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Leica Service (1 Viewer)

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Robinl

Member
Hi everybody. This is my first post and really a tale of woe - if only I read some of the threads on this forum. About 2 weeks ago I contacted Leica UK about a problem with my Televid 77 APO (it made a clacking sound when focused) and using the Serial Number we identified the Scope was registered in 2002. The lady at Leica UK advised me that it had a 10 year Warranty and should be sent back to Germany for repair and service. There is a procedure for doing the instrument return and this was done without any problems.

I then received a quote from Germany which stated the Scope was sold with a 5 year Warranty and would cost over 500 Euro for repair and if I wanted an express repair it would cost a further 200 Euro. Frankly (and perhaps naively) I was staggered at the massive cost for repair - don't get me wrong it is a brilliant scope and I have not suffered the coating problems experienced by others. Nonetheless it is a significant amount of money for a nine year old scope. If I had known the Scope was not covered by Leica warranty I would not have returned the scope to Germany in the first place and sought a UK repair option instead. Anyway, feeling quite low about the whole business I rang Kay Optical. They are now able to repair and re-gas Leica scopes for about £200 and seemed very knowledgeable about the scope and the problem I had encountered. I intend to use this service when my scope is returned Leica Germany.

Last Thursday I sent an email to Leica refusing to pay 40 Euro + 19% tax return postage but more than happy to make a contribution - so far no response.

I think the lesson from my experience is if you have problems with a Leica scope out of warranty it will likely cost a fair bit to service/repair - and I hate to say this but Chinese APO scopes can probably provide 95% of the performance for about the same cost.

I hope my experience will be helpful to others using this forum.
 
Robinl said:
Hi everybody. I then received a quote from Germany which stated the Scope was sold with a 5 year Warranty and would cost over 500 Euro for repair and if I wanted an express repair it would cost a further 200 Euro. .
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i can not believe that the warranty was only 5 years, there has to be something wrong;
- like the scope is older than 2002 perhaps ??
 
Pimpelmees - The date of registration was provided by Leica UK using the serial no. from scope ...... therefore I assume it is correct.
 
Robinl said:
Pimpelmees - The date of registration was provided by Leica UK using the serial no. from scope ...... therefore I assume it is correct.
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ok, even then 5 years is not correct , and i even think that in 2002 the warranty period was still 30 years, in recent years they have changed it to 10 years .
 
Hi Pimpelmees - not sure why you are challenging my post wrt dates. The quote for work on my Televid from Leica Germany stated the warranty was for 5 years. I have nothing to gain by giving out incorrect information. The main reason for starting this thread was to point out the likely costs of sending a Televid to Germany (and the ridiculous charge for an "express" service).
 
Robinl said:
Hi Pimpelmees - not sure why you are challenging my post wrt dates. The quote for work on my Televid from Leica Germany stated the warranty was for 5 years. I have nothing to gain by giving out incorrect information. The main reason for starting this thread was to point out the likely costs of sending a Televid to Germany (and the ridiculous charge for an "express" service).
Click to expand...

what is on the warranty card of your scope , how many warranty or don't you have the papers anymore ?
 
The Televid 77 and afterwards the 62 (I don't know about the newer models) always came with a 5 year warranty not the 30 year one that th the bins have.
 
Thats astonishing, for such a high end scope to recieve such terrible service. In Canada our Leica rep tells us that they will fix anything that goes wrong. Maybe the Canadian dealers just eat the price on that. But we sell lots out the door with a "don't worry, if anything goes wrong they'll fix it."
 
I do not know if that's astonishing or what warranty comes with instruments sold now or recently from Leica. What I do know is that "The Televid 77 and afterwards the 62 (I don't know about the newer models) ALWAYS came with a 5 year warranty" is NOT true at least in the case of instruments sold in the US when I purchased mine. My Televid 62 spotting scope, its eyepiece and my Ultravid binocular all came with the Leica Lifetime Sport Optics Passport Protection Plan which covered all Ultravid, Trinovid Compact, and BN binoculars, all Televid spotting scopes and oculars, and Duovid binoculars. This may not be true for instruments sold elsewhere or on later models.
 
peterginsburg said:
I do not know if that's astonishing or what warranty comes with instruments sold now or recently from Leica. What I do know is that "The Televid 77 and afterwards the 62 (I don't know about the newer models) ALWAYS came with a 5 year warranty" is NOT true at least in the case of instruments sold in the US when I purchased mine. My Televid 62 spotting scope, its eyepiece and my Ultravid binocular all came with the Leica Lifetime Sport Optics Passport Protection Plan which covered all Ultravid, Trinovid Compact, and BN binoculars, all Televid spotting scopes and oculars, and Duovid binoculars. This may not be true for instruments sold elsewhere or on later models.
Click to expand...

in the UK the Televid scopes came with a 5 year warranty - the Trinovid and original Ultravids came with a 30 year warranty, the Uktravid HDs came with just a 10 year warranty.
 
postcardcv said:
in the UK the Televid scopes came with a 5 year warranty - the Trinovid and original Ultravids came with a 30 year warranty, the Uktravid HDs came with just a 10 year warranty.
Click to expand...

the new televid's 65 and 82 come with a 10 year warranty in europe, but the 10 year is only because europe has forbidden warrantys longer that this , also swarovski has a 10 year warranty. But when i contacted swarovski and leica they say "between the lines" they will repair after the 10 years also in warranty
 
How long does it take Leica to repair a 'scope?

I wish I had read earlier postings on Birdforum before I commenced my saga in getting my APO62 'scope's focussing problem repaired

In early January, I dropped my 'scope at the end of a visit to Potteric Carr only to discover a fortnight later that I could not focus on a Great Northern Diver at Pugney's. I took the 'scope to the local Leica dealers who arranged for it to be collected by Leica with a view to obtaining a quote for repairing it; £575!

Fortunately, my insurance company agreed to cover the cost - less the £50 excess - under my Household Contents policy. Accordingly, Leica were given the go-ahead to effect the repairs on 16th February 2012

For three months, I have heard nothing except that Leica are awaiting the SUPPLY OF SPARE PARTS TO CURE THE FOCUSSING PROBLEM (a similar excuse was offered by Leica to another Birdforum poster, thirteen months ago!) after the dealers had telephoned Leica enquiring about progress

I was offered the same excuse when I e-mailed Leica myself on 11th May. But things have moved on! Using the dealers as intermediary, I have been offered a reconditioned APO62 ("It's in better condition than your's" says Leica) in replacement for mine

After due deliberation, I have accepted the offer and am looking forward to taking delivery later this week; shoud I be holding my breath?
 
something is badly wrong with Leica's customer service. So many different stories of varying levels of satisfacion.
 
Sadly, it appears that it depends on the service facility. My experience in the U.S. was stellar.
I posted my results with Leica in another thread here...
 
twentywell said:
I wish I had read earlier postings on Birdforum before I commenced my saga in getting my APO62 'scope's focussing problem repaired

In early January, I dropped my 'scope at the end of a visit to Potteric Carr only to discover a fortnight later that I could not focus on a Great Northern Diver at Pugney's. I took the 'scope to the local Leica dealers who arranged for it to be collected by Leica with a view to obtaining a quote for repairing it; £575!

Fortunately, my insurance company agreed to cover the cost - less the £50 excess - under my Household Contents policy. Accordingly, Leica were given the go-ahead to effect the repairs on 16th February 2012

For three months, I have heard nothing except that Leica are awaiting the SUPPLY OF SPARE PARTS TO CURE THE FOCUSSING PROBLEM (a similar excuse was offered by Leica to another Birdforum poster, thirteen months ago!) after the dealers had telephoned Leica enquiring about progress

I was offered the same excuse when I e-mailed Leica myself on 11th May. But things have moved on! Using the dealers as intermediary, I have been offered a reconditioned APO62 ("It's in better condition than your's" says Leica) in replacement for mine

After due deliberation, I have accepted the offer and am looking forward to taking delivery later this week; shoud I be holding my breath?
Click to expand...

I am delighted to say that, today the Seventh of June, I have received the reconditioned body and repaired eyepiece from Leica through the good offices of my local dealer....................... One slight problem - the lens cap from the business end of the scope has not been returned; perhaps, if I speak nicely to Leica, they will rectify the omission!
 
Quite a lot of negative experiences from Leica on this thread but I thought I'd stick up for Leica service from my own experience. My Apo62 is 8 years into its 10 year guarantee. The focus wheels were always a little tight, even from new, but I thought this would ease up with use. It never did. In fact it got worse so I contacted Leica UK for advice.

They were brilliant and arranged for my scope to be collected and sent to Germany for repair. I received an email from Leica Germany within days acknowledging receipt and informing me the repair would be done under warranty without charge.

I was given a 10 week turnaround time due to spare parts shortages. Their on-line tracking system showed progress and today (10 weeks almost to the day) the repaired scope arrived back - focus wheels smooth as silk and cleaned and serviced.

I'm pretty chuffed with that.

Peter B.
 
Well I think Leica are shite. My Televid 77 is now approaching 12yrs old and for the last few years the coating has peeled off the eyepiece....and the objective lens. Leica even have said that this was a common problem with the older Televids (bought mine in 1998). So, they admitted that the problem is down to them but will not fix it as the warranty issue comes into play again. I'm sorry, but warranties aren't generally worth the paper they're printed on and for a company like Leica to welch on a problem that is their own fault is beyond me.
As soon as I can afford to upgrade, it'll be Swarovski for me....just like at least 8 of my birding mates who ran into similar problems with Leica. Biggest prob for us in the UK is that we no longer have any service over here, they've all gone back to Germany.
So, anyone from Leica reading this...keep going the way you are with your UK customers and you won't have any left in a few years.....
 
Is Leica working on getting a lousy reputation?

birdboybowley said:
Well I think Leica are shite. My Televid 77 is now approaching 12yrs old and for the last few years the coating has peeled off the eyepiece....and the objective lens.............
Click to expand...

This is so appalling!

I'm apparently on the lucky side this time. My APO Televid77 dates from November 1995. And so far, it still has perfect coating. I have long had the impression that the first scopes got a good coating, and that the problems started some time later.

But it completely eludes me how a (formerly) reputable company can treat their customers the way they do regarding this coating problem. I have yet to be informed of ANY optics company that has had such a lousy coating. And to not even remedy the situation for their customers, makes it so much worse.

Thanks for letting us know Adam, though it may not really help you much.
 
To all.

To clear the circumstances why Leica has problems with the availability of spare parts of the "old" 62 and 77 serie:
Leica never built this model but outsourced it to Meopta, like Zeiss also did with their former scope models. Leica and Meopta didn't split up like "friends" when Leica decided to manufacture the new 65 and 82 APO model in their own house.

IMHO you will not find the similar problems with the new model because Leica's current quality control prevents this from happening.

Another thing that will decrease the repaircosts is that more and more Leica let their customer repair service be a part of the designing team. In other words: in the past Leica designed outstanding optics but they were a pain in the ass to repair because of the fact that the repair service had to remove several parts to get to the broken part.
Constructing/designing is one thing, repairing is a totaly different ball game. Put those two together as a team and you have a winning product.

Jan
 
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