It all works out in the end!

Okay here is my story of my camera. One day while we were about to go for a walk, I grabbed my camera by one of the straps and went to place the strap over my head (I have two but I usually put them on one at a time so the straps don’t get all tangled up). As I did this I saw the strap start to come undone. I quickly scrambled to grab the camera but I was unable to catch it or even slow it down. It landed right on the top of the flash. I quickly checked it out and found it was black through the view finder. Upon further inspection I saw that the mirror was in the incorrect position and the shutter was folded.

So I scrambled to get it to a camera store before they closed but they said I would need to send it in to Nikon for repair. So that is what I did. Nikon inspected it, quoted me and then I approved it. They fixed it and sent it back to me. After two weekends of shooting (a total of 665 pictures), it just stopped working. It gave me an Err message on the display screen.

I sent it back to Nikon for them to fix it properly. After they inspected this the second time, they came back saying that there must have been secondary damage in between the time I got it back from them and now. I told the customer service representative that there was no secondary damage to the camera and it just stopped working while I was photographing deer in the backyard of the cottage. He was telling me that I would have to pay the same amount for the camera to be repaired. I was upset with this so I asked to speak with his manager. I ended up speaking with the assistant customer service manager and he too had the same response. I then asked him for his bosses contact information at which point he refused.

With the help of my girlfriend we researched Nikon to find the key contacts and how to go about complaining. I then wrote a really professional looking letter to The President and CEO of Nikon Canada expressing my disappointment with Nikon. It also contained the facts of my situation and how it got to a letter being mailed to him. I gave them a list of three options of what I felt was fair for them to resolve the issue. I told them that I would look forward to their reply and to them resolving my problem, and I would wait until March 19, 2010 before seeking help from a consumer protection agency or filing a complaint with the Better Business Bureau. I heard back fairly quickly from a new person at Nikon offering me one of my proposed options. They said they would trade me my broken camera for a new upgraded camera body (the D90). They basically subtracted the amount I already paid for the first repair which meant I was getting a new and better camera body.

I feel I probably could have pushed them for more but I was sticking with what I felt was fair and I am very happy with the results. This new camera will allow me to take faster photographs and closer together which should help me capture the special moments in nature I have been seeing. It also has the capability to capture movies and that could be fun with the 500mm lens. It also has 12.3 megapixels which is more than double what my last one was. This should help maintain the quality if I need to crop a photo or for when I get enlargements done. By the way Posterjack did a very nice job on the enlargement I received for the photo contest and I would use them again. I will add a link to the side if anyone would like to check it out.

I am very anxious for the new camera to arrive so I can get back to doing what I love.