This is another reason why the suggested price list should be seen as a guideline - there will be many variables to be taken into account, which is where a more detailed dialogue between a dealer and the Naim Service team comes in.
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I’m sure it’ll become clearer much clearer over time, but in many cases it would seem that dialogue needs to be had before the customer agrees to a final charge, or is at least kept in the loop.
Absolutely.
I know you can’t say for certain or make any promises/predictions, but if some of the heftier price increases for new products/repairs are due to volatile supply chain issues, is there a possibilty that we could see the prices reduce if component prices/supply chain issues improve to pre-pandemic levels?
I suspect not as presumably Naim and dealers will have absorbed a lot of changes over the last couple of years before deciding to increase prices.
Maybe it should be in the wishlist thread 
So this means a cost estimate is provided before doing anything. This is what the German distributor did and the customer gives the go ahead on what to do in the end. Unfortunately this was not the case with my CDS3 which was sent back to the UK. In the end though I’m happy to have the player back repaired and fully serviced and the cost of doing this was completely reasonable
There’s definitely the potential for cuts as well as rises, but to set expectations around components, we’re now having to lock in orders well into 2023, and some of the prices are insane.
For example, one component usually costing around 70 cents is now costing… $44!
Even a commonplace item, typically around 50c, is around $9-10…
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Despite the variable costs of components (which now seem to have been fixed by buying forward) a service cost for a particular box should be entirely predictable, as there must be a standard works schedule to complete the service work. So standard service prices should work and be fair to Naim, the dealer and the end customer.
What I don’t understand is the setting of standard repair costs, as others have pointed out. A repair can vary hugely in cost, and hence price to the end customer. We have seen recently on here how mighty 500 units have been brought down by a sticky relay, a rather common fault it would seem. Surely it won’t cost £899 to sort that out?
Surely it is better, like automotive main dealers, to have a standard price for a service, and repairs to be quoted on a case by case basis, depending on the severity of the fault(s)? If the customer decides not to go ahead with a repair, the unit can be returned with a handling fee to pay, to cover both Naim’s and the dealers time and courier costs.
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Sorry to sound like the proverbial stuck record, but this is why it’s guideline prices and why a conversation with a dealer - and a dealer chatting to the Naim team, as they do on a regular basis - should always be the starting point.
Hopefully people are beginning to understand a little more about why we didn’t want to distil something so complex down to ‘a price list’…
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Sorry, I too don’t want to sound like a broken record.
I think a standard service cost is workable and desirable. It is standard repair costs I have a problem with.
So are you agreeing that there is always a ‘discussion’ about an individual repair cost, and setting a standard repair cost is pointless?
If not, when, in general, would the standard repair cost be applied?
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For streaming products, an error code may easily indicate a particular failure and the required repair - that’s one example where the standard repair cost would kick in.
There will be many more: many repair costs are fixed in terms of the time involved; the component cost is just one (often tiny) element compared to the staff costs, logistics etc.
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Clare, thanks for being so attentive to this subject, much appreciated.
I believe there is a huge degree of in-built trust between end customers, dealers and Naim. This debate is not about unearthing ways Dealers or Naim might rip end customers off. It is about us lot getting our heads around the lifetime costs involved in keeping our beloved Naim kit up to spec and operating optimally. I think this thread has been tremendously helpful in that.
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Fully understood (especially as I am also a Naim owner, and have been long before my time working here!)
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Tremulously, well I’m shivering at the costs. 
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Fat-finger syndrome, combined with aggressive autocorrect.
I always bash out a post and then go back and correct. You were fast!
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To be fair though a ‘stuck relay’ might seem trivial - until you realise a whole PCB has to first be removed (with unsoldering / resoldering a bunch of wiring etc). Then if something like a control board dies you might well be glad of the fixed price model. Or would you rather pay per actual cost of repair and risk getting hammered if something major fails ?
Basically what I’m saying is you can’t have it both ways. With the fixed price model you at least (usually) know the upper limit but need to accept in return that more minor repairs could still cost you the same fixed amount.
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You must be new here
No, just an eternal optimist
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In my company we had a price jump from
10USD to 160USD on a single semi conductor component. Horrible. I’m surprised we don’t see more price increases than already do. Must be more coming this year.
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My understanding is that the standard repair costs are only a guide. Yes, some repairs might fall into the category of standard, but other repair costs would reflect the actual outlying costs, be they relatively low or high compared to the standard price.
As I expect not to be ripped off by an excessive repair price for a minor repair, I would expect Naim would want to recover the full cost of a major repair with a reasonable margin for the dealer.
That is why I think that publishing a standard repair cost is pointless, unless there are many common faults that fall into the standard pricing.
Not pointless in terms of communicating the maximum guideline price for a repair.
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