Not Happy At All

W

workaholic

Member
Well... exactly 8 days out of the box my HVX began to fail. I began to see horizontal stripes flickering on and off across the screen. They were especially noticeable in low light and they appeared on both the LCD, the viewfinder, and the recorded footage.
*see footage link below

Because Panasonic cannot meet the consumer demand, the cameras are on back order and I was told it would take another month to get a new camera. It was then that they offered to try and repair it for me.

With no options in front of me I agreed.

I was told to mail my camera to Panasonic and that they WOULD NOT pay for the shipping. I was forced to throw down $70.00 so Panasonic would repair a camera that never worked in the first place.

When it's all said and done, I will have carried an 8k balance on my credit card (HVX & 2 8GB cards) for almost two months for NO REASON, paid interest on that 8k, paid $70 in shipping, and turned down countless jobs because of this camera.

I know I just got a lemon. I know these things happen. But I'm not happy with the way Panasonic has handled my situation. I should have been offered the first dang camera off the assembly line or AT LEAST have had my shipping covered. I didn't pay $8,000 for a toy.

footage:
www.quickmechanism.com/movies/lines.mov

(during the first part of the clip the problem is hardly noticeable. the second part it is extremely noticeable).
 
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that stinks. Did you go through a reputible retailer like B&H? They'd hold themselves responsible for stuff like that.
 
I hate bad customer service from dealers and manufacturers; that really sucks. I hope you get it sorted.
 
Yes equipment failure if a major bummer, but I noticed the Jan, our Panasonic Queen and HVX Product manager, responded 10 minutes after your post. That's better than just about any phone tree help system in the world.

This is one that clearly should have gone back to the dealer. It sounds like it was defective on arrival, so they should have taken care of you. If you mail ordered than I can see how it becomes problematic.

Let us know how it turns out.

--

Rob
 
Any credit card company worth their salt would take your side in reversing the charges. In fact, Amex I believe automatically gives you a one year warranty on anything you buy.

I'd return it all and buy new elsewhere.
 
Are you sure?

Are you sure?

I watched your footage and the only place I saw it was in extremely low light as you said in your post. Are you sure it's not a low light problem in general with the hvx200? I have heard that the DVX100 does not handle low light well either.


I began to see horizontal stripes flickering on and off across the screen. They were especially noticeable in low light and they appeared on both the LCD, the viewfinder, and the recorded footage.
 
I am feeling like our original poster is either very busy, which is good, or his computer crashed as he has not contacted me or reposted here. :-(

Wanting to help,

Jan
 
dvInsight said:
Yes equipment failure if a major bummer, but I noticed the Jan, our Panasonic Queen and HVX Product manager, responded 10 minutes after your post. That's better than just about any phone tree help system in the world.
Click to expand...
Wow, Jan, that was FAST... if a Sony representative ever responded like that on DVXUser, I'd pass out in disbelief... even today, 26 years into the world wide web revolution, it amazes me there are still companies that don't put in the time to actively participate in community discussions... 10 minutes, cool.
 
Jan_Crittenden said:
I am feeling like our original poster is either very busy, which is good, or his computer crashed as he has not contacted me or reposted here. :-(

Wanting to help,

Jan
Click to expand...
And she even FOLLOWS-UP . . . how cool is that! :) There is something to be said about "brand loyalty."
 
Yeah.. its funny seeing posts like this.. and seeing how incredible Panasonic really is in terms of support. Jan kicks ass when it comes to stuff like this, and even if this dude was just some guy making a libel post cause he had a bad day, its great to see Jan rocking the support department.
 
I hate to sound like an ass but the same thing happened to me with the Panny DVX when it first came out. Camera went zonk after 3 hours of use. It was a system failure defect from the factory.

We bought the camera for a movie shoot.

We got it two weeks before shoot date to be sure we would get it in time.

We already had one DVX for about 3 months and we knew the camera well so we only did some general set ups and testing on the newbie during the two weeks.

The camera failed after about a hour on set first day of shooting.

A call to the online supplier informed us that they would not take the camera back after 10 days.

A call to Panny informed us we needed to ship it to them and they would figure out what was wrong with it and let us know if they would fix it. On our dime! Lucky we had a second cam or the shoot would have been hosed.

Repeated pleas to Panny to send us a new camera fell on deaf ears. They were sympathetic and we quick to give advice. They told us to rent a camera for the shoot. ( FYI at the time that was $250 per day @ 20 days) WTF?

A month and half later minus our shipping cost we got notice that the camera was not fixable. ( to be fair they did get our tape out and return it )

Several weeks later they shipped a new camera.

Two months after our shoot we had the camera. Nice. Indie film support WOO HOO!

Lesson- Panny is too big to help you as an individual. They build electronics and deal on a global scale. Buy locally so you can walk into the shop and demand a new camera. Check return policy.

Did it stop me from buying the HVX? Hell no. But I did buy it locally! The local shop even promised to loan me a JVC HD100 for free if the HVX didn't arrive in time for our shoot! Nice. ( HD100, I know... but hey better than nothing ) And when the HVX arrived they delivered it to my door personally.

Forget brand loyalty go for seller/dealer loyalty.
 
Yes I will say that the dealer wll need to be involved to have what is known as an initial failure because the only way we can take something back is throught the dealer, and it may seem really stupid but it is an accounting thing. There has to be a trail that shows that it came from us and it gets cradited against that invoice and a new one can be shipped. This can happen with a long distiance dealer but requires more finesse in making it happen. It is one of the reasons that I do encourage folks to work on a local level, it builds relationships that you may need one day. I mean there is a Panasonic person that works locally to help the local dealer make that exchange. The long distance dealer doesn't even have to call you back and may very well tell you to call Panasonic. My words of advise here are, and that is only in the sort of situation, rather than call the service department, ask them for the name of their Panasonic rep. Once you have their sales person on the phone, explain it to them, and it should work out that you can get an exchange under and initial failure program. The service guys are not in the business of doing this, their job is to fix it.

Hope this helps,

Jan
 
I am sorry for posting and then leaving. I had some personal business to attend to and had to leave town. I have not had access to a computer for a while.

Jan... I really appreciate your follow ups. Thank you. How should I contact you? By phone?

I have been working with my dealer who is an authorized Panasonic dealer. They did not refuse to take it back, they simply told me the cameras were on back order for another month or more. I was then given the option of trying to repair it for a quicker turn around time.

Since my post I have called the Panny service center in Los Angeles. I spoke with a service rep who told me that when it comes to repairs, they never pay for shipping. I have been making efforts lately not to explode or scream at people on the phone but it sure seems like that's the only way to get anything done these days. Why is that? Why do the nice people that comply and follow the rules get taken advantage of?

During my trip, I started thinking about the whole situation and how the shipping costs should really be taken care of by Panasonic. Afterall, they made a defective product, right? I decided, after much inner debate, to call the service center and use my angry voice. I was immediately offered an extended warranty in exchange for the shipping costs. Funny how my nice voice didn't accomplish ANYTHING.

Unfortunately, my cell phone battery died right before I was told just how much of a warranty extension I would get. It sounds like a good deal, and if it's the right amount, I'll walk away perfectly happy. If it's something shallow like an extra month (seeing as how I've already lost a month of warranty on a broken camera), I'll be very disappointed in Panasonic and my decision to give them 8 thousand dollars.

That's where I'm at right now. My brand new camera is at the repair center being examined and I was offered some sort of extended warranty for the $70 in shipping.


Boy, I hope this camera works when I get it back. I'd hate to have to wait a month for a new camera after already going through this mess.
 
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Contact me by private message. Let me know who you are, your contact information, the ticket number on your service, the name of your dealer etc.

Best,

jan
 
Workaholic- At the risk of you calling me and using your “angry voice” (I really do have sympathy for your situation), but: I received my camera with an issue. I’m not sure if it was right out of the box, or if it occurred after a few hours use . . . not being familiar with my new camera at the time played into how long it took to discover/identify the issue -- which was further exacerbated by my having to call around for a couple day before I could locate any P2’s.

Was I upset? Oh yeah, you bet I was! I was, at the time, really worried I had made the wrong decision regarding my purchase of the HVX vs. “whatever.”

Frankly it never occurred to me to contact the dealer . . . they are on the opposite coast (and I bought from them because I thought that active dealers were going to get a boat load during initial production). Anyhow, I contacted Jan, afterwhich a Panasonic Engineer called me at home that very afternoon. I made the decision to send it up to the repair center, never thinking about the cost of shipping (insured). But, then again, I can’t think of too many products I have ever owned that failed under warranty that offered free shipping. Yeah, I know, there probably are some but nothing comes to mind . . . how ‘bout it Sony, Canon, anyone? I’m with you, it smarts a bit when you have to shell out the cash to send it off to repair but, in my case, it probably would have been more expensive and taken much longer if I had sent it back to the dealer.

Bottom line is I shipped it out on a Friday. I had it back repaired, explained, and also received a number of calls from Panasonic along the way, all in less than a week . . . and I never raised my voice.

Again, sorry to hear that frustration in your “voice” but trust me, Panasonic (and the Panasonic Queen) are going to take care of your camera. I’d sure like to hear the final outcome when all the dust settles . . . good luck!

I like this camera (and DVXUSER) more and more each day.
 
I will have to look up the invoice to find out the on-line suppliers name. It was one of the popular 3. I seems most of them have this policy to avoid people buying the camera to "RENT" and return when the shoot is over. An even exchange would have been nice but would only do that if they could prove the camera was really bad and it would take Panny to do that.

Getting any product that is in short supply is always dicey. You gotta know if it goes down there are not boxes of them sitting around to refill your order. A fast track repair is the best you can hope for. If you buy locally the dealer will eat the cost of shipping.

What Jan said makes sense. They are set up to deal a certain way so working within that system is always going to be fastest.
 
dregenthal said:
Workaholic- At the risk of you calling me and using your “angry voice” (I really do have sympathy for your situation), but: I received my camera with an issue. I’m not sure if it was right out of the box, or if it occurred after a few hours use . . . not being familiar with my new camera at the time played into how long it took to discover/identify the issue -- which was further exacerbated by my having to call around for a couple day before I could locate any P2’s.

Was I upset? Oh yeah, you bet I was! I was, at the time, really worried I had made the wrong decision regarding my purchase of the HVX vs. “whatever.”

Frankly it never occurred to me to contact the dealer . . . they are on the opposite coast (and I bought from them because I thought that active dealers were going to get a boat load during initial production). Anyhow, I contacted Jan, afterwhich a Panasonic Engineer called me at home that very afternoon. I made the decision to send it up to the repair center, never thinking about the cost of shipping (insured). But, then again, I can’t think of too many products I have ever owned that failed under warranty that offered free shipping. Yeah, I know, there probably are some but nothing comes to mind . . . how ‘bout it Sony, Canon, anyone? I’m with you, it smarts a bit when you have to shell out the cash to send it off to repair but, in my case, it probably would have been more expensive and taken much longer if I had sent it back to the dealer.

Bottom line is I shipped it out on a Friday. I had it back repaired, explained, and also received a number of calls from Panasonic along the way, all in less than a week . . . and I never raised my voice.

Again, sorry to hear that frustration in your “voice” but trust me, Panasonic (and the Panasonic Queen) are going to take care of your camera. I’d sure like to hear the final outcome when all the dust settles . . . good luck!

I like this camera (and DVXUSER) more and more each day.
Click to expand...

Apple products come with free shipping when you send them in.
The ipods period is for the first 6 months. The reason they do this is because generally if a defect is going to arise it will do so in the first six months of purchase. I'm not sure exactly what the time frame is on Powermacs and Powerbooks.
 
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