SoraNews24 —Japan News—

Bringing you yesterday's news from Japan and Asia, today.

TOP

» Japan
» Nintendo fans in Japan are overjoyed when company tells them their hardware repairs AREN’T free

Featured

Weird
Studio Ghibli
Jobs

Nintendo fans in Japan are overjoyed when company tells them their hardware repairs AREN’T free

Casey Baseel Jun 8, 2019
Tweet

Gamers are happy to pay repair costs once they find out they’re paying for more than just parts.

In the modern hardcore fan-driven video game industry, where companies often see legions of supporters abandon them after a single unpopular decision, Nintendo enjoys an extraordinary amount of goodwill. A big part of that is the company’s amazing customer service, like the time it coordinated with the Pokémon Company to brighten the day of a young bullying victim.

But recently Japanese Twitter user @ORESAMA_No1 was singing Nintendo’s praises for a surprising reason: the amount they charged him for the labor to repair a piece of broken Nintendo hardware. Since he was happy about the situation, you might expect the invoice to list the repair labor (記述料 in Japanese) as free, but actually…

任天堂に初めてハードの修理依頼を出したんだが、明細に交換部品は100円だが交換に必要な技術料はこんだけかかったぜってしっかり書いてある。素晴らしい事だ。なぜか今の時代、ここが0円だと思っている客や、0でしか仕事が取ってこれない営業がいる。仕事は道具だけでは出来ないというのに。 pic.twitter.com/s9oqMnTuLh

— おれ様！ (@ORESAMA_No1) June 2, 2019

…Nintendo charged him 3.800 yen (US$35) for labor, even though the necessary parts were only 200 yen.

“They made sure to write down how expensive the labor is. That’s wonderful,” tweeted @ORESAMA_No1 without a shred of sarcasm as he also shared a snapshot of his bill. “Nowadays, there are a lot of customers who assume everything is free, and companies that can only get customers be offering to do stuff for free. So many people don’t understand that companies can’t make ends meet only charging for parts.”

Several other commenters chimed in to say that they too had no qualms about paying for repairs if Nintendo was telling them where that money was being spent.

“I’ve sent a whole bunch of things to Nintendo for repairs, and they always do an even better job than I’d expect for the price. Sure, it costs a bit, but when they ship my stuff back to me, it’s like it’s brand-new.”
“Nintendo has always taken good care of its customers.”
“That’s Nintendo for you, giving you the details like you’d get when you take your car to a mechanic.”
“Sony doesn’t write the details on their repair invoices, so sometimes I can’t understand why it’s costing me so much.”

Yet another Nintendo fan tweeted a photo of his Switch Joy-Con controller and the invoice for its repair, and sure enough, he’d been charged 100 yen parts, and 1,900 yen for labor.

私も直近で同じような事があり、@Nintendo にジョイコンの修理を出したら、恐らく新品？になって返って来ました
。元々ジョイスティックの問題でカバーもカバーは使用感があったのにここまでして頂けるとは😳
ファミコン時代からお世話になってますが今後も任天堂製品を買って応援しようと思います😎 pic.twitter.com/jtjMTc0Eb3

— Yamato@Dell Technologies Tech Instructor (@lab8010) June 2, 2019

Still, high-quality work or not, it’s an unexpected turn of events to see customers happy about having to pay for something. Maybe it’s a result of Nintendo’s image being more personal and artistic than its video game hardware rivals Sony and Microsoft, and so the reminder that some of the money repair service customers are spending is going to dedicated, hard-working Nintendo technicians probably makes those repair fees hurt a lot less.

Source: Twitter/@ORESAMA_No1 via Hachima Kiko
Top image ©SoraNews24
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!