Inspection fee refund under the Consumer Guarantees Act

[plod]

I paid the Dr he can't find what's wrong with me so am I eligible for a refund too?

Refund I'm not sure about, but going back for sane thing within a week or so I haven't had to pay again. Although from my dr charges it feels like I pay twice the first time

[pctek]

Shop "fixes" the computer, charges $160 to fix it.

Problem reoccurs a day later ... "fixes" it, by re-seating a part on the motherboard, sends it back.

Problem reoccurs a day later...Shop insists it's now a software fault, wants to wipe everything.

Shop now advises after they wipe everything and set it back up again (No additional charge) that if the issue reoccurs they will refund the amount paid, less a $50 "inspection" fee.

Seeing as the fault was never actually fixed, and the shop admit they can't fix it (IF it reoccurs), is the customer actually liable for the Inspection Fee?

I think the inspection fee is fair. The rest of the charges? No.

And I would be going elsewhere.....first it's fixed twice and now it's software? Hmmm.

I agree intermittent faults can be a PITA but really, swapping from hw to sw like that? Wild guesses IMO.


I did a job for a business customer. After he had got a crowd round to sort it. He paid them heaps, no idea what they actually did. Problem was still there, so they also wanted to wipe his PC. And charge another small fortune.

I had a look, couldn't find any issues with any of the PCs on the network and after a bit found it was the modem that had the problem.
I told him he shouldn't have paid the fix fee, callout yes, the whole charge? Hell no.

[1101]

Fair points.
What if the shop had it for 11 weeks over a 3 month period?

What if the issue was a cellphone, and not a computer?

Would that change your thoughts?

11weeks : some issues are just that intermittent.
Do you expect a tech to sit in front of the PC for 4,5,8,40 hours just typing, opening programs etc waiting for the fault & trying to reproduce the fault. :-)
If the fault is strange, and cant be easily reproduced, how can we expect the tech to know if its really fixed or just waiting to reoccur a month later
Yep , some faults re-occur 2,3 months later . How can anything that intermittent be traced

Its not the repair companies fault that the PC has an intermittent fault, its the customers issue & the tech is just trying to fix it.

Same if its a ph , or a car
My previous car, had an issue with it intermittently running on only 5 cylinders.
Each time I took it to the garage, it work work fine, on 6. Garage did the best they could, pulling out & testing coilpacks etc
Now it wasnt the garages fault MY car was so hard to repair , it wasnt the garages fault my car was not easy to work on (final bill was $500 for a $100 part)

With my car, I had 2 choices, be reasonable & keep taking it back & hope that it had the fault while in the garage, or the garage replace EVERY single part that MIGHT have been the issue
ie 6 coil packs, wiring looms, sensors, car computor : replace all that it would have been fixed 1st time. would have cost thousands

[pctek]

I dunno.

Had a guy in cause his PC would shut off randomly. Couldn't reproduce it in a few hrs at shop.
Swapped out PSU (on his insistence) with workshop one, same issue.

So I asked where did he live?

Aha....in an old villa that had recently had some electrical work done in that room.

and the one with the hijacker I mentioned before, other crowd wanted to wipe his PC, I couldn't see any issues on the PCs, so went to take a look at the modem....couldn't, factory reset it, end of issue.

Sometimes thinking helps, not just randomly doing the usual.

[kahawai chaser]

11weeks : some issues are just that intermittent.
Do you expect a tech to sit in front of the PC for 4,5,8,40 hours just typing, opening programs etc waiting for the fault & trying to reproduce the fault. :-)
If the fault is strange, and cant be easily reproduced, how can we expect the tech to know if its really fixed or just waiting to reoccur a month later
Yep , some faults re-occur 2,3 months later . How can anything that intermittent be traced

Its not the repair companies fault that the PC has an intermittent fault, its the customers issue & the tech is just trying to fix it.

Same if its a ph , or a car
My previous car, had an issue with it intermittently running on only 5 cylinders.
Each time I took it to the garage, it work work fine, on 6. Garage did the best they could, pulling out & testing coilpacks etc
Now it wasnt the garages fault MY car was so hard to repair , it wasnt the garages fault my car was not easy to work on (final bill was $500 for a $100 part)

With my car, I had 2 choices, be reasonable & keep taking it back & hope that it had the fault while in the garage, or the garage replace EVERY single part that MIGHT have been the issue
ie 6 coil packs, wiring looms, sensors, car computor : replace all that it would have been fixed 1st time. would have cost thousands

I learnt - through my own lack of action
1. To act quick if a fault occurs - particularly if you are heavily reliant on that item
2. Then soon enough other intermittent or constant faults can occur - the domino effect.
3. Sometimes one fault masks another because of similar effect/output.

Hence a pain to resolve - even after fixing one thing - but no apparent effect

My Car had 2 OR 3 intermittent faults and I reckon 2 could have been prevented if i quickly fixed the first fault. Had 2 subsequent faults: rhythmic surging at idle,and low idle (near 0) at times. The first failure was catalytic converter failure - rattling at times over about 5 weeks. I believed the disintegrated substrate- ceramic - blocked the EGR valve (jammed the internal valve open - causing internal air leak at idle - too lean - CPU had to quickly add subtract/ fuel, hence surge- add strong smell of fuel). Also I think stuffed the idle control valve (somehow caused it to not open - close smoothly). I reckon it's coil circuit was stressed through cycling too much. Though both easy to fix/replace - took equivalent of 2 weeks of research/testing. Example here of "twin" idle fault for car engine. needed two fixes.

Not sure if for PC's if one fault can cause another. Maybe software or Windows trouble shooting might need a lot of diagnostic testing, e.g. with Sysnternal Suite. I assume easier to reinstall..

[Chilling_Silence]

Some good food for thought there team, thanks
My issue was the gyroscope chip, so no tilting / orientation / compass. I could reproduce it within 72 hours of getting it back each time. Wish me luck with this one