As a user of medical equipment, you will face the situation that your equipment sometime will have a problem and requires Service or Repair. If you have a Service and Maintenance contract with the equipment manufacturer, you are all covered and they will handle it for you. They know the requirements to get the equipment to perform as it should, within the specifications of the manufacturer and they know who can do such repairs. If you are on your own, most likely you will do what we all do when we need to find something in today’s times….. you try to find help on the Internet using various search engines and search terms. Always a good combination is to use the part number in combination with the manufacturer and the term service or repair. This should get you the results you are looking for. But what now?

You might get various results and they all advertise they can fix your equipment. But is just a plain fix good enough? If your equipment is used for diagnostics you will need to make sure the performance after repair is within the manufacturer’s specifications and the set-up matches the manufacturer set-up otherwise you risk your patient health and life. As an authorized Service Provider for Siemens Medical CRT Monitors and Siemens / Eizo LCD Displays that are used for diagnostic, we would like to give you some guidance to find the right partner for you and your equipment to ensure your patients safety and health. Please note that the below is based on our experience and only tries to give some general guidance and does not represent the various detailed manufacturer regulations.

The key word is “manufacturer authorized”, we at the VeeArc Displays group will only repair and service Monitors and Displays that we are authorized for by the manufacturer. That means that we have been trained by the manufacturer and use the same parts, test procedures and alignment processes as the manufacturer does. As an example, we at VeeArc are required that we do not repair on component level (regardless of our capabilities of doing so). This way the manufacturer wants to avoid that a new component on a used board might cause a conflict with the specifications. We need to change complete circuit boards and use only and exclusively new original spare parts from the manufacturer. Also the test and adjustment software is unique from the manufacturer and is identical what is used at their Service department. This tools and parts are not available for anybody else besides an authorized partner or the manufacturer itself. So always ask for the manufacturer authorization before sending your equipment in for Service and Repair. We know from most manufacturers of Diagnostic Monitors and Displays that they have authorized partners or provide the service themselves. A manufacturer would never recommend that you shop around for the best price; they always would recommend that you go for the highest quality at an Authorized Service Center. But how can you identify an Authorized Service Center for a specific product vs. the various non-authorized providers?

Here a few hints with examples:

Manufacturer Authorized Service Partner: In our opinion, this authorization is the most important as this ensures that all manufacturer and FDA requirements are followed. Trained and supported partner from the manufacturer. Manufacturer warranty and more important the Liability stays valid after repair and the Service partner operates in compliance with FDA requirements for quality.

Factory trained technicians: means, the technicians are trained in a factory but most likely not in the manufacturer’s factory. This has nothing to do with “manufacturer trained” and is a misleading term that is often used to attract potential customers.

Multiple Manufacturer Offerings: most manufacturers (not all) are careful who they authorize for service as they don’t want their competition to get access to their specifications and design details. Request from service providers that offer the full range of services across various manufacturer brands their certificate of authorization before sending the equipment. Distributors are not necessary also authorized Service partners!

Cost efficient repairs and low pricing: Authorized Service Partners are mostly locked into a tight price scheme as they use original expensive assemblies vs. unauthorized cheap component level repair. In addition, some of the test and alignment procedures required from the manufacturers are very time consuming but necessary to make sure the equipment is within the manufacturer’s specifications before returned to you. Even that we all try to offer the most cost efficient and comprehensive pricing, our hands might be tied. Don’t jeopardize quality by cheap service. Ask if the repairs are performed as required by the manufacturer and with the proper authorization.

Quality reporting: As an authorized Service Partner for Eizo and Siemens, we have to report all product failures back to the manufacturer. FDA requires from the manufacturers traceability of all product failures and our reporting of your product problem is saved in the manufacturer’s database. How could a non-authorized Service Center support those FDA regulations?

Product Liability: Nearly all manufactures specify in their Terms & Conditions that their warranty and liability will be null and void in case a non-authorized work is performed on their equipment. Authorized Service Centers ensure that the warranty and liability stays valid and is honored by the manufacturers after any work is performed. Always ask for authorization and if the product liability will stay valid after the service.

In summary, there are excellent and professional Service providers out there in the market for the various products and we hope this article helps to identify who they are.

Do not to get fooled by tricky advertisements designed only to get your business and money without the care that a person’s life depends on your diagnosis.

We at VeeArc Monitor and Display Service guarantee that on the products we service, we follow the strict requirements from the manufacturers. Quality is not negotiable and we care about our customers and the patients the equipment is used on.