Richard "Willy think of it like this, you go to Sears and buy an item. It's damaged or doesn't work the way you thought it should. Who do you complain to, the store or the manufacturer? The store of course. They are your connection, the retailer is responsible for customer service."
But what if the local Sears didn't want to take care of the problem because you bought it from a Sears 2000 mile away?
That is a problem that shouldn't happen but yes I can see where it could.
Many moons ago we sold truck mounts, a cleaner would price us then buy from someone in Missouri or Texas. Mostly because the could avoid sales tax here in Kansas, unethical but we lost many a sale back in those days.
Now when that cleaner had a problem and he was just minutes or an hour or two away from us he would expect us to warranty it for him.
Hey, made zero off the guy, he used us for a price and made a business decision to go out of state for the purchase. We were strong arm forced by the manufacturer to diagnose and repair these units. We were not happy to do it but were forced to do so. In later years they did all they could to make the situation better by giving you $300.00 when a unit was sold in your territory. Nice when you never saw the unit, a bitch when it came back repeatedly due to operators with no understanding of how a TM works.
We hated warranty work on units we didn't sell, we heard their complaints, fixed their issues and bit a hole in our tongue's and sent them on there way.
We were compensated for the mechanics time but at a rate set by the manufacturer.
These were no profit jobs, for cleaners that were not our customers. They didn't support our distributorship yet were were required to help them in there time of need. They added nothing to our bottom line, just took up time from the mechanic and for us to open up after hours or on weekends what ever the customer wanted.
You got a raw deal but
Sapphire made it right for you, when it really should have been the distributor's responsibility. Not that I would expect John to send someone that far either.
I know its a tough lesson to learn and I don't blame you for making the deal, especially if you've never had to live though that kind of experience before.
Hopefully you can put this all behind you and chalk it up to experience. Good luck with the truck, it really look like a nice one.
I did see a photo of an old 1200 and it had (2)-2.5 containers that sat in the door opening. You could probably buy the holders and some one fabricate a couple of legs beneath for support. It would put the jugs at easy reach and that space isn't used anyway.
Thank gawd we got out of that business. You think being a cleaner is tough, a distributor has it far tougher and I feel for all of them. We should be thankful there are people out there willing to go though so much for us. Thank god for distributors!
