I bought a Samsung TV with a one-year guarantee. The TV is two years old and the main board has died. I have already paid $72 for them to check out the problem, they now want another $325 to repair it and any further expenses that might be incurred. I expect a new TV to last longer than two years. My weekly income on the pension is the same as the repairs so I can't afford to have it fixed. What can I do?
You are correct that a new TV should last longer than two years. You are within your rights to ask for it to be repaired under the Consumer Guarantees Act (CGA). If you have no luck, you can take the retailer to the Disputes Tribunal. Tv Circuit Board
Samsung has since contacted me and asked that you get in touch with them to resolve the issue.
READ MORE: * How to get your money back from dodgy car dealers * I'm 65 - what good is KiwiSaver and will Government pitch in? * Three reasons to give extended warranties a miss
We bought an (expensive) microwave from Briscoes a few years ago, which had a two-year warranty. After we had owned it for less than two years, the turntable stopped working. They replaced the microwave, but told us the new one would only be covered by warranty for a couple of months - two years from the date of purchase of the first microwave. Surely the brand-new second microwave should have its own two-year warranty?
The CGA will apply to the replacement, even if the manufacturer's own warranty does not.
Consumer NZ head of research Jessica Wilson says the CGA still gives you the right to take the product back if it isn't of acceptable quality.
"Consumers' rights under the CGA are additional to any protection offered by a manufacturer's warranty."
I bought my car in February, it was second-hand but only six years old. We had it inspected and even the Mazda garage had a look under the bonnet. We researched the car we wanted due to its reliability but we have had to have the sump completely changed at a cost of thousands of dollars. In the research I've done it shouldn't happen to a six-year-old car but Mazda just said they didn't know how the car was treated before me because it was secondhand and there was nothing they could do. I know the car was secondhand but it's not like the tyres needed changing or something. Do Mazda have a responsibility for major works that should not be needed yet?
I put your question to the AA.
Motoring adviser Cade Wilson said the CGA would apply if you bought the car from a dealer. They are required by law to sell you a car that is fit for purpose. Private sellers don't have that obligation.
"The general (unwritten) rule of thumb seems to be that inside a few months, any problem that arises- the dealers seem to fix with minimal hassle. Outside this period, the CGA would ask the question 'when taking into account the vehicle purchase price, age, mileage travelled, and condition, is it reasonable for this problem to occur?'
"The answer to this question for a 20-year-old car with 200,000km on the clock that was purchased for $3000, might be yes it would be accepted that the vehicle would require a certain repair within in the next 12 months. The same fault in a six-year-old vehicle, with low kilometres and in great condition, purchased for $20,000, may not be acceptable."
He said in some cases it was possible to make a claim back to the original New Zealand supplier or manufacturer of the car.
"This is a tricky process as the current vehicle owner may not be the ones who purchased the vehicle from the manufacturer and has no relationship with them in order for the dealer to look into a 'goodwill' remedy. As in, the vehicle might have two or three owners by now and the dealer may not have seen the vehicle for a long time or have a service record, and so the manufacturers head office may struggle to see why they should offer a repair.
"In a nutshell, any remedy refused under the CGA may need to be settled in the Disputes Tribunal, as they may be the only ones who can definitively say that the vehicle fault is or is not the responsibility of the vehicle manufacturer/seller."
A few weeks ago I purchased flights for a holiday to Europe through Flight Centre. I was happy with the route and airlines that were presented to us but never saw a breakdown of the component flights. I requested that but as told it cannot be provided. My agent tells me the flights (with different airlines) were purchased as a package so they can only quote the price of the combined six flights. This feels like a deliberate strategy to make it harder for anyone to check the Flight Centre claim of "lowest airfares guaranteed ".
I asked Flight Centre how this works.
A spokeswoman said, in your case, you have booked a Lufthansa through-fare from New Zealand to Europe.
Tv Led Strip Light Set "As Lufthansa do not fly their own aircraft to New Zealand they have fares which utilise alliance partners to carry passengers to ports where they operate, and they provide a huge number of stopover options for clients to choose from. In terms of pricing, as the travel expert advised we cannot break it down into single segments because that is not how it is paid, the fare is calculated as a return, so when our travel expert priced it the only breakdown they get is the fare component (for all flights) and the applicable taxes. If our customer were to search for all the segments they are travelling individually, the journey would cost significantly more than the fare they paid." She said if you could get the same itinerary cheaper elsewhere, Flight Centre would still beat the price.