Customer Service or Lack of it. Thoughts please.

[Craw15385]

Good news! My dealer got involved and received approval from Grand Design for the replacement of the Samsung fridge.
It is on order but no delivery date yet.
I will take rig back to dealer to let them remove existing and install new. Dealer has agreed to do a 1 day turnaround on install.
I will update after install.

[Dakota]

Update: In September the dealer I bought from said to send pics and he would get the process started. I was told the first opening to get in for service was December 1st. Brought it in an they said they needed to plug in the fridge for 8 hours to confirm it’s dead. Lol. Ok. I asked if they had a new unit and they said they couldn’t order one until the 8 hour test. Said it could be April before they could get a new unit. I was surprised to hear from them yesterday. They got the néw cooling unit in and will be done in two weeks. Yay! I’m looking at snow outside and planning our first trip for April.

[titanxd]

Grand Design built it what ever parts they use is their responsibility in my opinion. This is BS that has gone on long enough. What a wonderful business marketing procedure. Raise prices and continue to force your customers to outsource their warranty work to the vendors that supply the rv manufacturer. Passing the buck.....and I think I am tiring of these price increases and particularly the increases noted at RV shows by dealers.

[chemist308]

You're under a bumper to bumper 1 year warranty. If Grand Design will not replace it, it's time to get an attorney make it a public deal for them.

[Redapple63]

Update: In September the dealer I bought from said to send pics and he would get the process started. I was told the first opening to get in for service was December 1st. Brought it in an they said they needed to plug in the fridge for 8 hours to confirm it’s dead. Lol. Ok. I asked if they had a new unit and they said they couldn’t order one until the 8 hour test. Said it could be April before they could get a new unit. I was surprised to hear from them yesterday. They got the néw cooling unit in and will be done in two weeks. Yay! I’m looking at snow outside and planning our first trip for April.

Glad you got this resolved. Happy camping, and Merry Christmas!

[John303]

I am a GD owner on my 2nd GD 5th wheel. I have close friends with 2022 Solitudes who had to fight to get even a mobile tech to help and warranty from Grand Design without their famous new saying (bring it to the dealer for help).

I think it is just a matter of time before dealers say either build a better product or revamp your warranty procedures or get off my lot I will sell something else. It also time for people to stop spending 110k on a new 5th wheel....are you kidding.......and then hassle their customers about warranty claims because you can't understand quality control.

Agree completely! We got out of RVing completely in part because of the poor quality and horrible business model. I essentially fired the entire RV industry as an entertainment and experience provider....like a boat, the best day was when I bought it, the second best day was when I sold it. Maybe if things change we might consider it again, but I do not see anything changing.

[Old dawg]

A 40 foot boat is 1 1/2 million or more.
I think they do pretty well with RVs for as inexpensive as these are. They have to roll down the road and shake. The components take a beating. Those components are not made by GD.
And these days those components are in short or delayed supply.
I guess if RV’s start selling for 10 times more you might see a little less in terms of problems. But problems and breakages will still occur


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[tfgd21bhe]

A 40 foot boat is 1 1/2 million or more.
I think they do pretty well with RVs for as inexpensive as these are. They have to roll down the road and shake. The components take a beating.
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RV's have a smooth ride compared to boats. An average day out for my boat is 3ft waves and it's seen 8 and 12 ft waves. RV's only have to deal with bumps of a few inches. That's a smooth ride compared to what my boat sees. My current boat is roughly the same length as my Imagine and cost was only about 50% more than the imagine. It wasn't perfect but build quality is orders of magnitude better and warranty service was quick and painless. RV industry is building crap and service is abominable.

[Walaby]

In the first warranty year, I think it's utter BS for GD to pass the responsibility to work with component manufacturer on to the consumer. They advertise a one year warranty, they should be the one to arrange for warranty service with the component manufacturer. They should also be the ones to install said replacement part, at no cost to the consumer.

Im glad OP is getting it resolved, but they had no right to tell him (in the beginning) to go talk to Norcold. That's crap service.

I got similar treatment, although at a far lower scale. My bedroom slide controller failed. Still in first year of ownership. GD told me to call Lippert and talk to them. Full disclosure, they did say if I didn't get assistance, to call them back. Lippert was great. After some troubleshooting to confirm for them it was the controller, I received a new controller in the mail. Had I not been mechanically inclined, and able to figure it out myself, who knows how long it would have taken, or how much run-around I woulda gotten.

Refer puking yellow stuff? Shouldn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the fridge is toast. I learned that the first week of research before purchasing my first RV.

Mike

[dryfly]

Just wondering, are there other consumer products that require the buyer to deal with component manufacturers during a specified warranty period? Off hand, only one I can think of is a new house where for instance the owner would be responsible for obtaining warranty service of appliances (for example).