EBME Forums Forums Maintenance Spare Parts Spare parts rip off!

This one may be worth a re-visit to the "front page" too. Who knows, it may even tie-in with batteries!

Can we safely assume that your boss doesn't get on the forum much, then, SLR? Ha, ha.

I like it. Good relationship with your Boss then SLR.

That's a brilliant link, John. I was all ready to submit my own nomination, when I noticed that it looks like it's a bit out of date. Maybe we should start our own "Awards" poll right here on this forum. All it takes is someone to open up a thread ...

Back on topic, do we dare to have our own award for "Gouge of the Month"?

All power to you, if you can do it without getting into bother for exposing companies your hospital has contracts with. Be careful if you are likely to bust a big deal for new equipment!

A lot of the big companies seem to use the "medical grade" tag as an automatic price multiplier, usually by a factor of at least 10 times. It is sheer greed - an assumption that the public purse is bottomless, and only an idiot would not take advantage. Here's news for you - Geoff Hannis is on the case!

I don't mind helping with a "Company X part no. bbb/bbb is the same as RS part no. ccc-cccc" type list. Especially when you can see it's from the same manufacturer that RS use, or has an actual RS label on it when it arrives!

I do know of some companies that are honest enough to admit when they use RS/Farnell or other third party parts, and I would be more than happy to help with that sort of list.

On the suject of only using OEM parts, heres a little story.
A service engineer came in to fix a bit of kit and needed a few bits and pieces. I was asked if I had them, I didnt.
So he went off to B&Q and Maplins and bought the bits he needed to fix the machine. We got charged for the bits at the OEM costs, which I raised hell about.
I even asked a certain regulatoy body, who shall I say are firmly glued to the fence, not just sitting there.

Here are some more service scams you should look out for…

You need a service visit to repair say a ventilator. You explain exactly what the problem is and what parts need replacement. The company send a ‘repair kit’ for the equipment before the engineer arrives. This is supposed to hold ALL the parts required for repair of the unit. Lo and Behold when the guy arrives the part required is not in the repair kit! You then get charged for a totally unnecessary second visit.

And another one is…

The parts for the repair are to be couriered to the hospital for delivery ‘before 8am’ say. The part does not arrive until 10am. So you get charged for their engineer to sit on his backside waiting for two hours because their courier cannot deliver on time. Nice work if you can get it!

Further to this, I have just learnt that the users don't like the cost of consumables and so we have now changed to a different make of nebuliser! Thank God, there is no monopoly on nebs!

"Could it be that the manufacturer receives 'sub-assembly kits' (as boxes of parts) from various different suppliers and then assembles those boxes of 'Parts' to build the device?

They then sell us the 'sub-assembly kit' rather than the part - because that is how they buy them in.

If this is the case, they need to give us a list of their 'sub-assembly kit' suppliers so we can get those 'original' parts... or the manufacturers need to look at the feasability of supplying 'sub-assembly' parts."

This is a 'difficult issue' for us industry folks.

It all boils down to product liability - we have to supply the parts fitted at production. If we don't, then there could be issues in the future if there is a subsequent failure.

We (that is, manufacturers or distributors) have to carry expensive product liability cover, and if we supply 'aftermarket' or 'second-sourced' parts without the necessary work to validate and document the suitability of these parts, then the excrement could hit the impeller in a big way if there should happen to be an incident. So, we are generally unable to provide lists of component sources.

So, we're obliged to play safe and supply either the parts fitted at production, or aftermarket parts that have been through a lengthy testing and validation process - and naturally all this incurs costs, which as businesses we have to recover.

Yes, Keith, we see the problem. But why can you not (as John Sandham has suggested) provide us officially with your list of suppliers so we may purchase parts (components etc.) directly from them? Wouldn't "all bases be covered" in that way, or is it really because you want to protect your margins when supplying individual parts (if you indeed do that at all)?

On a slightly different tack, there are many examples where hospital biomed sheds have no alternatives to buying assemblies, when all they really wanted was a particular component on/in that assembly. We know that there may very well be valid supply side reasons, but again, openness about original suppliers would be the answer, would it not?

And, as regards recovering your costs, surely you do that when you sell the equipment in the first place? If not, then, a) Why is it so expensive? or b) You got your sums wrong!