EBME Forums Forums Maintenance Spare Parts Spare parts rip off!

stryker sdc pro power supply, cost from RS £74 and no more than 1/2hr to fit, cost from stryker £426! problem is rs no longer stock the supply so i have to go to stryker. stryker will not sell me the part, they have to fit it and charge me labour and the cost of shipping and vat total £518.17 unit out of use 2 weeks so far. on another stryker classic a knob from the bottle securing screw on an insuflator gas yoke was broken, when i asked if they could supply me one so i could screw it in (no tools required)i was told send it back for an estimate!

Geoff et al,

I saw a valve manufacturer advertising that their products were of such high quality that they even supplied the medical industry and showed a picture of a valve that I recognised as coming from a blood gas analyser.
When I contact the valve manufacturer they said that they had an exclusive sales agreement with the company so could not sell it to us.

I also found out who the original manufacturer of a single use item was and bought direct from them. When the equipment manufacturer found out, they changed the connection of the disposable slightly and set up an exclusive contract deal. So I had to go back to paying the "medical" price.

One foolish equipment manufacturer left the delivery note for the manufacturer of a bought in part in the box. When I went to them directly they could not sell the part to me because of an exclusivity agreement. But would sell me the bare part and told me where to buy the plugs that fitted that manufacturers equipment (they made the same part for a couple of companies and just fitted different plugs). As a tax payer he was not happy with the way his money was being grabbed by the multinational equipment manufacturers. He knew his selling price and the medical equipment manufacturers price and could see a large difference.

I do believe that the price of original equipment is kept (relatively) low to be competitive but the manufacturers use parts to keep an income stream coming in.

Robert

Oh dear, oh dear - I have just learnt that the trust bought a batch of 100 SPO2 monitors for only the cost of the probe each. The catch is that we have to buy spares from them exclusively.

Oh dear, oh dear

Yes, here we are in 2008 and nothing much has changed. Neither will it, I'm afraid, as far as gouging is concerned. This sort of thing has been going on for as long as I can remember, and I don't see it changing any time soon. Especially when purchasers fall for the sort of deal mentioned by Jonathan above. I'm depressed!

Regarding the exclusive contracts that Robert mentions. Yes, this is a popular ploy by our beloved manufacturers. I'm wondering if there's an opportunity here to source parts from the United States, where the market is, shall we say, a little more open, and third-party vendors are often available.

Geoff,
I have tried that, may be I was unlucky. A package with a customs declaration of "medical equipment" was intercepted by HM Customs and Revenue. They wanted tax, import duties and proof of CE certification. They did not (would not) understand the difference between a spare part and a medical device. We could not provide that so it presumably is still sitting in a warehouse somewhere. We still had to pay the supplier.
Our NHS finance department was very obstructive, it was far too much hassle for them to raise an order and pay it in US dollars.
Perhaps if you costed their time and our time contacting the USA, and added the tax, duties, currency exchange charges etc. it might not be so cheap after all.
But it makes you feel a lot better finding the same thing cheaper. But how much is a happy workforce worth?
Robert

Yet another reason why all EBME departments should push to be involved in the purchasing and procurement of medical equipment!

OK Robert, I give up. Is it just me being paranoid, or are the odds increasingly being stacking up against us? Even I tend to "roll with the flow" these days. When the people we work for couldn't care less about cost effectiveness, never seem willing to support us when we try to be innovative, and even stop us from doing things that we've happily been doing for thirty-odd years, then perhaps it's time to call it a day.

With all the incompetence and massive waste that I see around me every day, the few pounds (dollars) that I may be able to save isn't going to make a great deal of difference in the grand scheme of things. I for one certainly don't make enough (money) to worry too much about it all now. But yes, there is a little bit of job-satisfaction still to be had, if you care to think in those terms (which I do). That's the only reason I bother with any of it all these days, in actual fact. Little victories here and there, carrying out the odd "nice fix", working on the occasional interesting bit of kit, being with good techs, and generally spreading "joy and goodwill" up on the wards. It's enough for me.

Jonathan Wells was actually mistaken.

We've actually negotiated a very good deal where, based on a 2 year spend on parts - it's not an exclusive deal - we have to spend a certain amount over 2 years (consistent with current spend), and we've received 100 free pulse oximeters.

AND The prices we negotiated were very slightly lower than the discounted prices we were currently paying.

It was, of course, agreed with Purchasing who tied up the contract on behalf of the trust.

We'll spend less and have the pulse oximeters!

No Spare Parts Rip Off here!

question, who repairs the unit when it goes wrong, have they got a 2 year warrenty. The elctronics involved in modern spo2 units is so little that you are paying for the unit anyway by buying the probes.

Have they got assurance that after the 2 years the price isnt going to suddenly jump or can you shop around.

My old adage 'Nothings free in this world' were it comes to business that is.

The Wall of Shame is back! And the guy is calling for submissions. How about sending a few from this side of the Great Divide?