Hand Held Refurbished GPS Devices Are Cheap Alternatives To New
Posted in GPS by Jeffrey Newsom on July 9th, 2009 Have you ever noticed that there seems to be a huge abundance of refurbished GPS devices for sale, within just about any given ecommerce store that can be found by doing a google search? This shouldn’t come as a shocker to anyone, considering the popularity of the hand held refurbished devices, and especially the automotive GPS devices.
So why are there literally thousands, if not 10’s of thousands of inexpensive refurbished GPS devices on the market? There are actually a lot of different reasons why a unit is going to marked as refurbished by a manufacturer or retailer. Interestingly enough, some units are marked as refurbished even though they have never even been opened. Here is a list of some of the common reasons why electronics can get marked as “refurbished” by their manufacturer:
1. The product was a “return” by the customer that purchased it, which means that they returned the item to the store that they bought it from within 30 days of the purchase date. In some circumstances the reason behind this return has nothing to do with the functionality or quality of the product; sometimes people just don’t want the product that they bought.
2. The product sat on the store shelf too long and became “overstock”. Here a store could simply mark down the product since it was opened and put it back out for customers to purchase, or ship the GPS back to TomTom, Garmin, or Magellan; once the company that made the product get it, the company has to decide what to do with the product – sometimes they just label it as refurbished after making sure it works, and then sell the “refurbished” product to specific retailers/wholesalers for a greatly reduced price. There is a small chance that the product has not even been opened.
3. Another reason could be that the product was the one on display in the store. Devices used as display models generally get shipped back to the factory; the factory then inspects the product, makes any necessary changes, and ships it back out under the refurbished label.
4. The product was opened. If this happens and the store doesn’t want to deal with the unit themselves they send it back to the manufacturer who reseals it and labels it refurbished.
5. Shipping damage. Sometime boxes get crushed or dropped by shipping personnel, if the damage is major or minor, components or just cosmetic, the unit is shipped back and labeled refurbished.
6. And finally, a reason for a product to be labeled refurbished is that there was an actual defect in the unit. This is can be a rare scenario. When a product has a defect or cosmetic damage it is sent back to the manufacturer for repair, and if they are able to repair the item’s cosmetic or mechanical problem they do so; whn all this is over the product is going to work just like it was new, and some might argue it is now actually less likely to become defective than the non refurbished products sitting on the shelves of Staples; they argue this because refurbished devices generally undergo a battery of tests.
As you can see, the reasons for a GPS to be refurbished are varied. There may still be some bad apples in the barrell, but probably not more than if they were all “new” devices.
Tags: gps nokia, garmin 60cx gps, garmin 660 gps, golf gps, treo gps, gps for car, in car gps
