Ever got a lemon/faulty watch?

[TheKing]

Have been reading through the old posts and have read through a few threads on faulty watches/lemon?

http://www.sg-roc.com/threads/66417-...-dealer-online
http://www.sg-roc.com/threads/46858-...ervice-at-LVMH
http://www.sg-roc.com/threads/27745-...ng-with-my-pam

Was just wondering how common the problem is? Care to share? Cars have many rating systems for their reliability, but is there any for watches?

This in turn will help us to decide AD vs grey dealer. Ie for very reliable brand it would be less risky to buy Grey(no warranty).

Was also wondering how different companies deal with these lemons.

Will getting a lemon put you off the brand that caused heart pain? Or just put it down to being unlucky, ie disgruntled employee that try to get back at the watch company by doing a poor job. Often you will hear the excuse that its a mechanical movement and hand assembled so mistakes are to be made, but I think it happens more for certain brands then others.

I just experienced getting a lemon. That's what started getting me thinking... But I was lucky cos my AD helped me to settle with the service centre, sent it in twice and they will be exchanging my watch. Now just waiting for it to arrive.

Sianz.....

[redneckk]

i think the only common lemon piece that i know of is the pam 312. do a search and you can easily find horror stories.

[exxondus]

My sinn 857 bought from a local AD was a lemon. after 2 times of servicing within a week of purchasing and complaining to their HQ, they gave me a 1-1 exchange.

but i went back and bought another sinn. no, having 1 lemon from a brand will not stop me from gg back to get another piece.

[triton]

i have not gotten a lemon watch watch before. i know of a forum member who got 1 once and the member's watch was in service centre more often than on the wrist.

for buyers who prefer getting a watch from a gray dealer even with warranty, buyer is on your own once transaction is over. that is the common understanding. buyer may save say 1-2k on the watch, that is the risk the buyer has to pay. if buyer go to an AD, the AD is expected to solve the problem for buyer. i have yet to see any AD rejecting any assistance.

[triton]

for sinn and other models, any price difference between the AD selling price and PI selling price of say under 5%, i would not consider.

My sinn 857 bought from a local AD was a lemon. after 2 times of servicing within a week of purchasing and complaining to their HQ, they gave me a 1-1 exchange.

but i went back and bought another sinn. no, having 1 lemon from a brand will not stop me from gg back to get another piece.

[triton]

about 4 years ago, i wanted to buy a model from brand X from a local AD. as usual, my lead time from the moment i am interested in the watch to actual purchasing the watch is usually about 60 days. the cooling off period gives me time to really think it through and find out more of the watch.

during this cooling period, i visited other branches of the AD and express interests in wanting to get the watch. during this period, i also found out that any buyer of this model has to send this watch to the service centre for the same common problem in the watch movement.

it is also during this period that i decided not to buy this watch. in between, there were also 2 forum member who bought the watch, one of them had the problem. the other member, i was not aware if buyer had any issues with the watch. however, i know that within 6 months of purchasing, it was posted on sale.

fast forward 4 years on. the issues have been fixed, but i wont be getting the watch anyway. not because of the issue with the brand and its movement. but rather i am no longer attracted to the watch already.

the price of the watch that i was offered was ~10k. for reputable brands, buyers dont expect any issues with the watch itself. they believe in their reputation. however, it is still possible that a lemon appears. however, if it is not a single piece, but an entire series and/or any series using the same movement that has issues, i would be cautious. an entire series/movement has an issues means it is more serious than just 1 piece out of the many produced. if 1 piece, it is what i say unlucky on buyer. but an entire series/movement, it is beyond unlucky for buyer. it is what i term manufacturer defect.

i would continue to buy watches from the brand, but i will exercise more caution.

[watchdogsg]

I've been collecting watches seriously for about 10 years now.

Never received a brand new lemon watch although one of my watches had paint missing from one of the dates on its date dial.

Another friend that bought the same brand had fogging issues within a few days of purchase.

Another friend had two defective brand new watches from different brands. The first would stop when the second and hour hand meet, the other had a bent second hand.

My lady friend collector had a chronograph that would stop for no reason.

All had their issues rectified under warranty claim except for my lady friend. Her chronograph was stripped and re-assembled by both the local service center and head office. Both could not rectify it and the AD gave her full credit for another purchase.

[TheKing]

Must say I was guilty of not researching on the watch or waiting for a cool down. Was kind of taken in by the 'limited edition' hype. Next time I will do my due diligence and also maintain discipline about the cooldown period.

Now retrospectively, I have went back and did the research, nothing bad about the watch can be found. So I just take it as my luck. So it seems it is inevitable that once in a while any watch company will produce the odd lemon. But due diligence can help identify series with manufacturing defects.

From the replies so far, it seems the lemons pop up frequently enough for me to stick to buying from ADs for brand new ones.

And it's comforting to know I'm not the only one and don't need to swear myself off certain brands too.