The importance of warranties

I bought a camera tripod from Harvey Norman just before leaving for Taiwan. A tripod is an important accessory if you wish to take photos at night or in dark places, where the foreground is too far away to reflect sufficient light from the flash.

Usually the camera shutter speed has to be lowered so that it can capture more light and the photo will not turn out too dark. Lowering the speed however means that slight movements will result in a blur picture. And that means you can't take nice photos with your hands.

I got my Steinzeiser tripod at $28 (after discount) together with my camera. Both served me well when I became trigger happy in Taiwan, though I used my tripod only twice so far. When it's not in use, I kept the tripod in my luggage bag where it is cushioned by my clothes.

However, upon returning to Singapore, 1 of the adjustment handles came off. Not very hardy I must say.

Anyway I called Harvey Norman's hotline to find out if I could have it replaced or fixed anywhere. Their reply was that the product did not have any warranty and neither do they provide services for fixing tripods. They did suggest a solution though: buy another stand from them at $28 (usual price $48).

Buy another sub-quality stand and wait for it to spoil for no apparent reason so that I can replace it again for a discounted price (WOW!!), and wait for it to spoil for no apparent reason so that.....hey, did I just repeat myself?

That's a really good way to make money. Too bad I'm not that stupid.