Red Dragon: 8 days after going in for repair and still waiting

[Joan Poggio]

I'm a bit dissappointed with the turn around having my Red Dragon repaired. It arrived to Irvine at 10am Tuesday January 30th. I only got a technical report back end of Monday with service quote. I gave instructions for credit card debit which happened Tuesday morning. Now, Thursday midday, I get a new email telling me that the technicians had not noticed a slight sensor scratch, and a new quote for $9,500 dollars to replace the sensor??? I really do not understand how I'm being charged $125 dollars for revision of the camera, and then 8 days later I'm told "btw, the sensor is scratched, would you want us to change it?". I have never noticed this scratch in my image, so I'll happily keep on shooting with my Dragon, and rather than spend $9,500 on a new sensor, will spend that money to buy a second camera instead. My real frustration actually comes from the fact that it has taken so long to get the repair going. I live in Africa and need my camera back sooner than later to get back to work. The camera has been at RED for 8 working days. I was told that upon arrival, it would take them 3 working days to assess the problem, and then 1 to 2 working days for repair.

 

[Phil Holland]

I'm a bit dissappointed with the turn around having my Red Dragon repaired. It arrived to Irvine at 10am Tuesday January 30th. I only got a technical report back end of Monday with service quote. I gave instructions for credit card debit which happened Tuesday morning. Now, Thursday midday, I get a new email telling me that the technicians had not noticed a slight sensor scratch, and a new quote for $9,500 dollars to replace the sensor??? I really do not understand how I'm being charged $125 dollars for revision of the camera, and then 8 days later I'm told "btw, the sensor is scratched, would you want us to change it?". I have never noticed this scratch in my image, so I'll happily keep on shooting with my Dragon, and rather than spend $9,500 on a new sensor, will spend that money to buy a second camera instead. My real frustration actually comes from the fact that it has taken so long to get the repair going. I live in Africa and need my camera back sooner than later to get back to work. The camera has been at RED for 8 working days. I was told that upon arrival, it would take them 3 working days to assess the problem, and then 1 to 2 working days for repair.

Beyond receiving the camera and QC'ing every aspect of it's hardware and image quality does take a minute. Your camera might not have been in the system until EOD Tuesday, so let's just say Wednesday on.

If sending your camera in for repair for virtually any company I would expect 10-15 business days as certain problems are harder to detect, like a scratched sensor. Most other companies take about 30 days in my experience depending on things.

That's not RED's official policy, but having that mindset can protect from things like "what if their repair department has a heavy load this week" or hardware passed QC, but we noticed something on our test images which led to us investigating the sensor itself.

 

[Joan Poggio]

Thanks Phil for your comprehensive reply, and for your incredible contributions to Red through your data sheets, notes, observations and thoughts. I've been in communication now with the technical department. Although the sensor has some slight scratch, it's not showing up on the image, and I'm not going through with that repair. I'll save my money for the next Red camera, after I finish paying my mortgage this year!
Cheers
joan