Gotta brag just a little…

A few weeks ago, after months of research, I finally pulled the trigger on a new camera.

Remember? If not, you can read about it here. When I bought the camera I bought three lenses, one of which was the Canon EF 50mm f1/8 II. I read a lot of great reviews about this lens and I was not disappointed.

When I bought the camera, Best Buy tried to get me to buy the extended warranties because {these were the salesman’s exact words} “If you drop your camera, it won’t be covered under the manufacturer warranty and you will most definitely drop it.”

Being the tightwad that I am, I politely turned down the extended warranty and promised myself I would be extra careful with my new camera.

And that lasted all of about two weeks.

I was getting out of the car one evening and was on the phone with Jessica and went to the back of my SUV, popped the hatch and snatched up my camera bag. I had my camera in my hand and thought the bag was zipped until my brand new 50mm lens went flying across my driveway.

I picked it up, checked it out, and it looked okay but the next day I put it on my camera to try it out and the lens wouldn’t focus. Upon further investigation, I noticed the very end {front} of the lens was sticking out and there was a metal ring showing. I was able to push it back in and the lens focused but the picture looked really grainy.

So of course, I immediately googled it and read a couple different reviews that said the Canon Service Center was the way to go. I could ship it to them, they would assess the lens and let me know how much it would be to fix it. One review I read said that the basic charge for a similar repair was $100 but the lens was better than new when he got it back.

Now, don’t think that I was trying to pull one over on Canon and get my lens fixed under the manufacturer’s warranty. I explained to them that I dropped the lens and that the impact of the lens hitting the ground was what caused the problem.

Last week while I was sick, Cory packed up the lens and shipped it to Canon. Within a few days, I got an email saying they had received my lens and would let me know what they found. Two days later, I got another email saying what was wrong, the part they would use to fix it and an invoice. I scrolled down to the invoice to see what the damage was when I found the total to be $0!

A day or two later, I got one last email with the shipping information for my lens. When I got home today, it was sitting at my door. The repair ticket in the box says “the AF assembly had been impacted causing the focus to operate improperly. The AF assembly was replaced.” Again, the balance for the repair was $0.

Being the daughter of a small business owner, let me just say how important customer service is to me. I was raised in my Dad’s grocery store and he prides himself on customer satisfaction. I understand that with such a large company like Canon, you can’t always get the customer service like you do in a small family business but I hold businesses up to a higher standard because I understand how important the customers are to a successful business. I wasn’t expecting the repair to be covered under the warranty, which was such a nice surprise but on top of that, the process was so easy and painless. Canon continuously communicated with me through the week they had my lens. Um, hello. A week? I shipped it, they repaired it and shipped it back to me within a week. I barely had time to miss the lens before it was back on my camera. You can’t beat that kind of service.

Hopefully I won’t have another reason to use the Canon Service Center but they made the experience so very pleasant, I wouldn’t mind if I had to. I can’t speak for any other person or company but in my personal opinion the Canon Service Center made it worth buying the Canon brand.

*I am in no way affiliated with Canon or the Canon Service Center. Just a happy customer over here.