Conrad Johnson Repair Issues

Thanks one & all for your advice & concern. It’s every Audiogoner’s worst nightmare.
I really don't want this to  be a bashing episode because I love this Company & their equipment. They've given me thousands of hours of beautiful music.
I was heartened by the tone of the responses. I was a little concerned that people would be hesitant to speak ill of an industry giant like CJ.
I've tried to stick to the facts & not let my emotions intrude.
The fact they didn’t tell me until the very last minute is beyond suspect.
There were several phone & email messages back & forth & nothing
was mentioned. 
I was ready to read off my credit card# when she sort of whispered
“oh by the way”. It was all verbal. Nothing in writing.
The requested repair consisted of replacing a blown power capacitor.
I had the same repair done in 2006.
Without going into the gory details of the bill the hourly labor
charge has gone up over 600% since 2006. I’m not complaining
about that, I’m happy to pay whatever it takes to get it fixed.
The repair manager told me the unit “works fine” & he doesn’t
think the resale value will be diminished. You can’t see the
damage from the front.
I wish I could post the photos. It’s horrible.
On the Audiogon grading scale I think it would be a one.
It makes me sad to think of my “friend” being traumatized that way.
It was obviously subjected to some serious force.
I feel pretty powerless now. There doesn’t seem to be any way around
the front line of phone numbers & I’m reluctant to give them my
payment info until they’ve acknowledged in writing
what they say has happened.
I'll keep you posted.

                                      Mark

I’m relieved to report that my CJ repair saga has come to a close. I was finally permitted to speak to Mr. Johnson & we came to an agreement whereby they would essentially purchase the repaired Premier 17 from me at a price that represents what I would have netted from
the sale of an undamaged preamp minus the repair charges for replacing a capacitor. Pretty much a wash dollar wise for both parties. He felt the unrepairable shipping damage would knock maybe $500.00 off the resale value. I was more pessimistic.
Mr. Johnson was very pleasant & once he realized what had happened seemed compelled to make things right.
He wasn’t there when the damaged shipment was received & he wasn’t the one who threw away the box making any insurance claim hopeless. He agreed that the whole thing seemed odd but added that CJ receives about 2 preamps & one amplifier per year damaged in shipping so it’s not unheard of.
I was fortunate that when I was first told about the damage I got a little agitated & hung up before giving my credit card info. Otherwise the whole affair would just have gone by the wayside.
Also If I didn’t have another preamp I would have just paid out of desparation to get my tunes back.
The repair manager initially just demanded payment & advised me that I could deal with any insurance claim on my own. When I didn’t respond to phone calls & emails requesting payment he offered to sell me some current CJ products at a discount. The U.S. Post Office confirmed to me that the party who receives the damaged shipment is responsible for filing any damage claims.
I understand that the repair of my 15 year old, out of production product is pretty far down the profit margin food chain but until Mr. Johnson got involved this was an unacceptably low level of service. My 2006 dealing with their repair dept. was so different. A comparison of the 2006 invoice, for the exact same repair, shows that the stereo repair industry has been hit very, very hard by inflation.
I may have started off the transaction poorly with multiple phone calls & emails asking about progress. I really did want to know what technically had happened. What specifically was damaged? Did I do anything that caused or contributed to the damage? Is there anything I could do or not do to help prevent future damage? My curiosity may have been misinterpreted as pressure or unhappiness with the estimated charges.
I know everybody’s busy but there was no chit-chatting with these guys.
But hey… “all’s well that ends well”… Mostly.
I came out of this experience without any monetary damage & still love the products. I will continue to be loyal to the brand.
My wife & I listen to it every day & marvel at the depth, detail & warmth it produces.
My wife is a classically trained musician who loves many genres of music. The quality of reproduced music took on much greater meaning after acoustic neuroma surgery resulted in loss of hearing in one ear. She might just be trying to make me feel good but she insists that a quality preamp provides a sense of depth she can feel even with only one ear.
We listen to it extensively every day. The preamp vs. no preamp discussion has to be one of the most argued over Audiogon topics of all time. I feel the current technology CJ preamp actually digs out more detail than the straight Dac to Amplifier configuration I tried while adding an element of warmth & musical soul.


I truly hope that my experience was an exception not the norm.

Cheers!