I have been posting recently about some issues I have had with an excavator I am helping a friend fix. the most recent being with a replacement Mechatro we got from our local dealer, Southeastern Equip. in Cambridge, OH. Besides the horrible customer service and delays, when we finally got the unit, it was programmed but locked to Japanese language. Well, we finally got it unlocked. They had to send a tech out who hooked up to our excavator and easily changed the language to English. Then they hit my friend with a bill for $1,006.96. Now, if this isn't fraud, I don't know what is. This unit should have been in English on arrival. I had suspected it was intentionally locked to Japanese but now it is clear that they did it so they could charge my buddy for a service call. I hope someone from Southeastern Equip reads this: You will be refunding us. I am prepared to take this as far as necessary.
How can Kobelco dealers make such money?! Have you observed how they do it? Do they use any device to unlock, or do they just operate and work with the screen buttons (switches)? I'm really trying to figure out how to help you. Anyway, this is also as a lesson learned so we can handle similar errors in the future.
I would be losing my crap, over something that is so completely scummy. I believe I would start with the service manager. So they imported a part that they reasonably knew would be in Chinese and when it was ins, it couldn’t be used but for a 1000k service call.
I guess the Kobelco dealer technician used a tool called "Handy Checker" to reprogram the C1 controller.
So a part came in that was displaying in Japanese and not English? How is that the dealer's fault? Not many dealers are set up to program stuff bench top from my experience. I do agree that charging that kind of cash is outrageous especially if it was just a 5 minute job. Could have easily coordinated that job with another one in that area and had it done as a courtesy.
let's assume that all Mechatro controllers are sent to the dealer in Japanese, ok? two scenarios are possible: 1. it is the dealer's responsibility to change the language before giving it to the customer or 2. everyone who orders a replacement Mechatro gets one that is locked in Japanese and has to pay the dealer to send a tech out to change it. both of these scenarios would involve the Dealer being fully aware ahead of time that all Mechatro's come locked in Japanese and will need changed. this means two things: 1. the dealer neglected to change it 2. the dealer neglected to tell us ignorance is not an acceptable excuse here. the only other possibility would be that the controller was supposed to come from Japan already changed to English and Kobelco themselves forgot. i am not blaming the dealer that the controller was in Japanese. I am saying that the controller should have been in English and to charge $1,000 to change it is basically fraud. they either knew it and set us up for a service call or it should have already been in English and to charge us to change it is ripping us off. if you can offer an argument in favor of the dealer, please share.
i think the easiest way to look at this is by comparing it to an automobile. legally, they are both bound by the same laws for service and sales. if you took your car to the dealership because it needed a new computer module and when they call you to say it is done and you go pick it up and you pay them for the module and you walk outside and you go to drive off and you realize that your entire car is in a different language and in km/h and the fuel is in liters and your navigation is locked to Japan. ***, you say. right? so, you go back inside and say, hey, why is my car like this? and the dealer says, oh yeah, by the way, we have to change that with our dealer tool. you say okay and they go out to your car, hook up to it and change it. great, you say. then you ask for the keys so you can leave, and they say, oh that will be $1,000. how would you react? would the dealer be at fault here?
@ r3vrsengnr All C1 controllers sold as spare parts are "NOT LOCKED IN JAPANESE LANGUAGE". All can be changed from Japanese to English; that's standard, not optional. C1 controllers are only set to "LOCKED IN JAPANESE LANGUAGE" as an "OPTION" when the customer requests it, or (very bad), it is an intentional setting to make money???!!! I think in this case, you can complain directly to Kobelco Construction Machinery Headquarters. I think they will have to refund you. Try contacting Kobelco USA at the following link: North America | Contact List Excavators | Kobelco Construction Machinery Global Website Global Official Website of Kobelco Construction Machinery,a leading company of excavators and cranes. We globally present business through hydraulic excavators, industrial machinery, crawler cranes and others with innovative solutions. www.kobelcocm-global.com
that is good to know, thank you. i reached out to them and it's being looked into.
If it's an easy change to English and they charged an hour labour at most might be acceptable if they had to drive aways to your machine. If your machine was close by should have been a courtesy call. $1000 is absolutely ridiculous.
shouldn't the thing be in English to begin with? it would be like getting the central module replaced in your car and when you go to drive off everything is in km/h and your navigation is speaking japanese. and then, they charge you $1,000 to change it to English. surely, this cannot be normal practice by Kobelco dealers when getting a replacement Mechatro. has this ever happened to anyone else?
Kobelco probably just ships them out to wherever knowing the dealers can change the language if necessary. It would be kind of a pain for the Kobelco parts warehouse to have to take new parts and change them to the language the customer needs. That's what the dealer should know and change to what the customer wants. It should be included in the price for sure.
All the error code information in my liebherr crane computer is in German. Factory engineers just recommended you learn German. Personally, I think it's nieve to think that your Japanese built equipment, isn't going to have language barriers at times. It's also going to cost money to fix big iron. If your buddy/ customer can't afford to fix it, he shouldn't own it. The dealer and their techs can't make money selling parts for no profit and giving away their techs time. No one made him buy kobelco or use that dealer. Honestly, I think you're probably fortunate they were able to find the part to sell you.
I think the dealer should have stated there will be an extra cost to change the language. Kobelco aren't that rare in N. America.
How much of the $1K bill was travel time and how much was the tech's time to swap it over? Did the dealer install the module or was it purchased from the dealer and installed by a 3rd party?
it was purchased from the dealer and installed by me. the machine's serial number was given, and it was stated that the controller would be programmed by Kobelco in Japan for this specific machine. others are saying the controllers come as blanks and program themselves upon being connected. either way, the unit did not need programmed which was confirmed by the tech which you can read for yourself. it took the tech only a few minutes to swap it over, but your questions are all irrelevant. the fact remains, nothing was said when ordering the mechatro and nothing was said when picking it up. they are selling parts in the US market - the language is required to be in English. the fact that it was LOCKED to Japanese is unacceptable. i cannot think of any other business that does this. it is like buying a cell phone and you realize after the fact that you have to go back to the store and pay another fee bc the language is locked to something other than English. or a laptop, or your television, or any other electronic device out there. we spent $4,000 on the unit and they forced us into a spot where we had no choice but to pay another $1,000 if we wanted to get the excavator operational. this is FRAUD by all facets of the law.
It is very common to have to program, or configure a new controller on the machine. Not speaking of kobelco specifically, this all brands equipment. Many times controllers are unprogrammed, or at least not configured and it is not possible for the owner to self install. I feel your pain, but do not feel you have a cause to complain, except possibly that someone assured you programing would not be necessary. Welcome to the world of equipment repairs.
Lol - OK sure my questions are irrelevant. Did you get the machine running since it was not in running condition at the time per the tech?
Nobody made him buy a old kobelco. I'm sure the dealer has no idea how the controller is going to pop up on your computer until it is plugged into your machine. Got to pay if you want to play with big iron. You'll be laughed out of court trying to " prove fraud".
it's a 2024. got to pay to play with big iron? so, you're saying because the cost of the thing being bought or owned that it is okay to rip customers off? haha ok bub.
the controller needed neither though. it was already programmed. it's the fact that the language setting was locked, they knew it would be, said nothing, and then charged an insane fee for 2 min of work.
yeah, the machine is running great now.
If it's a 2024, why isn't it warranty?
Yes indeed
Would think it should be on warranty but the main thing is it's running great now. Be happy for that!
It might be a pleasant surprise for you Lol
it was purchased at auction for 20 thou. had been in water up to the operator's knees. i pulled the entire cab upper and lower harnesses, replaced the relay box, mechatro, some other boxes and bits, and i went through the rest of the wiring replacing sections as needed. Southeastern's lead mechanic said the motor sucked in water and bent a rod but i knew that was highly unlikely. imho Southeastern wrote the machine off and didn't think it would ever run again. we got a 200k machine for 30k and i think they are a little angry about it is the reason for the anti-helping treatment we have gotten since the beginning. i will end this by saying that if anyone can come on here and show me that they too ordered a Mechatro controller from their dealer and it too came locked in Japanese and they too had to pay an additional $1,000 to have the language changed... then i will stop my tirade. but let's be honest here, no respectable dealer would do that and if they did no respectable person would put up with it. people want to say dumb stuff like "you gotta pay to play" but guarantee if it was them getting screwed, they'd be flying off the ****ing handle. lol.
Most wouldn't take a chance on partly flooded machine. You took a chance and even after spending a questionable extra $1000 have a good running machine for over $100K less than a non flooded machine. What's to complain about??
Got any pics of the machine in action?
How strange! Even though I said it very clearly, there are still many members, including the forum admin, who post as if they hadn't read my post ( HeavyEquipmentForums ). I should say again: "All C1 controllers sold as spare parts are NOT LOCKED IN JAPANESE LANGUAGE. All can be changed from Japanese to English; that's standard, not optional. C1 controllers are only set to "LOCKED IN JAPANESE LANGUAGE" as an "OPTION" when the customer requests it, or (very bad), it is an intentional setting to make money???!!!" I would also like to add my personal opinion: "This is not the policy of the Kobelco manufacturer, but can only be the viewpoint and policy of the Kobelco sales agent"
Oh I read your post. Do you work for Kobelco? Don't take this the wrong way but one post by one member on a forum doesn't make it gospel.
Sounds like you have an axe to grind with the dealer? So you bought a flooded machine which is a nightmare machine IMO. If I had a machine flood up to the operators knees I'd call my insurance agent, file claim and total it. You didn't get a $200K machine for $20K - you bought a flooded $200K machine for $20K. Since this is a 2024 machine this probably won't be the last thing you'll have to get the dealers assistance on so either make nice with this dealer, find another one or an independent mechanic that has all the software. Just like Crane Op said - You gotta pay to run big iron. Best of luck.
it the principle. it shouldn't matter if it was $1. this is part of the reason why these companies have gotten so out of hand. people have that mentality "oh it's just..." oh it's just a piece of Chinese crap that only lasted 3 uses, just throw it out and buy another. oh, it's just $10 ...$100... $1000... will your children's children say, "oh it's just $10,000 who cares" see the point? it just keeps snowballing. when is it too much? let's say for example i do nothing about this... safe to assume that Southeastern will do it again and maybe the next guy is scraping by trying to fix his excavator only worth $10k. that would be really messed up. but if i am up their a** about it, filing complaints with every regulator, association, department, and gov official that i can then there is a good chance they will think twice about doing it again. just making forum posts like this one about it could be enough bad publicity to cost them some business would be enough of a deterrent. so, it does matter. it always matters.
this is true, the machine's value is not 200k.
thank you @LACHAU
All right. This question is sensitive. I will answer you in a private conversation. Please check your message. Regards. LacHau.