What do you mean I’m being unreasonable on purpose? What’s unreasonable about wanting to return something yourself. Most companies allow this quite easily both before and during this pandemic. If Naim wanted to make this easier they could. I didn’t expect them to make changes overnight. I rang them back in May and they have done nothing to allow for the current situation.
Why would they need additional storage space. The box is the same size if I send it or a dealership sends it.
So they can set that up OK but you can’t send stuff via courier internal to the UK. Errr…OK.
Why not. Other companies have adapted very well to much harder challenges during this pandemic.
I really can’t see what the big deal if they’ve accepted returns from the customer previously.
I sent an amp back to Salisbury about 12 months ago (again I had to go through Richer Sounds) and that was far from straightforward. There were lots of calls between me, RS and Naim because RS weren’t aware of such agreement and wanted all sorts of assurances from Naim regarding who would be paying for what. I don’t think they’d done a return to Naim before. It would have been much simpler for me to return it myself and Naim to send it back to my address.
Okay. 3 years ago my CDS3 developed a faulty mech. I drove it to my regular Naim dealer who shipped it to Salisbury. When repaired I picked it up from said dealer. Covid would have slightly elongated the process, maybe, but still simples.
Well I am not their head of service. In my opinion, one chooses the company that does things the way one likes it. Other companies certainly accept direct returns, and many others don’t. Those that do during the pandemic would probably be those companies who already did it before, not switch during the current time. If Naim did it in the past, they will not have kept the requirements around after they stopped. They also built speakers once and now they build Statements in the same place. Like companies do. It also might be wise to consider that Naim may have constraints that you and I are not aware of.
I can see why you are unhappy, but really all it would take most likely would be a phone call to a reputed dealer and getting it shipped there.
There is one reason to put a dealer between you and Naim for repair work.
I had my UnitiServe repaired for the second time, all handled by my dealer. Six months later the US went down again, the same wretched ‘blinking logo of doom’. After this third return, Naim wanted a another £300 odd for the privilege. As my dealer was aware of my UnitiServe’s embarrassing history, he kindly told Naim where to stick this third bill.
If you deal with Naim direct, you don’t have a dealer to fight your corner.
I was told by my dealer that there is a one year warranty after a service. And I believe this would anyway be the case by law for those parts that were changed during the repair
Audio T in Preston is closed, but Brian and Trevors in Whitefield, Manchester is now a Naim dealer. Another option is Doug Brady HiFi on the outskirts of Warrington.
These three returns were repairs, not service. Maybe a year’s warranty is offered on the parts replaced, but if another fault appears, then it is a grey area.
Naim obviously felt it was legitimate for them to issue a third repair bill for the same unit in less than 2 years. My dealer felt otherwise and he argued my case and saved me over £300.
Sure, by law it would only cover the replaced parts. I would have expected for Naim to deal more gracefully with your case, after all they knew as they have your serials and what they did to them on file. Shouldn’t have taken the dealer to tell them, but it is cool that he did (and I certainly would also expect mine to do the same), and of course you are right that this can be an advantage of a regular dealer even if it should not have been necessary
That’s the most compelling argument thus far because I’m in the same position. This is the second hard disk failure. It was returned to Naim just under 2 years ago. It’s been bricked since lockdown so that original repair lasted less than 18 months.
However, I doubt I would see the same support from Richer Sounds as you did. They were very reluctant (they point blank initially refused) to get involved in handling my amp 12 months ago and it took me to ring Naim to ring them to get them to get their finger out. This despite that Naim had OK’d it with one of the staff the week before and they were told to expect the unit. So that was 2 trips to town to drop it off. No local parking which meant carrying the bloody thing a few hundred yards (4 times in total) to and from the car and in the pissing rain on the first aborted occasion. There’s also the added risk that somebody sees you carrying a Naim box down a sidestreet and knows exactly what it is. RS in Preston is right on the edge of a known dodgy area. I was glad to get the thing back in the car twice.
In that case I would definitely get a pukka Naim dealer involved, if possible the same one that dealt with your previous repair.
UnitiServes are not Naim’s most reliable unit, and Naim are aware of their, let’s say, fragility, as will a Naim dealer. My understanding is that, over the years, Naim have developed some proper fixes for the US’s known sources of failure. It is therefore worth going through the failure and repair history of your US with a Naim dealer to help facilitate a fair outcome.
You might need to wait for its return from repair to get a diagnosis and an agreement over who is to pay.
BTW, my US went off for its various repairs before I installed a NAS back-up. On each occasion Naim were able to recover and restore all my music files, so hopefully they can do the same for you.
Yes. Additional insured postage expense and long drives to add to the £400 repair bill. I suppose there’ll be VAT on top of that too. So I’m probably looking at the thick end of £600 with postage/petrol/repair/VAT. It should be 2 lots of postage plus the repair bill and that’s it. So yes I’m not exactly happy.
I suggest you find a Naim dealer you can get to and discuss the repair history. If it turns out to be another hard disk failure in 2 years then there should follow a discussion about who should pay for this.
Naim are reasonable about these things and they need to justify a series of repair bills, especially with the UnitiServe with its known fragilities.
Thanks. Good advice. Unfortunately the shop that repaired it is no longer a Naim dealership. They binned off Linn too at about the same time so that’s not an option. I will have to bite the bullet and take it to a proper dealership. I think I’ll make a detour to Brian and Trevor next time I go to Manchester and drop it off with them. I know them because I also have a Linn system and so I’ve dealt with them before. I wasn’t aware until earlier today that they now deal with Naim. It really should be easier than this though shouldn’t it? They have the serial number of the unit and if they keep records they’ll know it’s been repaired previously.
It doesn’t need to be the same dealership, as long as you appraise them (Brian and Trevor?) of the failure and repair history, even though Naim should have this at HQ. This will give the dealer the ammo they might need to fight your corner. Take along the last repair bill if you still have it.
Here here Doug Brady Hi Fi brilliant service highly recommended. Sent my CDS3 off for new mech and service. Unfortunately it developed a fault with the replacement mech about 2 weeks after its return. Andrew contacted Naim regarding return of player and sent off, due to lockdown it took a while but was returned all sealed and sounding superb. Really pleased, moral of story use an authorized dealer they are few and far between. Also I live over 40 miles away I didn’t whinge or bang on about distance involved. Also I was unable to collect for 3 months due to restrictions involved. Just waited patiently till collection day Ps how many other manufacturers would service and repair what is basically a 16 year old cd player …
Good point Nigel. As good as Richer Sounds are, they only really deal with the lifestyle and some of the Uniti range. Establishing a long term relationship with a dealer can be advantageous when things go wrong. Although I can understand the OPs frustration I still don’t understand why they just don’t go through another dealer, explain the situation to them and see what they can do.
Ps how many other manufacturers would service and repair what is basically a 16 year old cd player 