I'm still waiting for a call back on this one, so it may resolve. I'm just wondering what people think.
I got a Lenovo tablet in December last year at a good price from The Good Guys Ebay store. A few weeks ago it stopped working and I took it into my local Good Guys (O'Connor, WA). Yesterday I went to the store to pick up a replacement. I was told the the model I purchased was no longer being sold and was given what the guy said was the equivalent. I was also asked to pay $20, being the difference between what I paid and the list price of the new tablet. I was tired, I wanted to go home, and it was $20, so I paid.
Got home and did some research (which I should have done before). The replacement unit has lower screen resolution, less RAM, and a smaller battery than the original unit. There is a another current model that is close in spec to the dead unit. I called them up this morning and was told that they wouldn't offer that as a replacement because it was more expensive than the original. The difference in price is due to Lenovo jacking up their prices and a good deal on the
original purchase. Difference in functionality is negligible. They offered to give it to me if I paid the difference or they would refund me the purchase price.
Well, we had a long and polite chat about what a warranty actually means. My point was that it's not my fault if Lenovo don't keep enough stock aside to cater for warranty returns and it's TGG's responsibility to give me a replacement that's at least at the same level of specification as the one it's replacing. It seemed pretty simple to me. TGG have a suitable replacement in stock but they won't give it me because they don't want to take a loss. It seems to me that it shouldn't be that difficult to get a large company to honour a warranty.
I would say accept the refund then, since they are refusing to offer you an acceptable replacement. Making you pay for a same or worse spec replacement under warranty is BS.