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Canon clarifies warranty policy

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DQC Bureau
New Update

Resellers across India are facing difficulties while availing service from
Canon authorized service providers as they have no clear warranty/service policy
statement in their possession. The issue came to light after some Hyderabad-based
resellers expressed resentment on the state of affairs and urged their
association to 'do something about it'.

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In an effort to resolve the issue Canon moved swiftly to clarify its warranty
policy to the channel partners and customers. According to Alok Bhardwaj, VP,
Canon India, the company has a three-pronged strategy to resolve the issue. He
elaborated, "Firstly, we are sending out communication to all the channel
partners across the country on our warranty policy. This is being made available
to Twin Cities Computer Dealers Association (TCCDA) and its members also, as the
issue started from Hyderabad market. Secondly, we are putting stickers on the
printers to campaign against using fake or refill cartridge as it damages the
printer heads.

We have also clarified that using fake/refill cartridges will void warranty
claims for the head. Thirdly, we have announced swap warranty for the printers
where any defective product will be replaced with new one except for the print
head. All these initiatives are aimed at resolving the issue."

Alok believes that the issue is a fall-out of Canon's recent decision of
not suppor-ting warranty claims on print heads, where fake/refill produ-cts were
used. "Four months back, Canon took a decision of globally not entertaining
claims on print heads where fake/refill products were used. After implementing
it, there was a drop of 30% in the claims.

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We use a foolproof solution (which finds out the PH factor in ink from the
print head) to find out whether gen-uine cartridge was used and based on the
results, the deci-sion was taken to entertain the claim or not. What we have
seen in Hyderabad market is the backlash of this decision," he said.

Talking about the issue, Sailesh Gumidelli, President of TCCDA, said,
"There is a lot of ambiguity in Canon warranty/service program. And since
no company statement on this was available Canon authorized service providers
are taking the resellers for ride by dictating th-eir own terms and
conditions."

The resellers in Hyderabad and Chennai confirm that warranty issues with
Canon have been there and the issuance of policy statement by the company would
help resolve the issue.

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"We do not understand why Canon did not make its warranty statement
available to all the resellers. Most of the time, we know about Canon warranty
offers only through media and advertisements. However, when we approach the
company authorized service providers for any replace-ment and support, they
turn-down our demands saying the warranty does not cover it. We are not able to
demand our rights since we do not know what our rights are," said a leading
reseller in Hyderabad.

S GOPIKRISHNA

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