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Pastimes : Computer Learning -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Id_Jit who wrote (46132)	5/1/2005 7:49:08 AM
From: Doug Coughlan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 110626

Here is what Consumer Reports has to say about extended warranties. Take special note of the last paragraph if you have a credit card that will extend a warranty up to say a year just by using that particular card. Good luck! January 2005 Extended warranties: Say yes, sometimes On the way to the checkout counter, you have no doubt been waylaid by a sales clerk extolling the benefits of buying an extended warranty. But one of our editors, a battle-hardened shopper, was taken aback recently when the cashier at a chain store tried to sell him one for a $37 DVD player that would probably cost more to fix than replace. An extended warranty kicks in after the manufacturer’s warranty runs out. The insurer pays to repair or replace the item for a specified period of time, usually two to five years from the date of purchase. (Some extended plans start on the date of purchase, even though the manufacturer’s warranty is also in effect.) A variation, the replacement plan, is usually offered on less expensive merchandise and promises to give you a new or rebuilt product (or store credit) if the unit you bought conks out while the plan is in effect. Once offered on costly appliances, extended warranties have trickled down to just about everything on the store shelves. For retailers, that makes perfect sense. When profit margins on the products themselves are being squeezed, extended warranties yield 40 to 80 percent profit, according to industry sources. But if these extended plans are a cash cow, just who’s getting milked? You may already know the answer. For years, Consumer Reports has cautioned against buying this costly coverage. Survey data from thousands of readers have shown that, generally, extended warranties cost roughly the same as the average repair. That’s if you need a repair at all. As you can see in Product repair rates, many products, particularly those with tried-and-true technologies, are unlikely to need repairs within the first three years. But sometimes an extended warranty may make sense. If you’re buying a treadmill or an elliptical trainer with a standard warranty of less than a year on parts and labor, you should consider an extended warranty, which costs around $70 to more than $100 for two to three years of coverage. That’s not bad, considering that a service call costs $75 to $100 before you pay for parts. You might consider an extended warranty on a laptop computer. Laptops are expensive, fragile, and hard to repair. And the parts are made to fit within the manufacturer’s unique case design. For that reason, you should buy the warranty from the manufacturer, not from the retailer. Also, with a manufacturer’s warranty, you continue to enjoy access to free tech support. When it comes to liquid-crystal display (LCD) and plasma TV sets, however, the decision is more difficult. We don’t yet have sufficient data on either to tell you whether your set is likely to need repairs within its first few years of life. Plasma sets, however, run hot and use fans to stay cool. Those can wear out and need fixing. After the manufacturer’s usual one-year warranty, a service center will charge you anywhere from several hundred to several thousand dollars, depending on what parts need replacing. So even though an extended warranty for a plasma set costs $300 to $1,000 depending on the cost of the TV and the length of the warranty, buying one may be prudent, particularly if you bought an off-brand set. Screen burn-in of static images, a problem common to plasmas, is not covered, however. LCDs are a different story. The technology, which borrows from computer monitors, has been around for years so we would expect LCDs to be reliable. Even though one of the bulbs that lights the screen may eventually burn out, causing uneven illumination, the replacement costs may not justify the $200 to $600 or so it would cost to buy a three-year warranty. Before you say yes to an extended warranty on any product, check to see whether your credit card provides similar coverage. Such plans, which are most often found on gold and platinum cards, typically lengthen the original manufacturer’s warranty by up to one year. If you use a MasterCard, look in the fine print for the words “extended warranty”; Visa calls its program Warranty Manager Service.