You buy an extended warranty to give you piece of mind if something goes wrong.
But a Cincinnati woman has no working refrigerator, because the warranty company told her she failed to properly maintain it.
And that can happen to anyone, if you don't read and understand the fine print in your service contract.
Assumes Warranty Will Fix it
Lashawn Huckabee of Price Hill has a problem: Her fridge no longer works.
"It's just not working. The compressor is dead. It's not cold at all," she said.
But what made it an even bigger problem is that she has a special needs daughter, who requires formula several times a day.
"She's on a special diet," Huckabee said. "And we have to keep it cold for her or else it will spoil really quickly."
So Huckabee is now using a cooler, and the neighbor's ice, as she tries to get her extended warranty to fix the fridge.
Paid Extra for Coverage
Huckabee did what a lot of hard working people do.
She bought all her appliances at the same store and made sure she bought the extended warranty for her protection.
So she called the warranty company -- supplied by hh gregg -- and says a repairman came over and explained it needed a new compressor, as the old one had failed.
But then she got some really bad news. "The warranty company said they weren't going to honor it," she said.
She says the warranty company refused to pay for a repair because she "failed to properly maintain it," by not vacuuming all the dust under the fridge. The company claimed that may have triggered the compressor failure.
"They said because it was dusty they weren't going to honor the warranty at all," she said.
We Get Involved
So we contacted the store, which promised to help. An hh gregg spokesman scheduled a repairman to come over in the next 3 days with a new compressor.
Huckabee hopes she can soon properly refrigerate her daughter's formula.
Don't Let this Happen to You
The warranty actually comes from a third party company, so we want to commend hh gregg stepping to the plate and being willing to resolve this quickly.
But the message here: Check the terms and fine print of any extended warranty. If it requires maintenance, make sure you do it.
Or if it sounds absolutely ridiculous, don't buy the warranty in the first place, so you don't waste your money.
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