Buying an AVR from the states?

[Cygnus]

Hey guys,

I am thinking of buying an AVR off of eBay, because I can get them there much cheaper than in Canada, for whatever reason.

I was talking to a guy at an audio store that I frequent, and he'd said that if I buy an AVR from the states, that I won't get the warranty included for it, so that's really my only deterrent, as of right now.

I'm looking at Denon, mostly.

Any suggestions?

 

[markw]

Did you read the Denon warranty?

If not, here's a copy of their warranty. You might want to read it with a critical eye.

Here's what I can find for the Canadian warranty.

I'm not a lawyer, nor do I play one on TV, but it seems to me that you can get a Denon warranty in Canada, but the unit must have been purchased through a Canadian dealer.

Additionally, I don't know if there are import fees (or whatever they are called) involved when bringing new merchandise into Canada from another country. You fellow Canadians might be a help there.

Of course, I could always be wrong. The best answer would come from calling and asking Denon themselves.

 

[sharkman]

I purchased an Onkyo 876 on Amazon for about half of the Cdn retail about 2 years ago. I haven't needed the warranty, but I did on an Adcom pre-amp I bought from JRworld out of NY. Since I live 10 minutes from the US border, I've had the items delivered to a US shipping store that holds your shipments for a fee. So I brought the Adcom back across the border and shipped it from there, warranty honored.

If you have the AVR shipped to a Cdn address, they may not honor the warranty, you could ask. Denon is pretty picky on authorized dealers, I doubt they'd honor the warranty for something sold on ebay anyway.

 

[Cygnus]

Denon is pretty picky on authorized dealers, I doubt they'd honor the warranty for something sold on ebay anyway.

Even if it was band new from an authorized dealer?

 

[highfigh]

It's sold in the US market and comes with support in the US. If someone buys one in Canada, it won't be covered here in the US, either. Denon authorizes certain re-sellers as e-tailers and if it's bought from someone else online, it has no warranty. It's explicitly spelled out on their website. It keeps people who get them third-hand from whoring their products and not supporting them. No manufacturer wants PO'd customers who bought equipment from someone who closes their doors and starts a new company every six months because they have a long list of PO'd customers and took deposits with no intention of delivering goods and services. It happens more than you could imagine.

I'm not posting this next comment to start a political war of words but that high price is one reason we don't want a VAT here, in the US. They already raided Social Security to the tune of $2-3Trillion and if they enact a VAT, they'll just waste more.

 

[ichigo]

Unless the ebay store itself is providing the warranty, I don't know any manufacturers (in any field) that would touch an ebay product and provide product support.

 

[3db]

Read the warranty first before you buy

 

[GO-NAD!]

It's sold in the US market and comes with support in the US. If someone buys one in Canada, it won't be covered here in the US, either. Denon authorizes certain re-sellers as e-tailers and if it's bought from someone else online, it has no warranty. It's explicitly spelled out on their website. It keeps people who get them third-hand from whoring their products and not supporting them. No manufacturer wants PO'd customers who bought equipment from someone who closes their doors and starts a new company every six months because they have a long list of PO'd customers and took deposits with no intention of delivering goods and services. It happens more than you could imagine.

I'm not posting this next comment to start a political war of words but that high price is one reason we don't want a VAT here, in the US. They already raided Social Security to the tune of $2-3Trillion and if they enact a VAT, they'll just waste more.

Actually, those high prices are before the VAT (which is called the GST here) is added. That tax just adds to the pain. It's certainly perplexing as to why there is often a vast difference in prices between the two countries. Up here, we get the old "it's a smaller market" and "higher operating costs" and blah, blah, blah...

I take it all with a grain of salt, because companies use so much smoke and mirrors to justify higher prices, I don't know what to believe. Higher taxation is just one aspect of the higher price issue. With taxes, at least you know how much it raises the price of a product or service. What we don't know are the shell games companies use to justify higher prices.

We pay the highest cell phone bills in the world. Why? No competition.

There is an oil company based up here that has gas stations in both our countries. A couple of years ago, CBC news did a comparison of gas prices charged by this company in both countries. After subtracting alltaxes from the retail prices, they found that the gas was being sold at a lower price in the US. Where were the gas stations that they compared? The American one was in Maine, the Canadian one was located right outside the gates of their oil refinery!

 

[sawzalot]

I really think you should only go with an authorized dealer as well, worst case scenario-something simple goes hayWIRE what do you do with the E-Bay seller authorized re-seller or not your going to send it back to him and he will send it to the ACME school of avr repairs, not back to Denon, if you want it to go back to Denon you need to buy from them or their dealers, be careful.