I bought a Nikon D40 for my wife in December 2007. I took it back to the shop for repair (shutter is sticking) in Feb this year believing it to be covered under an extended warranty (Nikon UK says it’s not registered, I say it is, they say it isn’t, I say- well, you can tell how pointless that conversation was). Anyway, do you lot reckon I have a case to pursue the repair, replacement or reimbursement of the camera (“estimated £165:00 to repair” I paid £300 for the thing in December 2007) under the Sale of Goods act? I mentioned this to the store manager who phoned his head office and then came back with a shrug and “nothing we can do mate”.
Any help gratefully received.

You might do, as you might convince a court that it’s reasonable to expect the camera to last more than 14 months before needing a repair. You’d be on a surer footing if it was something like a washing machine – I think it’s well established that you have a case for anything up to six years after purchase.
Oh and extended warranties, UK registered etc, don’t mean anything. Your contract is with the shop.

Did you take out the additional extended warranty? That surely supercedes the warranty card that came with the camera? All the best.

Contact Consumer Direct. They’re brilliant and telling you wat your rights are and what to do about it. I nearly got palmed off with having some 2 week old RS Revs repaired until i spoke to these guys. I got a brand new pair 3 days later. 😀

http://www.consumerdirect.gov.uk/

Did you pay for extended warranty? I never do as usually expensive…so you haven’t got anything in writing about it then just relying on memory that you have it?

Did Nikon say why its not covered?

Are they stating its out of warantee or, other factors that are not covered?

It doesn’t necessarily matter if it’s out of warranty. The issue under sale of goods is whether or not the goods were inherently faulty at the time of sale. A reasonably expensive camera that fails in such a short time might well be considered to be inherently faulty. You’d probably have to take it to court though…

As gizzardman days, consumer direct is your best bet.

If you took out an extended warranty at the time of purchase with the retailer, the warantee might not be with Nikon, ask the retailer, they might have sent it to Nikon in error.

True ransos, but it gets back to the old argument of what is a reasonable amount of time…..

Extended warranty was free. Just needed to be registered within 28 days of purchase. Apparently, I registered it at 30 days after date of purchase. I bought it on the 1st of December as it was for Christmas and we didn’t get round to registering it until we got home (we’d been away for Christmas). We did it online and got an online reference but apparently, we should have received a certificate through the post,Never did and so we’re not covered.
However, i did some research re: Sale of Goods Act, chucked it in to the mix like a secret weapon……..well, that didn’t work. the store manager couldn’t have been any less impressed.
Double However! GIZZARDMAN is todays’ Singletrackworld Forum Star of the Day! I’ve just come off the phone from the very nice, very Irish accented Michael from the North West branch of http://www.consumerdirect.gov.uk/ who has given me a case reference number and the kind assurance that we have a very clear case of having the camera repaired, replaced or reimbursed under the Sale of Goods Act 1979 etc. as it is to be clearly and ‘reasonably’ expected that the camera costing £300 and not showing any signs of physical damage or misuse (it hasn’t, it’s treated with more care than our offspring) should be in full working order within 14 months of its date or purchase.
Thanks all and especially Gizzardman – Singletrackworld Forum Star of the Day!

So will they take the case on for you and pursue the responsibles?

Yup! I have to write out a letter (they even have templates for the shy of typing) stating that I believe I have a case under the said Act, give them 14 days to respond and let Consumer Direct know the outcome one way or the other.

Try not to get your hopes up and be prepared for a fight. I had a similar response from consumer direct and duly used their templates to fight for a warranty repair on a 15 month old tumble drier. After 3 months, I gave up. I needed the drier more than the moral high ground.

Directive 99/44/EC on the sale of consumer goods:

http://europa.eu/scadplus/leg/en/lvb/l32022.htm

The seller is liable to the consumer for any lack of conformity which exists when the goods are delivered to the consumer and which becomes apparent within a period of two years unless, at the moment of conclusion of the contract of sale, the consumer knew or could not reasonably be unaware of the lack of conformity.

S14 of the Sale of Goods Act provides an implied term as to quality of goods. S14(2B)(e) provides durability is a factor to be considered when assessing the quality of goods.

The above Directive provides a minimum term of 2 years. Therefore you should be able to argue that the camera should have lasted a minimum of 2 years i.e. until December 2009.

Hope that helps.

Well for what it’s worth, when I was scrapping over getting my watch fixed recently, I aimed v high – the higher you get in the org the better chance of success I think, assuming you’ve some sort of legit case. And someone on here advised to use humour rather than rant/argue – worked a treat. I’m getting sorted.

I’d recommend same – continue to tackle it at shop level through formal channels – get trading standards involved. And this is v inconvenient for the shop cos you target trading standards where you live rather than where you bought the camera. It means if it comes down to small claims court, they’ve got to see you at your court which is a pita for them. Serve them the registered post letter with 14 days notice etc. & get that going but meanwhile, find the name of someone v high up in Nikon and target them with something drole. For the sake of a couple of hundred quid they’ll probably just say “fix it” to people lower down, so long as you come across as reasonable.

Good luck…

Jakester is right with the “Directive 99/44/EC on the sale of consumer goods”. This applies to almost everything that we buy, under EU law there is no longer a 12 month warranty on anything it’s 24 months. Retailers and manufacturers tend to keep this a little quiet. Oh flipingheck I’m a manufacturer.

Glad i could help mate. A friend of mine had a 3 year old Macbook that packed up and the shop estimated the repair bill to be £790! He only had 1 year warranty on the product but contacted Consumer Direct and it ended up being repaired FOC. The general public don’t realise what rights as a concumer they have. Any kind of electrical good should be fit for purpose for at least 5 years from date of purchase regardless if you have only 1 years warranty!!! Don’t accept the bull that these mothers come up with!! 🙂