[slinkelist] Word about Big companies "Customer Relations"

[Kurt Albershardt]

At 06:29 AM 12/9/99 , Michael Holopainen wrote:
>8. The next day a angel wearing Sony overalls rang by door bell, and sat
>on the couch and took out a remote controller 
>and 30 minutes later it was fixed.
>
>He put tv into the service state and suddenly there was hundreds of
>previously hidden menus that allowed to adjust everything you can't even
>imagine about colors and then some. 
>
>Those wankers at repair service told me "there is now way to adjust the
>color in this model" so they changes twice all the panels & insides of
>the tv. (well, atleast I got fresh lamp & color panels)


For those of you unfamiliar with the intricacies of the consumer electronics biz, most of the manufacturers do handle repairs themselves, but usually only in or near their distribution centers.  These facilities are not anywhere near large enough to handle the complete load, so (in accordance with tradition going back to the 1920's and a lot like the automotive dealers) they have 'factory authorized service centers' at local dealers or service centers.  This authorization requires the local repair facility to send a technician to the factory-run school every time a new product line comes out but rarely (if ever) actually checks the quality of work done by the service center.  These courses are rather expensive ($500-1,200 US plus travel expenses when I was in the business a few years back) so many dealers only send one technician (and there's no guarantee he stays with the shop after he's taken the course.)
The manufacturer pays flat rates for labor 'minor' or 'major' repairs and covers the parts used for the job.  These rates are typically less than the dealer gets for non-warranty work so there is not a strong incentive to do warranty work at all.  One shop I used to manage would only put in a certain amount of time on a warranty job and if we couldn't fix the problem, we'd send the unit on to the manufacturer ourselves, thus cutting our losses.  Big-screen TVs complicate the issue, since they can't easily be shipped and the very act of shipping them usually throws off their alignment slightly.  All of the Sony units have a so-called service remote or technician remote from which you can make all the adjustments required to get a really good picture.  These adjustments used to be analog controls buried inside the set, but nowadays all is digital and remote firmware is far cheaper and less likely to drift than adjustment pots.
Most consumers have no idea how a TV picture is really supposed to look, and the manufacturers don't help the situation by putting only a single crosshair on the screen with their R/B centering adjustments.  The devil is in the details, and if you look at a full crosshatch pattern on most bigscreens you will be shocked at the degree of misalignment in the corners.  This does not even begin to address the issue of color balance.  In truth, bigscreen TVs should be sold with an installation that includes as part of the initial setup the adjustments you had done at your house.  This would favor the small, high-quality dealer but would kill the megastores who move most of the product nowadays, so the manufacturers usually just keep their mouths shut about the whole matter.

You can do this yourself if you are interested.  The service remotes usually cost about $100 US and often work with a whole range of models.

See http://www.imagingscience.com/ for more info and links to qualified dealers and installers who understand want a properly setup picture is.




Background:  I used to work in the broadcast TV business where we spent hours every morning tweaking every last one of our $20,000 19" monitors into perfection.  Even fifteen years ago, those pictures were pretty darn impressive.