The whole story
We weren't happy that this told the whole story so we spoke to Seagate's EMEA corporate communications director, Ian O'Leary, to find out the reason for the move and what it means for the channel.
"Number one we need to save some money," conceded O'Leary. "But secondly we also need to make our warranty more attractive to our customers."
We commented that this seems a funny way of improving things for Seagate's customers and asked O'Leary to elaborate. "Our warranties have a sliding scale of reimbursement and, as 95 percent of returns take place in the first three years we thought it better to improve the reimbursements for that period. So, for example, we've increased the year two reimbursement from 75 percent to 100 percent."
A full breakdown of the warranty periods on all Seagate drives and an FAQ on this change can be accessed here. Our understanding is that the only changes concern the desktop and mobile bare drives and that any other warranties of less than five years were already in place before this change.
