Facts About Refurbished GPS Devices - What You Should Know.....

Have you ever noticed that there seems to be a huge abundance of refurbished GPS devices for sale, within just about any given ecommerce store that could be found by doing a google search? It's very no big surprise, considering the popularity of the hand held, and especially the automotive GPS devices. But the other, more interesting think for this, will be covered in the following paragraph.

So why are there literally thousands, if not 10's of thousands of refurbished GPS devices out there? Well, that brings us to the important points of WHY so many GPS devices (along with any electronic devices in general) end up being labeled as "refurbished". Oddly enough, most of the refurbished GPS devices have actually never even had a problem at all, and in a little of cases, they are still brand new, literally still factory sealed. The most common reasons for electronics based products (IE: GPS devices) becoming "refurbished" are:

1. The product was a "return" by the customer that purchased it, which means that they returned the item to the store that they bought it from within 30 days of the purchase date. More often than not, there is literally nothing even wrong with the product; the person who purchased it just ends up not wanting it.

2. The product sat on the store shelf long and became "overstock". When this happens, the store will either sell the product for a clearance price, or send the product back to the manufacturer; when the product is sent back to the manufacturer, the manufacturer will, in come cases, label the product "refurbished", and then sell the "refurbished" product to specific retailers/wholesalers for a greatly reduced price. The funny part about this is the simple fact that the product is still literally brand new, and has never even been opened at all.

3. The product was a "demonstration" or "display model". When this is the case, the product eventually gets sent back to the manufacturer; the manufacturer then inspects (and repairs, if necessary) the product, and labels it as refurbished.

4. The product was opened. When this is the case, there is nothing wrong with the product, other than it needs to be sent back to the manufacturer to be repackaged, in which case, oddly enough, it is then labeled as "refurbished".

5. Shipping damage. When this happens, it usually just means that exclusively the box that the product was in got damaged, but if anything other than the product was damaged (accessories, or the actual unit), it is completely fixed or replaced by the manufacturer.

6. There was a abnormal in the product. This is actually probably the most rare scenario. When a product has defect (or cosmetic damage) it is sent back to the manufacturer for repair, and anything that was broken or defective is replaced with brand early parts; when the process is complete, the product is literally brand new again, and is actually less likely to become defective than the non refurbished products sitting on the shelves of the retail stores; this is due to the fact that refurbished products under go very extensive testing.

So with that being said and done, anyone looking to pick up a GPS device for about half the normal retail cost, might want to consider buying one that has been "refurbished". As stated above, most of the refurbished GPS devices (or refurbished electronics in general) have actually never even had an issue at all, but were just returns or overstock items. Also, even if the refurbished product DID in fact have a defect or cosmetic damage, it is completely repaired with brand new parts, thoroughly tested, and is then repackaged with all of the original items and accessories that would normally come with it.

There seem to be many discontinued GPS devices out there that you can now buy as "refurbished" (for example, the garmin streetpilot c340), and since they are discontinued, most of them probably got labeled as "refurbished" simply becuase the company that manufactured them is trying to clear out their warehouse, and get rid of their discontinued products any way that they can.

Tags: Garmin Nuvi, buy gps, best gps