I have I Rheem water heater that just broke. It replaced another water heater that broke suddenly and it was all kind of a whir and I’m not sure where I got it from or have a record of the purchase I can find , but I’m sure it was less than 3 years ago and I’ve looked online the they have a 3 year comprehensive warranty and 10 year limited warranty. I don’t want to buy a new water heater, what should I do?
Have you already tried going through the procedure on their website to register your heater? It initially just says to have your serial number ready, maybe it doesn’t ask for proof of purchase and you can estimate the installation date.
https://www.rheem.com/warranties/
If that doesn’t work, just contact them - based on how well designed and customer friendly that website appears to be, I doubt they are going to just blow you off because you don’t have the receipt. They likely will know roughly when you bought it based on the serial number.
Look at the water heater closely. My plumber wrote the installation date on both my furnace and water heater.
Yes. I’m seeing that ore and more, manufacturers will know exactly where and when something was sold based on the product’s serial number.
Having been an assistant to a plumber, if a pro installed it the paperwork for warranty, installation, dates, should be hanging on the water heater somewhere. usually on the overflow drainpipe. Sometimes on a taped plastic cover just about anywhere on the skin of the heater. The worst ones just roll them up and stick them on top between the pipes.
The serial number was on file on the website! Thanks!!
Yes, many manufacturers keep track of serial numbers. Unfortunately, this cuts both ways. If an appliance built in 2017 sits in a warehouse until it is finally purchased in 2021, you might find that a 3-year warranty has already run out.
I run a locksmith shop. A customer of mine had an issue with a safe they bought from me, 11 months after they bought it. I contacted the supplier, who told me that those safes have a 12-month warranty. The problem is that the clock starts running from the day it leaves their warehouse (not the day it gets sold to the end user) and that particular safe had sat on my showroom floor for 15 months. So I had to eat the cost of replacing the malfunctioning safe. Fortunately, I did get the customer to pay for delivery. The manufacturer and the supplier didn’t contribute one red cent.
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A “warrantee” is the person to whom a promise has been made, not the promise itself. The promise may be called a “warranty” or a “guarantee”.
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A “whir” is a quiet, steady, humming noise. A half-forgotten memory is a “blur”. A chaotic activity is a “whirl”.
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I don’t do water heaters but am in a related field working on wells. Most major components are date coded. The manufacturers will back a professional off date code alone. Home owners themselves can run into more issues because they can’t testify to the competency of the installation so thier milage can vary.
All the pumps I install have a five year manufacturer’s warranty. If the date code is within 5 years my distributors provide a new pump at my request no questions asked. They still back a 5 year installation as long as it’s installed within 3 years of manufacture but I need to provide accompanying documentation that I installed it in the last 5 years. That rarely comes up as most my pumps are installed within 6 months of manufacture and it’s pretty rare for them to fail within 5 years to begin with. I guarantee labor for 1 year and prorate labor for the warranty period. Most companies only offer the year. None of the manufacturers cover labor. Best I can do is leverage my business with the distributors for free stuff when thier crappy products cost me money.