Update on the Canon USA vs Grey Market Retailers Legal Action

[Valvebounce]

Hi Folks.
Just in case some here thought I was defending Canon or feeling sorry for them etc my 7DII is on its way, it was £800 (I think or there abouts) on Black Friday weekend so it may be a grey import but I don't give a fig as it comes with a 3 yr warranty from the seller yes it is worth the paper it is written on, I used it on a 40D with busted shutter box.
I'm with tr573 on this one, I'm in business for me.com and I'm getting the most for my money that I can.

Cheers, Graham.

If Canon don't like the "Grey Market" then why did they create it? Their (Canon's) differential pricing is the cause of it all.
I am expecting my Grey 7D2 to arrive tomorrow, UK retailer, UK taxes paid and £400 cheaper than the high street. The ONLY significant variable in the chain is Canon, perhaps they should look closer to home and give our high street retailers a chance with a single unit price wherever it is sent to.

 

[Bennymiata]

In Australia, you can grey import genuine articles and because of our laws, there is nothing the genuine importer (Canon Aus for example) can do about it, except to refuse warranty service on grey imports.
However, if you import a copy of a brand name article, that has a genuine brand name on it, then you are in deep do do.

This has kept our retail prices competitve with grey imports, indeed, I can often buy cameras cheaper here in Oz than I can get them from Hong Kong, especially when you take freight and insurance into the equation.

Our consumer laws keep the importers honest. If the importers were as protected as they are in the US, we'd be paying lots more in Oz than we do now.
As far as our lawmakers are concerned, anyone can bring in any genuine articles from anywhere in the world with no repercussions either for the individual or a company importing them.
That's the only way to keep the factory importers honest.

 

[sanj]

I saw the video. I see a hard working, organised businessman. I wish him all the success.

What exactly is he doing unlawful?

 

[unfocused]

I saw the video. I see a hard working, organised businessman. I wish him all the success.

What exactly is he doing unlawful?

Fabricating phony serial numbers would be unlawful.

 

[Mac Duderson]

Here is a crazy thought. ???
Maybe Canon created this pricing style to get out of their warranties and make more money.
Either way they sell the cameras to distributors for the profit they want but then if something breaks they don't have to fix it for free anymore (warranty). Not only that but when you send in your gray market camera they get to fix it for top repair $cost$. WIN! ;D
They double end it and pretend their mad at these gray market companies when in fact they are helping them to increase profits.
In the end we only win if I gray camera holds up longer then the warranty time would have. Everyday products are made cheaper and cheaper. My 50mm 1.2 AF ribbon just packed it in during a wedding amazingly after the warranty was up and the cost to repair it was way beyond what I think it was worth. :'(
My trusty solder gun saved me a few hundred bucks. ;D

 

[unfocused]

Be careful what you wish for.

If Canon loses the law suit they have a perfectly legal remedy they can take -- refuse to accept for repair any product not imported through Canon USA.

I think some on this forum have indicated that other manufacturers have done that.

Personally, I'm hoping they reach an out of court settlement, which would likely make grey market a little less attractive but not shut it down completely.

 

[sanj]

I saw the video. I see a hard working, organised businessman. I wish him all the success.

What exactly is he doing unlawful?

Fabricating phony serial numbers would be unlawful.

Yes indeed that would be wrong. How do we know he is doing that?

 

[unfocused]

I saw the video. I see a hard working, organised businessman. I wish him all the success.

What exactly is he doing unlawful?

Fabricating phony serial numbers would be unlawful.

Yes indeed that would be wrong. How do we know he is doing that?

Canon USA alleges that and provides examples of bodies that have been tampered with. We won't know anything until the case goes to trial ( if it ever gets to trial)

 

[AvTvM]

Be careful what you wish for.

If Canon loses the law suit they have a perfectly legal remedy they can take -- refuse to accept for repair any product not imported through Canon USA.
I think some on this forum have indicated that other manufacturers have done that.
Personally, I'm hoping they reach an out of court settlement, which would likely make grey market a little less attractive but not shut it down completely.

CDL / Canon Defense League.

Should Canon decide to go the Nikon route - refusing to honor warranty on their own products they themselves sold to somebody and made their profit on ... just because customers did not buy it from whom they thought they should buy it from ... then that is just one more reason not to buy Canon stuff any longer. As simple as that.

 

[scrup]

The lawsuit does not change grey imports in the long run, its like torrent piracy, many other options will appear. There are many other grey importers on ebay ready to take the position of f&e trading. It also doesn't stop customers going to ebay hong kong or other asian sites to buy goods to import.

Canon USA may win the battle, but not the war on grey importers. They really need to change the model to make it less desireable for consumers to import.

On the fake serials and fake accessories thats a big f*** up, not sure why you would knowingly do that.

 

[grainier]

Some would say you can help your state (MA I assume) by voting for politicians not quite so eager to tax and spend.

well true but on the outer hand I love small shops and if I buy gray market items those tend to close. superstores and online sales are one thing but try and get customer service I love human voices not robocalls or long lines at customer service and treated like how dare you have a issue.

You know, our local legislators raised the sales tax through the roof, pounded on Amazon until it has started collecting taxes, but I don't see any local businesses flourishing because of that - things you could only get online you still only can get online, and they are still cheaper by a similar margin. I mean if e.g. I wanted to buy the 100-400 (I am trying to convince myself that I do), there would not be a place to go get it.

 

[RustyTheGeek]

I saw the video. I see a hard working, organised businessman. I wish him all the success.

What exactly is he doing unlawful?

Fabricating phony serial numbers would be unlawful.

I wondered the same thing. What was inherently wrong with this video? What, the CEO is being held liable for... being the CEO? I guess I missed the part in the video where they were all hunkered down around a work table changing serial numbers. (I DON'T support that practice btw.) I'm just saying that I don't quite understand how this video in any way supports Canon's lawsuit. If anything, it makes me want to buy a grey market camera right away.

 

[tr573]

On the fake serials and fake accessories thats a big f*** up, not sure why you would knowingly do that.

I think the fake labels probably have to do with the source of the cameras. But I don't really have the ability to find say, a japanese camera to compare what the label looks like on those. My wife has an SL1 which came from Canon Aus, and that one has it's original label on it. But that label is in english - I just got a 7D2 which has one of the fake ones (which IMO, whatever why should I care? It's no less or more gray market because of that. ), and I am wondering if it's because the original label was all printed in Japanese or something like that.

If they are doing it for a reason like that, likely they don't feel like putting in the effort to print out real matching serial # labels as it would be too expensive and time consuming, so they just print a bunch of random ones (or all the same one) and stick them on.

 

[AvTvM]

to me the only reason why they would put fake serial numbers on genuine Canon products is to make it harder for Canon to track down and close down their supply chain. i.e. which Canon subsidiary has sold the cameras/lenses to which distributor where & when.

Replacing real with fake serial numbers on products does go to far as far as I am concerned, even though it may not be strictly illegal (everywhere), since it has a high likelihood to create problems for (unwary, not well-informed) customers in the future. (Not even I) would blame a company to refuse warranty repairs on products with fake serial number, since it is unclear what other "modifications" may have been performed on them (e.g. swapped out batteries etc.).

 

[tr573]

to me the only reason why they would put fake serial numbers on genuine Canon products is to make it harder for Canon to track down and close down their supply chain. i.e. which Canon subsidiary has sold the cameras/lenses to which distributor where & when.

Replacing real with fake serial numbers on products does go to far as far as I am concerned, even though it may not be strictly illegal (everywhere), since it has a high likelihood to create problems for (unwary, not well-informed) customers in the future. (Not even I) would blame a company to refuse warranty repairs on products with fake serial number, since it is unclear what other "modifications" may have been performed on them (e.g. swapped out batteries etc.).

I thought about that reason at first (the making it harder to track down) but considering that I can check the real serial from an exif, Canon can obviously do the same, so what would be the point? I was thinking more along illegible stickers or stickers that don't display an FCC approval seal or something like that.

For the unwary, I can see where it would cause a possible issue in the future. For me, I just peeled the sticker off. Now the body has only one "real" serial stored inside it, that any tech can access.

 

[tron]

hello, some clarifications please:

Do they put a sticker with false serial number over the real one on the camera body itself or just on the camera box?

I understand that some remove the hard copy instruction booklets and/or the real batteries. I remember seeing someone
in ebay advertising authentic Canon batteries taken from kits....

 

[tr573]

hello, some clarifications please:

Do they put a sticker with false serial number over the real one on the camera body itself or just on the camera box?

I understand that some remove the hard copy instruction booklets and/or the real batteries. I remember seeing someone
in ebay advertising authentic Canon batteries taken from kits....

The real serial sticker was removed from the body and replaced with a phony one

 

[tron]

hello, some clarifications please:

Do they put a sticker with false serial number over the real one on the camera body itself or just on the camera box?

I understand that some remove the hard copy instruction booklets and/or the real batteries. I remember seeing someone
in ebay advertising authentic Canon batteries taken from kits....

The real serial sticker was removed from the body and replaced with a phony one

This is both fraud and stupid of the seller.

 

[martti]

The grey market products are made by Canon and initially sold by Canon or a certified Canon dealer to somebody who sells them across the official trade border lines. If Canon wanted to stop this kind of trade it could do so whenever it wanted. Of course they want to sell their products. Somebody buying an EOS body will eventually buy an EF lens. There are a lot of them in the warehouses all over in Japan. Money, GOOD!

One thing that has changed is that some years ago the high-end lenses were sold to publishing houses and professionals who could deduct them in their taxes. Now even hobbyists pay thousands of dollars for lenses and bodies and whatever even though they make their money with something else. For them it makes a real difference if a lens costs 900 or 1400 clams or whatever monetary units used in their transactions.

You can easily make 300 dollars on the price of a high-end lens if you bother to click some links on eBay.
Are you doing harm to yourself buying at a lower price? Will the sky be falling or will there be some fiscal consequences to your transaction?
Negative, nil, nada.

But there will be a choir of jealous people howling because you managed to get something for a better price than they did. And they will be making up stories about how the grey import products will cause food allergy and erosion and salinification of ground water and...unless you stop exhaling, climate change of which YOU will be responsible. You did not pay the right price, the polar bears will suffer!

Unbelievable what kinds of things jealousy and envy makes people say and do.


Should I pay 1200 dollars for a Tamron 150-600mm zoom to get to heaven and if I can find the same lens at 850 dollars, will I end up in hell?

Frankly, I'll just look at the seller's history and if it is OK, I click 'buy'.
If I end up in hell...at least I'll meet people I used to know which would not be the case in Heaven...

 

[Khufu]

Nicely put, Martti!

Here's some more considerations to add to the mix which I think have simply failed to occur to people:

People on commission are at war with one another. They wish to increase their own sales and not support competitors in winning more sales and diminishing their own success. Sometimes these people are more like massive, multi-national corporations which in turn shift the products of their international parent-companies. I'm not certain of the particular titles of the territory-based company divisions but say, for example, they were to go by 'Conan ASIA', 'Conan USA', 'Conan UK', 'Conan AUS' etc. One has to wonder:

If all divisions have the same shiny bricks to sell yet 'Conan ASIA' are working with a territory where they are expected to sell for less than the other territories' divisions are authorised to sell them for, and one day they get a call from 'Conan USA' saying "we've found bajillions of your bricks selling in our town! Put loads of work and money into making this not happen so that you lose bajillions more future sales!"

Q) What is the liklihood that 'Conan ASIA' are going to be super-motivated to play along?

'Conan AUS' also get upset that even the high-street stores start buying in imports from 'Conan ASIA' territory, due to the frankly financially vile, abusive nature of the rules which 'Conan AUS' are at liberty to follow. 'Conan AUS' threaten Mr Jaybilly High-Five with threats to no longer supply them with officially licenced Shiny Bricks, but Mr High-Five is all like "No worries, bro, my Asian brothers are hooking me up and we're getting way more sales at much fairer prices for all involved... Bluff away, as scary as you are, business is pretty sweet right now!"
No doubt 'Conan AUS' get on the phone to 'Conan ASIA' but they're all like "LOL yeah, sorry, gotta' get to the bank! Put it in an email and Steve will get back to you super-soon!"