Are Lens Warranties Ready For Extinction?
Early guarantees quieted wary consumers. Now often abused, have these warranties outlived their original purpose?
By Joseph L. Bruneni

he first time a need for warranties or guarantees on ophthalmic lenses arose was when plastic lenses began to show up in the marketplace. Eyewear consumers loved the idea of cutting the weight of their eyewear in half, but that interest faded when patients discovered how easily plastic lenses would scratch.

It took 20 years for plastic lenses to become an acceptable substitute. With time and a lot of research, lens manufacturers eventually developed acceptable scratch coatings, but eyewear consumers were now wary about claims for scratch-coated lenses. Manufacturers who had confidence in their scratch coatings began to warrant their lenses against scratching, usually for one year. Warranties overcame consumer concerns and conveyed a message that the doctor or optician had confidence in the scratch-coated lenses they dispensed.

About this same time, manufacturers began introducing progressive lenses and discovered the same consumer lack of confidence. PALs were considerably more costly, so convincing people who had worn bifocals or trifocals for years to switch to a more expensive lens was not an easy task.

Seeing how warranties solved a similar problem for plastic lenses, progressive manufacturers began offering satisfaction warranties to convince consumers to switch to this lens. Most warranties offered to replace the progressives with bifocals or trifocals if patients could not adapt. Warranties provided a "comfort factor" for people going into a new type of lens.

Today, beginning presbyopes go directly into progressives, and word-of-mouth has established progressives as an industry standard for presbyopes. Consumer confidence in progressives is no longer a problem, and adaptation warranties for PALs seem to have outlived their usefulness.

CUSTOMER RE-DO WARRANTIES

To help patients who were unable to wear the lenses prescribed by the doctor and to help absorb the cost of re-making lenses, labs began to offer "customer redo" warranties. This replaced lenses at a reduced price if the patient's Rx required changing within a specific time period. This was a popular benefit for lab customers because it offered a savings in those few cases where the patient couldn't wear what the doctor prescribed.

Warranties proved to be valuable tools when addressing needs such as:

Scratch coats. Validating the effectiveness of scratch coatings

PALs. Convincing bifocal/trifocal wearers to try advanced progressive lenses

Replacement. Helping retail offices reduce the cost for replacing lenses for patients unable to tolerate a new correction.

Recently, however, warranties have become a financial burden for labs and a major cost factor for the industry. The following reviews both sides of the issue.

CURRENT ADVANTAGES

Even the most highly skilled refractionist occasionally finds a patient who can't tolerate his or her prescription. Doctor's re-do warranties were designed specifically to help doctors absorb do-over costs in these rare cases.

Scratch warranties represent a useful comfort benefit, but there's little need for progressive replacement warranties now since new presbyopes go directly into PALs without any convincing. The only advantage today is to absorb fitting errors made by inept or inexperienced dispensers.

Doctor's re-do warranties were never intended to be explained or even disclosed to the patient. When patients come back a week or two after delivery and report they are unable to wear their new lenses, the recommendation was to tell patients that replacement cost would be absorbed by the doctor, not the lab or manufacturer.

There are dispensers who tell patients that if anything ever happens to their lenses, they will be replaced at no charge. Experience proves that telling patients this almost guarantees that the warranty will be abused, unintentionally or on purpose.

Perception of value. Abused warranties also diminish the patient's perceived value of their new lenses. Free replacements imply the lenses are over-priced and downplay their quality.

Dispenser inattention. Warranty abuse can also come from carelessness or inattention by dispensers. Those who do so ignore normal precautions in verifying orders before sending them to the lab because they know that if anything is forgotten or left out, there will be no cost to them or the doctor.

Patient carelessness. Telling a patient their new lenses come with a no-fault guarantee to replace scratched lenses at no cost is going to encourage carelessness with the new glasses.

There are also hidden costs with lens warranties--new measurements must be taken, a replacement order written up, new lenses verified when they come in, and the patient must be called. This doesn't include time for mounting the lenses when the patient brings their frame in, and patients' reactions to the waiting process are often negative.

ALTERNATE STRATEGIES

There are ways to avoid encouraging that casual attitude regarding the care and handling of expensive new eyewear.

Scratch coating warranties. Scratch protection for plastic lenses has improved dramatically in the last several years. Explain this to the patient--the only time replacement warranties should be mentioned is when patients ask if the lenses include a no-fault scratch warranty.

Refit warranties for PALs. Replacement warranties raise issues that don't even apply to today's advanced progressive technology. In those few times when a newly fit progressive requires replacement, let the patient assume the doctor or dispenser is replacing the lenses, not some remote lens manufacturer.

Doctor's re-do warranties. These are the most abused warranties. Re-do warranties should never encourage carelessness. Patients evaluate the skill and knowledge of their ECP by how smoothly the process works. When they have to make several extra trips to end up with a satisfactory pair of glasses, their opinion of the provider is diminished.

Track re-do rate: Lens replacements have become a major overhead factor and labs are now tracking them.

Pro-rate warranties: Another popular trend is the "pro-rating" of lens warranties. Similar to the way tire warranties are processed, the customer will be charged 50 percent of normal Rx cost for lenses replaced after one year. When they are replaced at six months after purchase, the charge is 25 percent of normal Rx cost.

Practitioners looking to fine-tune their patient services should check how warranties are handled in their offices. How this sensitive subject is handled has a great deal to do with how patients perceive your office.