"Motorhome" magazine article on shock absorbers - Page 2

Dave and Jaime · 04-15-2009, 07:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Waterdog4315

I veel the article was incomplete due to the qabsence of reference to
warrantiees, except for the reference to the erroneous "life time guarantee". I would like to partially fill the gap by relating my personal experience with Bilstein/Thyssen Krupp Bilstein of America.

I had a set of Bilsteins installed by CW in 200 and concluded in 2007 there was a problem with them. I decided to use CW again because of an attractive sale, in the event they were not declared defective. Both CW and I attempted to deal with Bilstein through a very tedious process as they insisted upon using only E-mail. They advised the procedure was to send them the old shocks for their evaluation and authorization of a refund if found defective. That meant I incurred the full expense of purchase, installation and tax to get the shocks off for ssubmission. It was a pleasant and unexpected surprise when Bilstein confirmed defectice shocks. Reimbursement was aaa nother matter. Bilstein considers their customer to be the retail supplier, not the retsail purchaser. They authorized only the wholesalers cost price as the sole reimbursement and paid CW an amount unknown to me. There was no reimbursement to me for the retail price, removal of the defective shocks, installation of the new shocks, tax etc. by Bilstein. However, CW stood up like the company I thought they were and they reimbursed me almost 100%

In the course of E-mails to and from Bilstein, they advised that warranties are essentially a factor of price to an OEM, warranties are almost never purchased for the benefit if the untimate consumer and are limited to the warranties provided by the OEM.

So, even if youpurchased Bilsteins in the after market exxpecting a "lifetime warranty" you are in for a big surpris!

Waterdog4315

pm me with the actual "lifetime warranty" that is included with the box of the aftermarket shocks and copies of the emails if you still have them. As a practicing attorney who litigates warranties and contracts, I am at least intellectually curious about whether the mfr claim that warranties are not for the benefit of the ultimate consumer holds up. I'll post any conclusions I draw for informational/educational purposes (not rendering legal advice to anyone, of course -- usual disclaimer when anyone is not getting paid!).