the stuff we buy from UK sources and just claim back in the event of a fault, one of our china suppliers is good and gives us credit for all faulty items, our other China suppliers don't answer emails where we report faulty goods to them so we stopped sending those emails.

If there is a legal requirement to provide a 2yr warranty on items can you provide a link? As I read the SOGA and similar the warranty that is legally on items is 6 months minimum, and then as long as could 'reasonably be expected' said item to last, given fair wear and tear.

So if you buy a TV and it sits on a TV stand in your house and never moves, there's not much wear and tear, and you can reasonably expect it to last 3 years+ so the warranty from the people that sold it to you is 3yrs+. If you bought an eGo then it's not reasonable to expect the switch which gets pressed thousands of times to last 2 years, or the internal batteries to take more than about 200ish recharges before they no longer hold much charge, and people carry them around in pockets/bags and drop them and so on, so a 6 month warranty on an eGo is probably fair.


At the end of the day if people come to us with problems about things they have bought from us we do our best to sort them out. If it's obvious they are taking the piss then we politely ask them to shop elsewhere in the future.

 

[Phantom Diablo]

ah yes up to 6 years on sale of goods act 1979. Goods are supposed to have an expected percieved life span of upto 6 years ( obviously a bic pen wouldnt ). however for that to be implemented you have after 6 months to prove ( by way of egineers report etc) that the goods were faulty from off or not fit for purpose.
prior ot 6 months the onus is on the supplier to prove otherwise .
this really is more for goods that fail after a certain length of time when they are expected to last longer. a laptop is deemed as being around 4 years, a washing machine 6 years, a car 6 years, its very open to misinterpretation and indeed a minefield, however if a product develops a fault through normal use within the first 2 years its covered under EU law by the supplier unless clearly stated as otherwise prior to purchase.
batteries for instance are not covered and normally only under DOA, ecig replacement coils being persihable, not covered unless DOA. but a mod , or a dripper or atomizer if it has for instance say a faulty screw thread or a VV/VW refuses to fire or power up, then well theres grey areas here because in an atty for instance the coil isnt covered and if the glass tank cracks cos youve put some heavy citrus in then thats down to misuse, but if it has a glued tank and that glue starts coming away and the tank leaking . and its not caused by the juice ( hard one to prove i know) you could claim it as not fit for purpose. or if the screthreads wont tighten up ... attys are a tricky one being made of a mix of perishable and non perishable parts.

a mech mod with side button.. doesnt fire because the button gets a fault.. how many button presses are classed as acceptable before its deemed as normal wear and tear.. again a minefield
sure vendors shouldnt lose out or suffer. but nor should the end user too

 

[fungus]

Interesting thread, as I recently purchased a Vamo v5 that developed a fault after 8 or 9 weeks of light use, so I should be entitled to a fix/refund/replacment then, will get onto seller...