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This thread just aptly demonstrates that most people just don’t understand what ‘lifetime’ means when used in relation to a warranty.
Perhaps. But.
Assuming that to be the case, is it reasonable to expect the customer to read pages of small print when buying a coat? Or rather, should the manufacturer be up front and clear about what "lifetime" means in this context if they're using it as a selling point?
If you bought a screwdriver boasting a "lifetime warranty" and it snapped in half after a year then would you be happy to discover that in the T&Cs it defined an estimated lifespan of six months, or would you expect a new screwdriver? A lifetime warranty where the lifetime is "until it breaks" is surely a self-defeating nonsense.
I looked up Snap-On's lifetime warranty (for no other reason than they were the first company I thought of who I knew offered such a thing). They're pretty clear:
"For SNAP-ON brand hand tools (other than torque wrenches) and tool storage units, the warranty is a LIFETIME warranty effective as long as you own the tool. For BLUE-POINT brand hand tools, unless otherwise specified with the tool, the warranty is also a LIFETIME warranty effective as long as you own the tool." (There's an exclusion for abnormal use)
.. the length of time the manufacturer continues to make the product.
Again,
Do you think it's reasonable to expect your average punter to know this? I'm probably above average compared to most shoppers when it comes to knowledge of consumer law and it's the first I've heard of that definition. It makes sense, absolutely, but it is disingenuous at best for them to argue that they believe that's how it'll be interpreted by most people buying their products.
... the word “lifetime” refers to the average useful life of the product itself
Average or no, the OPs jacket looks still to be within useful life to me other than a bust zip.
there is no absolute definition that specifies how long a ‘lifetime’ warranty must last.
And herein lies the problem. They can define terms how they like, but they cannot wilfully mislead customers.
Or rather, should the manufacturer be up front and clear about what “lifetime” means in this context if they’re using it as a selling point?
Well made tools have a lot longer lifespan than a lightweight technical garment. Clothes wear out, it's the nature of the fabrics etc unless you are buying plate armour and even that rusts. A zip manufactured to give a waterproof seal is going to fail eventually, a spanner unabused is likely to last several lifetimes
Your three examples are just a lot of words used to soften people up for fobbing them off. Simplify things a little. There are two things to consider, the customer, mrs @b230ftw, a vision of elegance, fragrance and radiance, no doubt, and a plastic mac. One is alive, the other is an inanimate object, so if a lifetime is mentioned, it must only pertain to that which lives.
To take a very common well understood term and use it to mean something with significantly less value, while allowing the impression of higher value to remain, is simply dishonest.
Are you new to the world of marketing?
Do you think it’s reasonable to expect your average punter to know this?
You know, I think it's reasonable for some-one who's prepared to shell out a couple of hundred quid on an item of clothing to make enquiries about something as broad as that before actually handing over the cash. For example "It says lifetime guarantee on this label, what does that mean in reality" Isn't an unreasonable question to ask. Rather than assume, and hope for the best.
Are you new to the world of marketing?
RAB market themselves as a company that 'do the right thing' - it's not like you're buying timeshare over the phone from the Philippines or something.
Your three examples are just a lot of words used to soften people up for fobbing them off.
They are not words used by the manufacturer, they are used by a lawyer to try to explain a fairly ambiguous term as it stands in law. I am not trying to defend its usage in any way, just pointing it out as for most consumers it comes under the category of 'huh, I didn't know that'...so it is a useful understanding to have, for most people the thing does not mean what they think it means.
Being offered a £30 repair for a jacket that is eight years old and has clear signs of use, judging by the de-lamination of the fabric evident in the picture (around the taped seam areas), seems more than reasonable to me. It is ultimately just a broken zip that can be repaired. Personally, I am not a fan of that style of zip as their waterproof qualities are somewhat limited after even light use. Getting a more robust traditional zip is unlikely to make a noticeable difference in performance. Several manufacturers are now stating that the likes of phones should be stored in waterproof bags if they are going to be kept in pockets due to condensation build up. If you'll pardon the pun, I wouldn't sweat it!
I would be delighted to get that long out of a waterproof jacket! If you end up with a jacket that you can get more use out of, £30 is not a lot of money.
Alternatively, if you don't want to give Rab the money, I can heartily recommend Alpkit in Keswick. It cost me only £30 to have a replacement waterproof zip put on my Revelate Tangle bag.
Reading the reply from Rab, I would struggle to find anything wrong with that. While it might not be what you want to hear, they appear to be open and honest in saying that they cannot guarantee a repair to be as good as you might hope.
Cheers
Sanny
@Sanny, most of us would agree if that had been their initial response, but their initial response was a two word phrase involving sex and travel.
And now it isn't. Maybe someone made a mistake and it's been escalated?
They are not words used by the manufacturer, they are used by a lawyer to try to explain a fairly ambiguous term as it stands in law.
So call me wild and crazy but, maybe manufacturers could use less ambiguous terms?
for most consumers it comes under the category of ‘huh, I didn’t know that’…so it is a useful understanding to have
On this we are in agreement.
Agreed. But this doesn’t make sense:
The cost for a standard repair of this type on another jacket would normally be £30.00…
I am happy to honour that price in spite of this being a significantly more time-consuming repair.How can it simultaneously be a “standard repair of this type” and “a significantly more time-consuming repair”? Is “another jacket” wholly different?
It made sense to me - the cost for replacing a zip on one of our existing / current / more common jackets is £30. This one is made differently from those so will take longer and may not be as good a repair but I'll still only bill you £30.
RAB market themselves as a company that ‘do the right thing’ – it’s not like you’re buying timeshare over the phone from the Philippines or something.
Sure, they're a fashion company making expensive coats, one of the ways they're going to get you to shell out is making claims about the function and technical stuff, another is claim about lifetime guarantee, which many do, not just RAB. Yes it's shitty, yes there should probably be a proper definition, but there isn't, and expecting a company not to use everything at their disposal in order to profit from selling clothes. and to expect that after 8 years and a worn out zip is just naïve. I thought we are all supposed to be smarter shoppers these days.
At least we've all learned something.
Hmm. I’m not sure they quite said that in their initial reply! I would have definitely noticed that. Ha! Ha!
Agreed though that it would have been better if they offered the repair in the first place and their customer service team should reflect on that.
However, the OP describes the jacket as perfect. It isn’t anywhere near perfect judging by the photo that was posted. It has clearly seen a lot of use. For me, I would not be giving it much of a second thought and just opt to get it repaired, whether by Rab or by someone else. Saves on the stress and the getting worked up bit.
Assuming that to be the case, is it reasonable to expect the customer to read pages of small print when buying a coat? Or rather, should the manufacturer be up front and clear about what “lifetime” means in this context if they’re using it as a selling point?
To be clear, I dislike the term, it's ambiguous at best, and yes - misleading in a marketing sense and in an ideal world should be clear.
At the same time, as Nickc says (among others) does anyone REALLY look at a lifetime guarantee on a lightweight coat and not think 'yeah right!' - at least to clarify it. Because if so I've got some magic beans for sale.
I suspect some have a pretty good idea what it means or are at least sceptical but ignore that because then they can get all barrackroom lawyery about how it was clear to them what it meant and that's therefore the only definition they can countenance now.
Fibbers on both sides of this situation, I think.
It made sense to me – the cost for replacing a zip on one of our existing / current / more common jackets is £30. This one is made differently from those so will take longer and may not be as good a repair but I’ll still only bill you £30.
Made sense here as well.
Has any one got the tags off a rab jacket so we know what it says?
boriselbrus
Full MemberI am pretty good repairing things but I can’t see how I would repair this fault – see picture
Measure length of zip and get a new one from ebay.
Unpick stitching and remove old zip.
Sew new zip in place.
It’s easier than building a wheel with much less chance of cock up.
Waterproof zips are a bit more involved
“ For example “It says lifetime guarantee on this label, what does that mean in reality” Isn’t an unreasonable question to ask. Rather than assume, and hope for the best.”
We read the label - I always read all labels as I know (from working in retail a long time) that companies try to squirm out of things.
Are you expecting that for everything I buy I can’t just read the label, I have to ring the company and get them to explain exactly what they mean by what they have already stated?
I know from reading info about some companies that they have quite a nice guarantee which basically says “if something goes wrong we will help you out as long as we can do, as long as you haven’t abused it or it’s completely knackered and worn out and fit for the bin - you look after our stuff and we will look after you”.
As far as I can see this jacket is completely ok all over, perfectly waterproof and everything works as it should apart from the zip. All the other zips work perfectly and show no signs of any issues. So if the argument is “the lifetime of the product” then it’s clearly within its lifetime of use, but one small part has failed long before all the other parts.
The amount of time you have owned something in that case has no relavance to the “lifetime”, they should be looking at how it is overall and making a judgement based on its overall condition.
If the jacket was otherwise pretty beaten up I would not have even tried to use the warranty as I am reasonable and know that things wear out. But it isn’t and we spent a lot of time and money cleaning and looking after the jacket to make sure it lasted a long time - which I would do with any clothing but especially so on this £300 coat which was a big purchase originally and certainly not one I can repeat nowadays.
Not that I want to again anyway as this experience clearly shows spending more money makes no real difference when it comes to longevity or support from the company you bought from.
Precisely my thoughts too.
Anyway, we can’t really afford to spend £30 on a repair which I’m not really confident will look any good or actually work at all, given the excuses of potential incompetence they have given. It’ll be the outdoor clothing equivalent of a waiter spitting on your food. 😂😂😂
I’d rather put the £30 (which we don’t have spare and I’ll bet I have to pay postage there anyway) towards a new coat and never touch the brand again.
“ Has any one got the tags off a rab jacket so we know what it says?”
I’ll have a dig to see if I’ve still got the tag from the jacket in question - we do keep them for a while but we’ve moved house recently.
Google brought up this. Of course we still don't knowc what it said on the OPs jacket
But it seems clear to me
FOUND THE TAGS!!!
https://imgur.com/gallery/RFkVdU6
See the second image - “RAB means quality and RAB means performance ensuring you will get a lifetime of enjoyment from our products”.
the cost for replacing a zip on one of our existing / current / more common jackets is £30. This one is made differently
Fair enough.
does anyone REALLY look at a lifetime guarantee on a lightweight coat and not think ‘yeah right!’ – at least to clarify it.
Or turning that around,
Does anyone REALLY look at a lifetime guarantee on a £300 coat and not expect it to mean "lifetime guarantee"?
Do we apply this logic to other transactions? Plenty of banks are offering £100+ at the moment if you switch accounts to them, would you go "well duh, I should've thought of that" if they subsequently said "well of course there isn't REALLY a free hundred quid, that'd be madness! Did you REALLY think we'd just give away money?"
Of course there are going to be exceptions to that sort of warranty and of course there's a degree of buyer beware. The onus is on a consumer to research what they're buying before parting with their cash. But I'd expect to have to consider "is this too good to be true?" when buying from a dodgy-looking Far East website rather than from a well-regarded and internationally recognised manufacturer of fairly high-end technical clothing.
If you spent £300 on a waterproof then is it not reasonable to assume that the lifetime warranty is one of the reasons why it costs so much? What's £30 to a company the size of Rab for the sake of a bit of customer goodwill? 200 posts and counting here.
So if the argument is “the lifetime of the product” then it’s clearly within its lifetime of use
But you've learned that "lifetime" has multiple definitions. If you're going to insist that only your definition of lifetime is acceptable, then you're going to have an argument with RAB aren't you?
Are you expecting that for everything I buy I can’t just read the label, I have to ring the company and get them to explain exactly what they mean by what they have already stated?
No, that's daft, but I would just ask the store assistant. "what does this mean", "how many of these do you see coming back with issues", "Would you buy this" Those sorts of questions. That's their job after all.
I have to apologise. The jacket was £220 RRP, says so on the swing tag. My bad.
Ooooh this is fun now.
FOUND THE TAGS!!!
So from that the crux is, is a bollocksed zip considered "normal wear and tear"? I can't immediately see anything else that would apply.
I can't remember now if it was this thread or another one where I've already said this but, I'd be really tempted to email their Sales department and ask "before purchasing" what they consider to be normal wear and tear for their lifetime warranty purposes.
The tag does say the “life of the product” after saying you’ll enjoy it for a lifetime (but I suppose that is stated as a plural so it’s not clear if they mean you have to buy one of their products every week for the rest of your life or one will do ok…. 😳😳😂😂).
Apparently it’s an eVent jacket. I had forgotten that.
Its lightweight Event, a material notorious for leaking like a sieve after a few seasons use... I like the wording on the swing tag - "natural breakdown of materials over time is excluded from the warranty"...hmmm, so not much is covered then. 'Usable lifetime' of the product is doing the heavy lifting here.
But you’ve learned that “lifetime” has multiple definitions.
Just eight short years after the sale. Do you not think that this should have been made clear before purchase? We have laws to protect against misleading advertising.
I would just ask the store assistant
And if the store assistant lied through their teeth in order to make the sale, you're no nearer. "Well, the guy in the shop nearly a decade ago told me that zip failure would be covered under warranty, and that I'd get a free Lamborghini if it ever broke!"
I'll be looking at Rab clothing next time I see it in a shop. It seems to fit me better than other companies offerings.
As for the warranty I hopefully won't need to use it unless something fails early on in its lifespan.
My current Rab stuff is over 5yrs old and a bit tatty in areas, but the zips are working fine
I know eVent isn’t meant to be great but this jacket is awesome for waterproofness. It’s been reproofed a few times as per their instructions and is still very waterproof and breathable. A testament to how well it’s been treated? I think so! 🤔😂
You see you should research all these things extensively before you try them on, never mind part with your money. Just googling won't do though, it has to be a Singletrack search.
https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/event-durabilitylongevity/
It seems you're lucky it's just the zip!
I tried searching Singletrack world once. Never again “shudders”.
Just eight short years after the sale
buyer beware isn't it? Like I said, ask. If the "Lifetime" label is the difference between you buying this RAB jacket and that North Face one, then shouldn't make sure you understand?
I’ll be looking at Rab clothing next time I see it in a shop. It seems to fit me better than other companies offerings.
RAB sizing seems weird to me, I'm mr average; 178cm and 75kg, their medium is often too small (especially arm length) and their large makes me look like a child wearing their Dad's jacket.
Also, Labels; I can't decide if that's some sort of triumph of filing or just a wee bit weird after 8 years 😂
The thing with Event is that the fabric construction removed the protective element of oleophobic PU coating on the inside in order to improve breathability score. At the time it was one of the most breathable waterproofs about, but suffered because normal use would mean that body oils/ sweat would degrade the membrane which would eventually fail and leak. Goretex has traditionally used additional coatings to protect the membrane which gives them a longer service life at the expense of breathability. Its only in the latest Gore Pro that they have made a fancy way to avoid using this layer, while still keeping the protection - this makes it different to classic current 'Goretex' or the old ProShell - which in my experience has meant that Gore Pro now equalls the old Event for breathability...I still have both so can compare side to side.
When Gore Pro was launched, all things considered one of the most durable waterproof membranes made by anyone - the fabric makers themselves advised garment manufacturers that the expected lifecycle, or 'lifetime' of the membrane before it starts to degrade in performance, should be about 200 days of extreme mountain use. Which compared to something like Event, is a really good 'Lifetime'.
OP, I saw this in AlpKit's Outpost today. Others might have posted it sine I was last on the thread.
https://alpkit.com/pages/repair-station
Ok so the tag says:
The products that we design and manufacturer are completely warranted to the original owner for the life of the product. If a product fails due to defects in workmanship and/or materials we will repair the goods free of charge, or replace at our discretion. This guarantee is in addition to your statutory rights. Our warranty of products does not include any damage caused by accident, improper care or negligence. Normal wear and tear or the natural breakdown of materials over time even if accelerated by environmental conditions is excluded.
I don't think anyone reading that could honestly have come away with the impression that it was guaranteed for the life of the owner. The tag was on it either in the shop before you bought it or during the cooling-off period after mail order so you can't really claim you didn't have the chance to understand what a lifetime guarantee means. Like cougar's £100 bank analogy there are always going to be T&Cs and if that's the main reason for the product choice its worth checking them (the bank likely say new customers only, require to switch your main income to them and your direct debits, may not apply if you have an account at a bank in the same group, may require you to operate the account in a particular way for a particular period etc).
So now your only question is, on the balance of probabilities, did the zip fail due to a defect in materials or workmanship or through wear and tear or the breakdown of materials over time. Their argument will be if it lasted 8 years without failing it's either a breakdown of materials or accidental/negligent use on this occasion.
"natural breakdown of the materials"
That'll easily cover a multitude of sins.
I've been out hiking the last 6 days. RAB items were the oldest kit I used. I have Boriselbrus' approach of fixing things when necessary and don't take any notice of guarantees when I buy. If/when it breaks I fix it or chuck it in the releveant recycling bin. A 32-year-old RAB sleeping bag leaves me looking like I've been tarred and feathered, I really should bin the thing but it still keeps me warm at night.
I've been unimpressed with the life of waterproof jackets with one exception, a Schöffel which is EV rather than Gortex, it's still waterproof, breathable and intact after several years of use, even on the shoulders where the rucksac straps rub. Patagonia money though, about 600e for the equivalent model today.
I’ve had a beer so maybe a tad forward, but…
A £220 jacket can be saved, albeit with a proviso on the quality of repair, for £30 after 8 years use and the OP is not happy?!?!
Ridiculous.
Send them the jacket, take the repair (at a bargain price IMO) and move on with your life.
The OP talks about saving that £30 for another jacket as he’s not flush at the moment…but a new, similar jacket will coat £300 at a guess.
Seriously, send it off, get it fixed, sorted, lovely. You’ve already spent £30 of your time arguing about what is reasonable.