LCD TV Update.. Arg..

Joined
23 October 2000
Messages
13,885
Location
Saint Augustine, FL
Some of you may recall that I had a problem with my 40" LCD before christmas and that sears gave me a free upgrade to the 50". Well, after seeing the new Sony's over the holidays, we decided to go for the upgrade to a 60" Sony LCD KF-60WE610.

Well, we ordered it Jan 12th and got a delivery date of March 9th! TWO months! I was not pleased, but what can you do.

Well, guess what, March 9th has come and gone and no TV. They told us that it had been rescheduled for March 16th. Ok, one week. I was a little pissed, but not too pissed. Well, March 15th comes and I call Sears about my delivery the next day and they say that it is not in. I ask when it will be in and they said it has been rescheduled for April 5th! WTF! I was pissed. Not only that, but they said they have no clue if they will acutally get it on the 5th and it might be longer.

So I called sears corp and they are trying to help me out. The local store has tried their best to help also and given me an additional $200 off because of the trouble. The trouble apparetnly is with sony and with the LCD suppliers. Apparently they were just not ready for the amount of orders that came in over the holidays and are way backed up. Also, Sony apparently has a problem with the bulbs and that is the reason the TV has been so far delayed. They asked if there was any other tv I wanted and the only one I could think of was the XBR version of the 60". That is another $1000+, but I figured I would let them see what they could do. No word back on that yet.

Anyway, I don't know if anyone else has ordered any LCD tv's lately, but this SUCKS! I am ready for my TV!

End rant..
 
Hey, I just want to know if there is some secret you can pass along to us on how you managed this, so that we can take advantage of your experience. If there's some way I could get them to knock $200 off the price just for waiting a couple extra weeks, I'd be happy to do it, any time! :D
 
nsxtasy said:
Hey, I just want to know if there is some secret you can pass along to us on how you managed this, so that we can take advantage of your experience. If there's some way I could get them to knock $200 off the price just for waiting a couple extra weeks, I'd be happy to do it, any time! :D

Here are the steps:

1) buy a tv that will go defective in about 6 months.

2) Make sure the time it goes defective is christmas time when they are trying to move a ton of inventory to make their numbers.

3) Negotiate a replacement.

Back to reality now...

Ken, waiting two weeks is not bad. Waiting 3 months is crazy.

I am happy however with how Sears has handled this problem and I would still buy from them again.
 
nsxtasy said:
Hey, I just want to know if there is some secret you can pass along to us on how you managed this, so that we can take advantage of your experience. If there's some way I could get them to knock $200 off the price just for waiting a couple extra weeks, I'd be happy to do it, any time! :D

Do what i do...buy it .....then return it....and wait for the open box sale on the item and there is your discount.
 
NetViper,

I don't know if this would relate to your LCD TV being delayed in delivery, but there is a shortage of projector bulbs in the home theater industry. Everyone is getting affected from supplier to retailer to buyer. There are back orders from Phillips (manufacturer of these bulbs). I have a projector myself and I called my company and they confirmed this problem. Home theater forums are literally full of complaints of not being able to use their projectors because they are required to wait *months* to get their order.

LCD,DLP, LCOS projectors/rear projection TV's use these same bulbs.
 
I thought they were replacing the phillips bulbs with these OSRAM bulbs. Are those made by phillips too?
 
nsxtasy said:
Hey, I just want to know if there is some secret you can pass along to us on how you managed this, so that we can take advantage of your experience. If there's some way I could get them to knock $200 off the price just for waiting a couple extra weeks, I'd be happy to do it, any time! :D

Just do a lot of bitching and wasting of their time. I do this all the time to get "good deals" on everything I buy. I always ask the person I am dealing with "how would you feel in my situation' What would make you feel better about these circumstances?" The way I look at it everything is negotiable. I return anything that breaks. Just this weekend I returned wiper blades which wore out in Two months. I am not doing this to be cheap. I am doing this in hopes my actions, and others, will enlighten businesses to build better products or become overrun with returns. Most people would have just thrown out the wiper blades and bought new. This gives the wiper blade manufacturer no incentive to build a better product.

Sears has replace two garden tractors for me in the past after a year of use each. John Deere replaced my current lawn tractor after 7 months of use with a brand new one. Cub cadet has done the same.

I follow through to the end and never let up. I am currently working on BMWNA to replace the door handles on my X-5 for no charge 22k miles over the warranty. In reality the door handles should be recalled by the NHTSA for the freezing problem.
 
I'm not sure if Sears is being completely honest with you. I just talked to my brother to see if he knew anything about this. He works at a place that does very high end home theaters and such. He told me he's never heard of a problem with Sony on this matter. In fact, he told me that a client of his that just bought a bunch of Wilson speakers, etc... had this exact same t.v. delivered from Circuit City last week. You might want to call a couple of different places and see if they have this t.v. in stock and if not, how long it would take to get one.
 
White92 said:
I'm not sure if Sears is being completely honest with you. I just talked to my brother to see if he knew anything about this. He works at a place that does very high end home theaters and such. He told me he's never heard of a problem with Sony on this matter. In fact, he told me that a client of his that just bought a bunch of Wilson speakers, etc... had this exact same t.v. delivered from Circuit City last week. You might want to call a couple of different places and see if they have this t.v. in stock and if not, how long it would take to get one.

I have called all over and they are in very very short supply. There are numerous posts on audio/video forums about the delays and manufacturing problems with these LCD's.

They are filling backorders all over the US at this point.

Onecall.com had one left, but he said he did not know when he would be getting any more in. Ultimate Electronics said they had no idea when they would be getting anymore.

Waiting sucks!

Sears has been told not to take any orders for these tv's until the middle of april. I guess they plan to be caught up by then.
 
Here in Japan there is a lovely website http://www.kakaku.com
You can compare prices all over Japan, pick the best one and get the item (in my case plasma tv) sent to your house, sometimes at no extra cost.

The local electronics chain store (deo deo) had a wega sony plasma tv 400,000yen. Online it was 296,000 yen last i checked!
 
steveny said:

I follow through to the end and never let up. I am currently working on BMWNA to replace the door handles on my X-5 for no charge 22k miles over the warranty. In reality the door handles should be recalled by the NHTSA for the freezing problem.

Well it took several phone calls and a days wait but BMW is footing the bill for a ~1600.00 repair. IMO, BMW should repair all of the door handles, as a recall on all models. In cold weather the latch will freeze and will not latch or latch locks and will not allow exit. What if there was a fire? VERY DANGEROUS.

I would really like to start a consumer advocate business where I could charge to take care of these problems for other people.
 
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>>Just do a lot of bitching and wasting of their time. I do this all the time to get "good deals" on everything I buy.
Wasting THEIR time? I guess you don't put a very high value on your own time.

>>I am not doing this to be cheap
Of course you're not, you're doing it to save money. HUGE difference.

Let's see - what should I do with my spare time? Enjoy my friends and family, drive my NSX, get some work done around the house? Nahh, I'm going to spend it arguing with retail sales people over a few bucks that don't mean much to me. Each to his own I guess!!
 
Soichiro said:
[B
Let's see - what should I do with my spare time? Enjoy my friends and family, drive my NSX, get some work done around the house? Nahh, I'm going to spend it arguing with retail sales people over a few bucks that don't mean much to me. Each to his own I guess!! [/B]

There is nothing I enjoy more than getting a "better deal". In a lot of cases it is not about a few bucks. My recent bitching to BMW saved me $1600.00 in repairs that BMW will now make for free. Besides I am "retired" so I have to find something to do with my time.:D
 
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