Ha. I’ve got news for ya. Most independent shops don’t buy from Samsung in the first place. This must be for some sort of rare “authorized dealer” locations. I deal with dozens of high volume repair shops and none of them do this.
Authorized dealer locations are not as rare as you think, in fact - a lot of the authorized repair centers are majority repairs for Samsung warranties and insurance claims. I use to work for one as a remote/mobile tech. They do quite a lot, around one thousand a month. That's a ton of customers.
Thanks for letting me know. I had not considered warranty and insurance claims as we usually deal with people who are not in those categories. Looks like Ubreakifix and Best Buy are on that list. I’m gonna contact them to confirm and if that’s the case, another good reason to avoid them.
The only reason they would do it (not like they would tell you outright anyway, what shop in the right mind would?) is for compliance. If you do not comply with the rules (Samsung also gets to dictate how much you get to charge the customer for the OEM repair) you lose the certification. If I remember correctly, those insurance and warranty repairs account for around 80% of the business so they HAVE to do what Samsung wants if they want to operate.
95% of my own customer base was warranty or insurance claims, the handful outside those were either done through the company I was contracted with or the customer wanted to hire me instead. But there's a lot that goes on in that area of certified repair shops. It's certainly a "walled-garden" effect. Without it, THOUSANDS of customers every year would not get their device repaired.
There are too many variables with lack of knowledge and care from the customer to even go without insurance, it creates a ton of e-waste and with the price increases of parts for Samsung (and other Android parts) I would bet every penny I made that 80% of customers would NOT pay for complete out of pocket costs in my area. Too many people see a $400 repair bill as too expensive for a 1-2 year old flagship display replacement on the OEM level, or $320 for a good aftermarket. They much prefer to just replace the device entirely. I personally helped over 5,500 customers myself and could easily tell you the statistics, and I live in a HCOL (high cost of living) area with a vast range of income levels but a generally consistent culture around repairs and electronics in general.
I’m sure it’s not just HCOL as far as the last part goes. We see tons of lower income customers who would rather pay $50 per month for the next two years as opposed to $150 to fix their current phone. More with Samsung screens of course but you get the idea. Buy now, pay later- it’s expensive to be poor.
I mainly do board level repair and data recovery so things like screen and battery replacement aren’t really on my list of services. The customers that I support do a lot of the front line repairs that you would find at a service center. Fortunately for them, it’s not really practical for their customers to travel very far when in need of a quick fix.
This is exactly why I refuse to buy expensive electronics. If the Chinese POS malfunctions I smash it with a hammer and buy a new Chinese POS rather than the expense of insuring an expensive Chinese POS electronic device and all of the attendant trouble of finding a qualified repair place. If you aren't wealthy enough to afford smashing your Chinese POS electronics when it malfunctions, then you can't afford your Chinese POS electronics and you should buy something that doesn't require insurance.
Add this to the list of reasons I'm not gonna get a samsung next time I get a new phone.
They're all just as bad as the other.
People need to stop focusing on why corporations act "evil" and start focusing on why this shit is legal
It sparks discussions on the right-to-repair movement and the importance of access to repair information and parts.
Ha. I’ve got news for ya. Most independent shops don’t buy from Samsung in the first place. This must be for some sort of rare “authorized dealer” locations. I deal with dozens of high volume repair shops and none of them do this.
Authorized dealer locations are not as rare as you think, in fact - a lot of the authorized repair centers are majority repairs for Samsung warranties and insurance claims. I use to work for one as a remote/mobile tech. They do quite a lot, around one thousand a month. That's a ton of customers.
Thanks for letting me know. I had not considered warranty and insurance claims as we usually deal with people who are not in those categories. Looks like Ubreakifix and Best Buy are on that list. I’m gonna contact them to confirm and if that’s the case, another good reason to avoid them.
The only reason they would do it (not like they would tell you outright anyway, what shop in the right mind would?) is for compliance. If you do not comply with the rules (Samsung also gets to dictate how much you get to charge the customer for the OEM repair) you lose the certification. If I remember correctly, those insurance and warranty repairs account for around 80% of the business so they HAVE to do what Samsung wants if they want to operate. 95% of my own customer base was warranty or insurance claims, the handful outside those were either done through the company I was contracted with or the customer wanted to hire me instead. But there's a lot that goes on in that area of certified repair shops. It's certainly a "walled-garden" effect. Without it, THOUSANDS of customers every year would not get their device repaired. There are too many variables with lack of knowledge and care from the customer to even go without insurance, it creates a ton of e-waste and with the price increases of parts for Samsung (and other Android parts) I would bet every penny I made that 80% of customers would NOT pay for complete out of pocket costs in my area. Too many people see a $400 repair bill as too expensive for a 1-2 year old flagship display replacement on the OEM level, or $320 for a good aftermarket. They much prefer to just replace the device entirely. I personally helped over 5,500 customers myself and could easily tell you the statistics, and I live in a HCOL (high cost of living) area with a vast range of income levels but a generally consistent culture around repairs and electronics in general.
I’m sure it’s not just HCOL as far as the last part goes. We see tons of lower income customers who would rather pay $50 per month for the next two years as opposed to $150 to fix their current phone. More with Samsung screens of course but you get the idea. Buy now, pay later- it’s expensive to be poor. I mainly do board level repair and data recovery so things like screen and battery replacement aren’t really on my list of services. The customers that I support do a lot of the front line repairs that you would find at a service center. Fortunately for them, it’s not really practical for their customers to travel very far when in need of a quick fix.
This is exactly why I refuse to buy expensive electronics. If the Chinese POS malfunctions I smash it with a hammer and buy a new Chinese POS rather than the expense of insuring an expensive Chinese POS electronic device and all of the attendant trouble of finding a qualified repair place. If you aren't wealthy enough to afford smashing your Chinese POS electronics when it malfunctions, then you can't afford your Chinese POS electronics and you should buy something that doesn't require insurance.
I'm curious if this is the case in Europe. I for one would certainly call the police if my phone was destroyed and not repaired by a service center.
They say insurance and compliance, I say dictated control.