K7 for £949 each

Just been emailed by a friend in the camera business who has got his hands on some K7's, Brand New that he says i can have for £949 each. He says they all come with 12 months uk warranty as he provides a uk i nvoice. Not sure where he is getting them but does this stack up? , if so thats a good price isnt it?

Depends where they come from originally I would have thought.
Its a good price but Pentax must know from the serial numbers if a camera is an import and may not honour warranty if it develops a problem.

Saying that, if Pentax have an international warranty (unlike Nikon) then id doesnt really matter where it comes from.

Pixmania.co.uk has them at £1004 retail, but if you are VAT registered their pixmania-pro site has them at £864 (plus VAT comes in at £993 approx)

But £949 is good. The lowest I have heard about so far in Europe is fotokungen in Sweden but they won't ship abroad.

I think srs and other camera shops would by imports anyway wouldnt they?

So its not that much of a saving then really. Oh well i can tell him to keep em

I wouldn't let Chris see you type this, he will probably hang you up by the whatsist if he got hold of you. As it says on his web site, 100% UK stock.

I said i think , not i know. If im wrong then john can edit my post

Most good camera shops will buy direct from the importer. A camera manufacturer can tell from the serial number whether a camera is a legal import into the country or not. If it is a grey import then they may well not honour the guarantee on it. They are within their rights to do this.

Pixmania is well known for it's grey imports - often things from them come with the instructions in French or some other language than English.

If you buy your camera abroad, and have a receipt from that country Pentax will honour the guarantee. You can get a worldwide guarantee from Pentax if you bought it outside the EU, the normal EU guarantee is good enough otherwise. Though it is only a one year guarantee not the two years you get for buying from recognised Pentax dealer.

So i would have warranty then if i got a uk receipt of a uk company??

I may be wrong here Gwyn and no doubt there are more knowledgable people here in consumer law, but I think that a 2 year guarantee in the UK is a legal requirement. Most poeple think it only one year but I think that electronics manufacturers especially are required to give two years.

Regardless of whether you bought it from Pixmania you will still have legal rights and noone can take those away from you. Yes I once bought a Lumix P&S from Pixmania and sent it back because the instrucstions were in French, but I have bought Cybershots, printers and loads of other stuff from them without a problem.

As they are now part of Dixons/Currys they will no doubt honour UK warranties, although they offer something else called zen engagament which for a small fee means that they will simply do a straight swap out of a product for you within the year without even going through the manufacturer or importer. It might be worth it for the K7 given its high value and the current debacle over the allegedly faulty sensors.

I also thought we were entitled to a 2 year warranty as a matter of right now thanks to the European union.

Hmmm, now Im wondering my my Egg money card is making such a fuss of offering a free extra years warranty on any purchase especially as it says 24 months in total.

Personally I would never by from Pixmania - I did not realise that they are owned by Currys now but last time I looked at their Ts & Cs they were awful. Something like 20% restocking charge for returned goods and if anything goes wrong they only refund to market value of the product. Ie if the product is 6 months old they refund the value of a 6 month old piece of kit. Also all purchases are made under French law and are dealt with in French courts.

I lived for 6 years in France and In my experience retailers will try to get away with murder even if it contravenes consumer law. I have never found a retailer there who offered the same level of service as SRS or my locAl Canterbury Camera Centre.

Maybe Pixmania have better prices but out of principle I'd give my money to a retailer who respects their customers - whether that's a local shop or online retailer.

I'm sure SRS etc will be offering the same prices in a few months and by that time the K7 may well have a firmware revision or sensor revision (see recent thread about banding). Less chance of disappointment.

Seems a very good price but i like the backup of srs in case anything does go wrong

As I said, I have bought lots from Pixmania and never had a problem and was able to return things without any restocking fees. However, I have been lucky and not had faulty goods like the batch of K7s with the sensor problem and that scares me, regardless of the retailer frankly. I hope this gets nailed once and for all by Pentax quickly

As an aside I have just checked Pixmania's site and they have pushed back the availability of the K7 from 17th July to 22nd July. I wonder if this has anything to do with the sensors. Maybe Pentax is rechecking them all before shipping

£847.10 exc. VAT - Pixmania pro's current price for the K7