“Two-year warranty” is a sentence, not a process. What decides whether a claim is quick or painful is whether four details were agreed before the first shipment left.
1. Who handles the end customer
For a distributor or retail programme, the seller handles the customer and the factory supports the seller. That is the normal arrangement — but it needs to be stated, along with what the seller needs from the factory: replacement units, a technical answer, or both.
2. What a claim requires
Agree the evidence up front: the date code, a photograph, and the failure described against a list of failure modes. A factory that receives “it doesn’t work” cannot diagnose anything, and a buyer that receives “send it back” without knowing what to include loses weeks.
3. Spares policy
For chargers, spares usually mean complete units rather than components, because the cost of repair exceeds the cost of replacement. Agree a percentage of the order value to be held as replacement stock, or a price for additional units bought as service stock. Both are better than discovering the policy during a recall.
4. What ends the warranty
State the exclusions: water damage, physical damage, use outside the rated input range, third-party repair. Stating them is not defensive; it prevents a conversation later where both sides assume different things.
Why this matters for the brand
The cost of a warranty is not the unit — it is the handling time and the customer’s confidence. Programmes with a clear process convert a defect into a replacement; programmes without one convert it into a review, and reviews are what kill repeat orders.
What to put in the purchase order
Warranty duration, what constitutes evidence of a claim, who ships the replacement and who pays the freight, and the contact for a technical question. Four lines, agreed once, and every claim afterwards takes days rather than weeks.