Best warranty

[FLRon]

In my personal experience with Larrivee I would rate them as excellent as far as honoring their warranty. The only thing I don’t like about it is you have to ship your guitar to them just to be examined. They do not have “authorized Larrivee Repairmen”.

[rstaight]

Being in manufacturing sometimes something falls through the cracks. With all the required checks and check sheets something sneaks through. It happens.

What I look at is how long a company will stand behind there product. But I won't walk away from something because of a shorter warranty.

[jjbigfly]

The best warranty policy is the one you never need to use. I respect a manufacturer that will stand behind their products, or a retailer that will step up when needed. But not needing any service is easily the best.

[llew]

I've never let a builder's (limited) warranty stop me from purchasing used. I'm about half & half new vs used. There are a lot of fine used guitars out there. Just gotta do your homework. It's a non issue for me as I'll always look to purchase used if I can specifically find whatever I'm looking for.

[juststarted]

Rather than creating a new thread I think it is better to put it in here.

My Seagull S6 developed some "neck warping issue". I am not an expert at terminology. I was having issues in playing it and thought that a setup at a guitar shop is due after about 8 months (the guitar was bought online and I played with the setup done at the time of shipping). That is what is recommended anyways, to get the guitar setup once every year.

The gentleman broke the news that it is not worth trying to get it in a playable state as the neck warp/twist was beyond the scope of truss rod adjustment. Essentially it was better for me to buy a new one rather than pay for expensive repairs.

I still had few months of warranty left on the guitar. I got in touch with the shop I bought it from and they put me in contact with the Seagull official importers. I took the guitar to them and the kind gentleman had a thorough look at the guitar. Then said that he will send me a new Seagull S6.

So yeah, Seagull did well.

[GuitarDogs62]

I really never consider the warranty when purchasing. However the time I had an issue with a Seagull SWS guitar that had the saddle lifting, I contacted Godin via E-mail, They provided me a shipping label and all I had to do was pack the guitar and take it to UPS. I took 6 weeks for the guitar to be repaired and sent back. Godin kept me in the look during the entire process. The guitar cam back and was repaired and looked like it was ever touched. The guitar played great. I can only speak for Godin right now, but the customer service was excellent.

[jpmist]

My one experience with Larrivee was ok. I returned it due to a barely visible finish flaw on the back. Being quilted mahogany, there was a recessed area that simply hadn't been sanded so once you saw it, it was always apparent. I threw in a few other items, like a few frets that had floated up as well as to check for a bridge re-glue and they replied that a few of those weren't covered and quoted a repair fee.

One aspect of guitar factory warranties that doesn't get much mention is how long a factory repair takes. Hopefully my experience was an outlier, but it took almost a year to get my guitar back in spite of regular nagging calls and so perhaps with embarrassment, they never charged me for the other repairs.

So for me, having a "lifetime warranty" doesn't factor at all when deciding on new versus used.

[rstaight]

Since I posted in this thread about 2 years ago I have read a lot of threads regarding this topic.

One thing I have determined is I will not buy a Martin.

My Indiana Scout that was purchased in 2007 one of the things that caught my attention was a $100 (at the time) guitar with a 10 year warranty.

I still play that guitar today, as a matter of fact I was playing it last night. It has stood up well over time and would not hesitate to purchase another Scout if it fit my needs and wants at the time.

My Takamine's have been so good to me that I don't even know what the warranty is.

[sinistral]

Fwiw, I have had warranty issues with a number of companies including Martin, and Martin has been just as easy to deal with as any other company.

[Bob Womack]

Another necro thread comes back to life!

Taylor has excellent warranty service and great customer support. I've had two guitars back to them. The first was for an NT neck reset and fret work on a new guitar back in 2002. The were glad to help. The second is a twenty-two year old guitar that developed/revealed a finish issue this sumer when I had it in for a refret. It is being serviced under warranty as we speak.

I also bought a used Taylor K4 preamp that was missing some stainless steel screws. I called to ask if I could order the screws and pay for them and Taylor sent them free.

They've been great to me.

Gibson has also been good, believe it or not.

Bob

[Draft Guitar]

There are several reasons that I bought a Huss & Dalton, then bought another one:

1) They are local to me. I like to support local businesses and their employees.
2) They have a great reputation
3) They sound great
4) Excellent build quality
5) Warranty, considering that they are local to me
6) Friendly people who are players and builders

I never really expected to need to use their warranty, but I did. I had some minor ringing that developed after about 1 1/2 years. Took the guitar to the shop and Mark evaluated the guitar. It had a high fret that needed to be addressed; however, the fretboard just wasn't up to Mark's standards. They planed the fretboard and did an entire re-fret on the guitar. It now plays and sounds great (not that it didn't before the high fret issue). Great customer service, they went above and beyond what I expected.

I have no other experience with other brands' warranty work. I mostly buy previously owned guitars.

[Mbroady]

Love older tthreads when they resurface especially when it has an Old Post of mine or other folks that I've chatted with before.

In regards to the Martin warranty, my experience has always been it all depends on the approved Martin Tech that you bring it to. If they go to bát for you, sometimes presisting with multiple folllw ups, there's a better chance that the warranty work would be approved. I had one guy threaten to stop being a certified tech unless Martin approved the work. It was approved. Unfortunitly there's a lot of Martin certified shops that do not want to be bothered.

[rllink]

Originally Posted by Bob Womack

Another necro thread comes back to life

Bob

Originally Posted by Mbroady

Love older tthreads when they resurface especially when it has an Old Post of mine or other folks that I've chatted with before.
.

Well, there is a faction here at AGF who get all undone and like to call you out if you start a new thread on something already discussed, so happy days I guess.

I like a new guitar warranty. Not saying I won't buy a used one, I have, but I like having a warranty. But also having the new guitar warranty assures me that no one else has been dicking around causing undisclosed problems with it that I get to uncover later. So it is like a double warranty to me, protection against defects in materials and workmanship plus the guarantee from incompetent fiddling with it by previous owners.

As far as getting a deal on a used guitar without any protection, that isn't a consideration for me. I mean, I'll pay new price for a guitar if that is what I want. I'm not in it to save money.

[s2y]

It's tough to beat Taylor. I'd like to order a 12 string some day and it will likely be Taylor due to the various 12 string risks in the long term.

[jricc]

Originally Posted by RP

I would say that Taylor stands behind its guitars as much if not more than any other manufacturer...

Originally Posted by Bob Womack

Another necro thread comes back to life!

Taylor has excellent warranty service and great customer support. I've had two guitars back to them. The first was for an NT neck reset and fret work on a new guitar back in 2002. The were glad to help. The second is a twenty-two year old guitar that developed/revealed a finish issue this sumer when I had it in for a refret. It is being serviced under warranty as we speak.

I also bought a used Taylor K4 preamp that was missing some stainless steel screws. I called to ask if I could order the screws and pay for them and Taylor sent them free.

They've been great to me.

Gibson has also been good, believe it or not.

Bob

I agree with RP and Bob.
Taylor for their excellent warranty/customer service.