Life on the West Island - Redundant

A few days ago, the mobile phone used by Life on the West Island refused to recharge, and the battery eventually ran flat, rendering the phone unusable. Naturally, we took it back to the national telco from which it was purchased and asked to buy a new battery. The pimply-faced attendant expressed amazement, because, he said “This phone must be almost three years old.” He proceeded to try to sell us a new model at a price almost high enough to cover the deposit on a home loan. Well, maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration, given the exorbitant prices of West Island houses, but there would have been very little change from $2,000. Of course, he added, “Nobody uses these redundant old phones anymore.” We responded that we did and that we expected an expensive item such as our phone to last much longer than three years. He explained that current smart phones had lots of wonderful new features, that the telco no longer sold batteries and he was not aware of anywhere else which did.

As the telco was in a large shoppingtown complex, we tried two other phone companies and two mobile phone repair booths, with similar results. But at least there were some suggestions of where batteries might be available. JB HiFi drew a blank (“Nobody buys batteries these days”), but Battery World some 15km distant did have a wide range. Unfortunately, none of them fitted our phone and the friendly retailer checked his online catalogue and said that they were no longer manufactured, although we could try online suppliers.

Back home, an online search revealed two possible sources with websites in Spanish and Italian and with delivery times of about two months. The battery would cost about $9, but shipping from some undisclosed location would be around $30. As a last resort, we tried a small back street computer repair shop near our home run by an Indian man. He made a couple of phone calls and located a supplier who could deliver the battery within a few days. We had the inconvenience of not having an operating phone for a brief period, but saved $1,900 on the transaction! Our “old” phone is now working fine.

This episode got us to thinking about the plague of “planned obsolescence” infecting our throwaway society. One good example is the printer linked to our laptop computer. We have bought about four of these in the last five years. They are small, inexpensive and quite reliable. That is, until you get the dreaded message on the screen – ink absorber is almost full. Pretty soon, the printer will simply cease to work, with an amended message saying – ink absorber full, contact manufacturer. The first time this happened, we contacted the manufacturer who advised that it would cost around $400 to fix the problem. As the purchase price of an equivalent new printer was $60, we did not pursue that option. But we did consult Dr Google online, finding numerous sites which advised how to fix a full ink absorber. There were even YouTube videos showing how to dismantle the ink absorber mechanism, remove the ink absorbing cloth, wash it, dry it in sunlight and reinsert it in the printer. Simple!

But of course, when we tried that, it was difficult to replace the absorber cloth in just the right position and to have the printer resume normal service. So we ventured off to our nearest discount store and bought a shiny new printer for $59.95. This came complete with full sized colour and black ink cartridges, selling at the same store for $78.95. In other words, our new printer cost us minus $19.00! The only problem came with disposing of the old useless printer, which had to be driven 20km to the nearest waste disposal centre, where it could be left in the electronic waste skip at no cost after providing a paid council rates notice.

What irked us was that, in a little over a year, we had created a sizeable contribution to the climate-destroying mountain of e-waste – and that this whizz bang example of modern technology had become redundant after just 14 months of use. Further, the manufacturer was making money from the expensive consumables. Naturally, the ink cartridges are different for each printer and are sold at exorbitant prices. We have found an online source which is somewhat cheaper, but over the short life of each printer, the ink costs around ten times the price of the equipment itself. And of course the used ink cartridges are pollutants which must be disposed of through special collection bins.

Then there was the case of our refrigerator/freezer. We bought a handsome state-of-the-art fridge which had a 10-year warranty on its compressor. After less than three years of use, in the middle of last summer, the fridge broke down. Our local electrician quickly diagnosed that the compressor had burnt out. We lodged a warranty claim with the manufacturer, who after a two week delay advised that they would send one of their mechanics to examine the appliance.

Time passed, and we made a number of contacts with their call centre in some foreign country. We had to send them the electrician’s written report and copies of our warranty documents. Six weeks after the breakdown, they advised that a mechanic from their capital city office (120km away) would visit us a week later with the necessary parts to repair the compressor. When he came on the appointed day (five hours late), he spent less than 10 minutes looking at the fridge, before declaring that the compressor was burnt out. He then had to send a written report to the company’s head office overseas and await their decision. Finally, 10 weeks after the breakdown, we received a voucher to obtain a new fridge from our original retailer. But they did not have any suitable fridges of that brand as ours was “redundant”. But after a haggle they supplied us with another brand – with a 10 year warranty on its compressor.

Fortunately, we got through a hot summer with the use of a borrowed camping freezer and the generosity of neighbours who allowed us to store perishables in their refrigerator.

In the space of 12 months, we have found our mobile phone, printer and fridge redundant. It seems that these miracles of modern West Island engineering have very short shelf lives!