GH3 Abysmal Panasonic Camera Repair...

[bcarson@bitstream.net]

I'm wondering if anyone from Panasonic monitors this website? In the past I seem to recall that someone was.

Panasonic has had my GH3 since February 7th of this year, and in spite of being a happy, content, and calm 63 year old who has long known that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, Panasonic has broken me. I'm pissed. I'm a very pissed Minnesotan and yes, we in Minnesota are known to be nice. Everything I own for my profession is made by Panasonic and to discover how pathetic and virtually non-existent their customer service is, not to mention that they apparently know nothing about cameras and can only respond to questions from a script, has gone way, way past disappointing.

I'm leaving tomorrow for a working trip to New York and I have no camera, not even my broken one that was promised to be at my place today. Granted, by some miracle the delivery could still show up... but both FedEx and UPS have come and gone and no camera. Not even my broken camera returned along with my lenses.

Panasonic, if you are monitoring, please contact me at 612-270-1613 today, Wednesday, March 25, 2015. I'm asking politely, but firmly.

For anybody else reading, let me assure you that I am a very nice guy and I just don't get mad but you should hope to high heaven your Panasonic product never needs service. Google and find out for yourself....

 

[Jim Simon]

If I'm not mistaken, Panasonic repair is done through contracted third-parties, which means one's repair experience will vary with the quality of the local shop you sent it to.

You should contact them directly.

 

[bcarson@bitstream.net]

I've been dealing directly with the repair center in Texas. For almost two moths... Roger and Tiffany are the people who answer the phones, and they read replies to your questions from a script. They do not read any correspondence you include with your camera. For instance, I included a manual Canon lens and a written reason why and they said, we do not repair Canon products and are returning this lens to you.... I wish I was kidding but I'm not. I have repeatedly asked to speak to a supervisor and they give me a scripted response, the same one, every time. By the way, this camera was under warranty when I sent it to them two months ago.

Yes, I'm contacting a consumer fraud attorney here in Minnesota.

I never did get my camera back and nobody from Panasonic has called. As an aside, there already is a website called Panasonicsucks, and even the Daily Kos has complained about Panasonic.

 

[c3hammer]

Sounds weird. I had a couple screws come loose in my G6 and they took two weeks to get a new main board in and send it back to me. What was wrong with your camera that you could possibly want to send a canon manual lens with it?

 

[bcarson@bitstream.net]

As I posted quite a while ago in an effort for some troubleshooting help (and thanks to everybody that chipped in), the camera's ability to accurately judge the amount of light is WAY off. As an example, taking a picture indoors on a sunny day on the south side of the building, F2.8, shutter 125, requires an ISO of 6000 (!) or I get just a dark smudge. In order for them to understand that I was using both a manual lens and several Panny lenses, I sent the camera and the lenses, several pictures that I had taken, and a detailed letter so they could re-create the issue.

I've gotten zip in reply. No camera (even tho I was promised by Roger I would have it yesterday), no repairs... They did a factory reset. That was their troubleshooting.

I guess that makes me wish something physical had gone wrong because that doesn't require a lot of intelligence to troubleshoot...

 

[estarkey7]

As I posted quite a while ago in an effort for some troubleshooting help (and thanks to everybody that chipped in), the camera's ability to accurately judge the amount of light is WAY off. As an example, taking a picture indoors on a sunny day on the south side of the building, F2.8, shutter 125, requires an ISO of 6000 (!)...

I saw this kind of issue with my GH4 too. I couldn't figure out why in daylight, I was shooting at ISO 3200 at f/5.6! Then I turned iDynamic off. Bingo!! Auto ISO is now back down to a respectable 640. I believe the iDynamic increases ISO to get better exposure of shadow areas.