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I work for a non profit org. We sometimes purchase reconditioned laptops as they are good value for some use cases. We have a lot of WfH users so need to cour

I work for a non profit org. We sometimes purchase reconditioned laptops as they are good value for some use cases. We have a lot of WfH users so need to courier laptops to some staff. We recently had an insurance claim denied for a damaged reconditioned laptop as TNT/Fedex used a "no second hand goods" clause in their insurance to wriggle out paying up. This has not stopped me purchasing reconditioned laptops, but something to be aware of and taken into account. In fact just buying another reconditioned laptop was not a large expense and damaged laptops in transit are relatively rare.

poisonborz 3y ago
Good to know, but in practice this just means more and cheaper second hand devices to be available to the public.
kelnos 3y ago
You sorta hint at this in your post, but I assume that eating the cost of the rare damaged-in-transit laptop is still cheaper than paying full price for all-new hardware. And while I certainly understand that environmental impact might not be the chief concern for a company (even a non-profit), continuing to give secondhand hardware a new life is certainly way better for the environment. Regardless, it seems bonkers to me that a courier can get away with such a clause. You're paying them to ship something safely from point A to point B; it should be completely irrelevant what that thing is when it comes to paying you out for their mistakes.
- crazygringo 3y ago
  If you look at it from the courier's side it makes more sense though. It's obvious if an item was new and you can safely assume it was the delivery company that damaged it. Whereas for secondhand items there's no way of knowing the original shipping condition. And it would open up massive amounts of fraud where people would buy a cheap broken item on eBay (sold for parts), ship it to a nearby friend with full insurance, and then claim the shipper broke it. Insurance should still cover the case of an item lost in shipping however, regardless of new/secondhand, since there's no opportunity for fraud there.

poisonborz 3y ago

Good to know, but in practice this just means more and cheaper second hand devices to be available to the public.

kelnos 3y ago

You sorta hint at this in your post, but I assume that eating the cost of the rare damaged-in-transit laptop is still cheaper than paying full price for all-new hardware. And while I certainly understand that environmental impact might not be the chief concern for a company (even a non-profit), continuing to give secondhand hardware a new life is certainly way better for the environment. Regardless, it seems bonkers to me that a courier can get away with such a clause. You're paying them to ship something safely from point A to point B; it should be completely irrelevant what that thing is when it comes to paying you out for their mistakes.

crazygringo 3y ago
If you look at it from the courier's side it makes more sense though. It's obvious if an item was new and you can safely assume it was the delivery company that damaged it. Whereas for secondhand items there's no way of knowing the original shipping condition. And it would open up massive amounts of fraud where people would buy a cheap broken item on eBay (sold for parts), ship it to a nearby friend with full insurance, and then claim the shipper broke it. Insurance should still cover the case of an item lost in shipping however, regardless of new/secondhand, since there's no opportunity for fraud there.