Please HELP! SONY TV Warranty refused

MattMattMattUK

ArturR2 said:

JJ_egan The claim that it’s a software issue is a made by Sony without carrying out an inspection. All the troubleshooting as far as resets have been done in accordance to their instructions. It simply feels no different to here, do this and if it doesn’t work it’s software issue without any possibility of it being a hardware fault. You can’t possibly separate the two with remote troubleshooting. 

Matt the price was £4499 if I remember correctly. Why is it likely it be a software issue ? There’s literally zero indication if it’s software or hardware. It can be either but without an engineers assessment it’s he said she said. 

Tellit01 You’re right, I think this is the only route I have left as I’m being stonewalled by Sony. 

The price somewhat gives you an idea of expected lifespan, eg. one would expect a £4,499 TV to last longer than a £499 one. As they are able to refund less usage they might for example say a cheaper TV would last five years, where as an expensive one would be expected to last seven, so that would factor in to the pro-rata refund.

It is more likely because they will have made that initial assessment based on the information you told them, the issues you have had and the troubleshooting.

Have you tried the factory reset and reinstalling the OS? I am fairly sure Sony TVs of that age and price would have been Google TV/Android TV, so you can reinstall the OS if it is, you can also access additional diagnostics.

If that fails then you can go down the engineer route, but I would first eliminate the potential software issue.

cx6

One way is to pay for the repair yourself and then claim this back from Sony via small claims court. No idea of the chance of success but if you find it isn't a software issue then you may succeed.

Also what is the make and model of the TV and are there any Sony or AV forums where you might get some friendly technical help / advice.

ArturR2

Thanks guys. I am confident that any repair resulting in it not being a software issue would ultimately result in it becoming uneconomical for the current market value of the set. Any repair required for it being a software issue would not be possible as it would fall back to software support/update/workaround by Sony directly and not a third party engineer. Considering they’re not interested in helping to resolve the issue now (claiming its software) they will be of no more help if in fact it is proven its software.

The model is Sony 75ZD9 and I have put a post up on Avforums but they’re more interested in diagnosing the fault rather than addressing the issue of Sony stonewalling me because they can. 

Matt, that’s a fair point about value. As far as further troubleshooting, there’s nothing I can do that hasn’t already been done and the issue still persists. 

Manxman_in_exile

ArturR2 said:

Okay putting the law and consumer rights aside what happens when a manufacturer claims the warranty is not applicable without any basis for it ? How do you fight for your rights under the warranty?

You can't put the law aside with either course of action!  Your statutory consumer rights are the law.  In order to fight under the warranty - if Sony refuse to accept your claim - you would have to take them to court.

You are unlikely to succeed going down either route without some kind of "expert" result as to what the nature of the fault is and what has caused it.  I'd do what @TELLIT01 suggests

TELLIT01 said:

One alternative is to take it to an independent repairer and get a report from them.  If it is firmware, they may a solution and if it isn't, you will have grounds to claim the cost of the report back from Sony.

JJ_Egan

Sony are addressing the problem under warranty and that is subject to any terms and conditions they want .Have you actually looked at the T&C .

So why wont you go down the Consumer Rights road  ( the law ) as said commission an independent report .

ArturR2

I didn’t want to commission an independent engineer who’s report would act as an expert witness because it seems almost damn near impossible to find someone like that. That aside taking someone to court is not something I take lightly and so wanted to avoid that route all together. 

I have attached T&Cs from my warranty where I cannot find a clause that refers to software issues however in my email correspondence with Sony they claim the following:

“First and foremost, we would like to apologize for any unintended inconvenience for any service that has not met your expectations to date. 
Following our conversation regarding your query, please be noted that your query is related to software issue, accordingly the issue needs time to be sorted out, as we are manufacturing the hardware parts of the TV not the software. 
Moreover, the warranty does not cover Software issues and also refer to the EULA as this is concerning a third party service for which Sony is not liable.“

On a side note, thank you all for your time and responses.

ArturR2

T&Cs warranty 

ArturR2

T&Cs warranty 

MattMattMattUK

ArturR2 said:

Matt, that’s a fair point about value. As far as further troubleshooting, there’s nothing I can do that hasn’t already been done and the issue still persists. 

Just to clarify, as you say there is nothing you can do that hasn't already been done. Have you factory reset the TV? Have you re-flashed the firmware? Have you reinstalled the OS?

visidigi

ArturR2 said:

I didn’t want to commission an independent engineer who’s report would act as an expert witness because it seems almost damn near impossible to find someone like that. That aside taking someone to court is not something I take lightly and so wanted to avoid that route all together. 

I have attached T&Cs from my warranty where I cannot find a clause that refers to software issues however in my email correspondence with Sony they claim the following:

“First and foremost, we would like to apologize for any unintended inconvenience for any service that has not met your expectations to date. 
Following our conversation regarding your query, please be noted that your query is related to software issue, accordingly the issue needs time to be sorted out, as we are manufacturing the hardware parts of the TV not the software. 
Moreover, the warranty does not cover Software issues and also refer to the EULA as this is concerning a third party service for which Sony is not liable.“

On a side note, thank you all for your time and responses.

That reads like a its a known issue with a piece of software that needs to be updated remotely to address the issue. So to clarify....

The fault is it turns off by itself in use. Is the in use behavior the same that triggers it? Does it turn itself back on when you turn it off? I guess the big this is does it turn itself off for 10 different scenarios or on or two?

That last question but one is because I recently had a Sony 4k set do this, where you would turn it off and it would turn itself back on, or would turn off in use, but turn itself back on which was an infinite loop mainboard issue.

Its not hard to find someone to do a engineers report - because you just call the company that the warranty work is outsourced to - the difference is you have to pay for it.