Omega service advice

Hi all,

We recently gave an Omega Seamaster women's quartz which had stopped working(we thought it was the battery) to the Omega company store in Stratford for battery replacement. The watch is 3 years old and hence out of warranty and has been used daily but is in great condition and has never been abused.

Today I received a call from the store that a full £320 service is required as its not a battery issue(was quoted £80). Now I am not as knowledgeable as lot of people on this forum but to me it seems a bit ridiculous that a £1500 watch with a quartz moment needs such kind of service?

https://i.imgur.com/qRSuNZp.jpg

Given the cost of service is almost 25% the price of the watch, do you think it makes sense to get it repaired officially or just better off using a 3rd party and if so any recommendations?

I have had my PO serviced at the store before and the service was quite good.

Thanks

I will be happy to change the battery for you and reseal.

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Contact omega direct and complain. You may end up that they do it complementary.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Webwatchmaker

I will be happy to change the battery for you and reseal.

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That's very kind but I am not sure if its just the battery anymore or if it genuinely needs all the above listed parts replaced.

Thanks

Well there are two ways to find out !

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Get the watch back and send it to Brendan as offered above. He will no doubt tell you if there is anything more untoward. It is highly unlikely that too much has gone wrong in a 3 year old quartz, and most things can be sorted out cheaply enough.

Unless you feel it needs a full Omega refurb, and you want the official Omega warranty card at the same time, that's exactly what I would be doing.

Thanks, I will ask them to return it back to me.

Seems crazy that a 3 yr old watch needs all these bits replacing. In truth, it doesn't but for some reason there' s a policy of replacing everything whether it's necessary or not.

I would be asking why the watch needs servicing. Is it because it won't run, or is it because the movement's drawing too much current? If it's the former it's due to a circuit fault or possibly dirt in the trainwheels, if it's the latter that's usually associated with the lubrication drying up or getting sticky. Or has it got some other problem (handsetting mechanism) that the OP's not mentioned?

Apart from an obvious hand-setting issue I find it hard to believe the movement is faulty and I would seek clarification as to exactly what is wrong with it. However, there must be some justification for saying it needs service, they wouldn't make this up, but it makes sense to get a straight answer.

Clearly, the 'service' will include full refinishing and that puts the cost up; I'm assuming they're taking the glass out to do this and that's why the gasket gets replaced.

The daft part about ETA quartz movements is the non-availability of circuits. In the past the circuits were supplied separately, usually priced around £20. If the watch developed an electronic fault it was simple to replace the circuit, not much harder than swapping a battery! Swatch group stopped selling circuits separately for reasons I don't understand, so a circuit fault now means a new movement has to be bought. Coupled with the restricted availability of Swatch parts this is making repair of an ETA-powered watch potentially expensive.

My advice is to find out exactly what's wrong, but as the watch is already with the Omega Service Centre I guess there's a cost involved if the watch is returned and the quote declined.

Paul

I do agree with you Paul. Some Houses, I won't say which, certainly have a policy of extracting as much cash from the poor customer as they can get away with. I've seen them joke about it.
Us Indies have to be sure to be scrupulously honest as our reputations depend on it.
We haven't for the most part yet started charging for estimates !

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*home: I meant joke

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OP, read the items in the quote, then ask yourself whether it makes sense. The watch won`t run, maybe it's the battery maybe it's something else, but it sure as hell isn`t the crown or the glass gasket! How many of the parts on that list will influence the running of the watch?

Strongly advise you to phone them and ask for an explanation. What exactly is wrong with the watch?

Paul

OP. If you wanted to get a second opinion from an Omega approved repair shop you could try STS: http://swisstimeservices.co.uk/about.html

I am guessing all those parts belong to a full service by Omega - since they provide you with a guarantee (usually 2 years) for the watch after they service it. they replace gaskets and other parts by default.

Same for my X-33 where they replaced all the pushers / crown / gaskets etc after a full service. I did get all parts returned to me though :-) unlike some brands I could mention!

Martyn.

I'm with Paul on this and would speak directly with Omega to ascertain why they consider the watch needs a complete service at only three years old.

I sent my auto Seamaster for regulation recently and was told it needed a full service. When I queried this as it had had a full service three years earlier I was told that Omega had made a mistake and it was then regulated for free. It has kept very good time since.

The chap I spoke to is Mike Webb and he could not be more apologetic or helpful.

I have sent two Seamasters to Omega for battery replacement and that is exactly what they did.

Brenden's offered to sort it and I think I`d take him up on that if I was the OP. It isn`t going to need seals, crown etc at that age and the hnads only need replacing if they get damaged during removal.....unlikely on a 3 hander.

The question to ask of Omega is whether the circuitry is faulty. If the circuit's kaput it needs replacing and that's tricky to source. Again, I`d be surprised if it is.

I could sort this myself but frankly I don`t want the job, I`ve enough on at the moment and I try to stick to the stuff I`m happiest working on. Stripping ladies watch quartz movements is an exercise in masochism, it's all 'strong eyeglass' work because the parts are tiny.........I end up with headache doing these. They're not hard, just fiddly. My guess is that Omega would fit a new movement if there was a movement fault, replacements will cost peanuts for them and it's probably more cost effective than stripping one.

The last one I stripped had a tiny hair/fibre wrapped around the train wheels.........that's what stopped it!

Paul

Hi all,

Apologies for the late reply but I didn't realise there were more posts after Omegamanic's post and just declined the service.

I now have the watch back from Omega. The sales person at the store said it was a battery leak and insisted the £300 service was the way to go. The only explanation I can think of is that given the watch is actually quite an old model, maybe Goldsmiths had it in inventory for few years before the sale.

I am not sure how much damage a battery leak can cause? and if it is a lot then maybe the quote is justified?

On the plus side they did return the watch in the Omega service case which I wasn't charged for.

Thanks

Usually a battery leak causes cosmetic damage to the movement but often it's no more than that. It's possible the circuit's been damaged, and that's a big problem if it has. I've serviced quartz watches after battery leakage and they've been fine, my guess is that the circuit will be OK but that's a point that needs to be established. Hard to say without seeing the thing, if Brendan's offered to fix it that's the way to go.

Paul

Thanks. I will send it over to Brendan.