I would like to share my bitter experience with kent peral water purifier. The objective of this mail is to enrich the fellow citizens about the facts so that at least they can protect themselves from bad experiences and loosing money.
Myself and my neighbors purchased three Kent pearl water purifiers on 16 Jun 12 for 15, 000/ (machine serial number KR120502485) at hyderabad-. At that time it is supposed to be the best and high end model (as per kent)from kent. One of its feature is 15 liters purified water output in one hour. The said output as per the kent is at 750 ppm hardness and at room temp.
I have connected the purifier to the ground water supply and the hardness is around 750ppm. One of its feature is auto cutoff once the storage tank is full. From the day of installation, it never produced beyond 8 liters in one hour time period. I measured the water coming from the wastage pipe (kent calls it as dirty water ) and found that it is wasting nearly 33 to 36 liters liters of water for producing 8 liters of purified water. Both the time and wastage were rude shock to me. Then, I tried to contact their call center its experience is given below.
No single point contact / call center :
The kent web site displays the following number 1800 100 1000 . But this is not applicable if you are from outside Delhi. Then what is the use of call from any where ????. only kent and its aggrieved customers know? After calling this number it asks your STD code and it advises you to call some other number ?????. what a wonderful customer service ?.
A company which wants to track the service requests / grievance generally wont ask customers to call directly the dealers. Here, kent is asking to contact the dealers directly. Then what control kent is having over the grievance of the customers ???. hope you are intelligent enough to guess !!!!.
Complaint to the dealer where I purchased : .Finally , I came to know the kent is directing the call and expecting the dealer who sold the product to attend the complaint. Then, I called the dealer and explained the issue. The dealer simply refused to attend my complaint and said that it is not a problem at all. In fact, he told me that there may not be sufficient water pressure. (There is a motor in the machine to pump the water into the RO !!!!). Then. I started searching their web and lodged the complaint in the web.
Web complaint :
After lodging the complaint in the web , I got a mail from kent manager and he directed the dealer to attend the call. There the matter ended.
Complaint un attended :
Now, due to the directions from kent after ten days , dealer has send the technician and here they played the trick. When the wastage water is more and time taken is high means, RO is not performing properly. Instead of attending the RO, they simply changed one small device called the flow regualtor at the RO wastage water output so that flow of waste water is reduced . This I came to know very recently . Due to this, pressure will build up on the membrane filter and it will fail. Pressure exerted by RO motor must be sufficient to produce proper output under normal circumstances no need to further restrict the flow, provided RO is working properly. Had this trick (further controlling waste water output using a device other than company provided spec) is revealed to me at that time, I would have returned the machine then itself. As a normal customer , it is just impossible to notice these things. Again, I measured the wastage output after technicians visit and found that there is no much improvement. Now, there is nobody to monitor / respond. I have not even signed the call sheet stating that, it was not attended properly and since there is no improvement. Kent , not bothered to see the reasons for customers feed back. This itself shows , how the kent tracks the customer complaints.
My neighbors RO failed :
Just with in one year, the RO membrane failed and Kent replaced it free of cost. What sort of quality kent is delivering to the customers ?. There is no alarm from the machine.
Alarm / sensor indication :
As per the kent, alarm will come automatchandru021y and accordingly you should change the filters like sediment, active carbon etc. As per the booklet provided with the machine, RO membrane should be changed after 24 months .
No indication for RO failure :
It is a really surprising to note that, there is no mechanism in the machine to know whether the RO membrane is working or not for normal customers.
problem withMy RO membrane :
My usage is restricted to 8 liters of pure water per day. I bought the machine on 16.6.12. I have already explained about the wastage water problem. On 23.6.13, I was bit free and decided to measure the waste water. To my surprise it is wasting nearly 65 to 70 liters of water merrily and taking 3 hours to produce 8 liters. There is no alarm. Then, I asked my neighbor about his machine performance. He told me that his RO membrane failed and Kent replaced 10 days back. Luckily in his case the out put is very very low. That is the reason he colud find out. Where as in my case , I could not detect because , we rarely empty the tank and take measurement of time and waste water. I contacted the kent manager through mail on 25.6.13 and he directed the dealer to check the problem. On 26.6.13 dealer sent the technician and he declared that RO membrane needs to be changed and for that I have to pay 2200 RO cost + 350 service charge. I have send email to kent manager stating that, the problem is existing before the expiry of warranty (I reported after 9 days of warranty) since RO membrane cannot fail in one week or few days. Also, I told them we bought three machines together and for two machines RO failed and told that there could be a batch problem. Also, I told kent that, since there is no normal indication (because you cannot every day measure time and waste water isn’t) to identify the problem, I asked for free rectification. Kent, local team informed that, they have escalated the matter to their headquarters. Still no response even after 20 days.
Now, I want you to think , decide how a normal consumer will track these issues ???. is it not kents responsibility to supply quality products ?.
High price for spares :
For example, kent is using, FILMTEC RO membrane 1812-75GPD. The cost of the kent RO membrane is 2200/-. In the market, FILMTEC 1812-75GPD is available for 1100 to 1200 /(check ebay.in)-. That means kent is simply charging double the price. Other filters like sediment, active carbon cost is also will be just double the market price.
AMC for the machine :
As per the information given by kent team , AMC wont cover, any filters, RO membrane, UV. AMC is only for pump + micro controller + solenoid. The AMC quoted is around 3000/-.
Annual cost after one year of warranty :
RO membrane : 2200
Filters (3) : 1000
AMC : 3000
UV lamp /year : 400
Total cost is : 6600/- + Electricity + raw water cost etc. is it economical ??. per month cost is around : 550/- + other costs
In fact, if you change sediment and active carbon twice a year then cost will further increase !!!.
No seal/ hologram / no guarantee for the spare parts :
I bought sediment and active carbon filters from the dealer. These filters size is around 10 inches. But, the said dealer gave me 8” inch active carbon filter and told me that now kent is not supplying 10inch hence, they are using 8 “inch only for kent peral also !!!!. That means even there is no proper spare management. Kent , says, you go to the dealer where you bought the machine. surprisingly, there is no sealed packing for these products. No serial number. No guarantee. Is it a professional company ???. As a normal customer, you don’t know whether you are getting a brand new or used product. Machine wont give alarm about the quality ofwater !!!. Then , how can you expect safe water from the machine ???.
It is cheap to buy RO water cans than using Kent RO :
I need 300 liters purified water for one month . which is equal to 12 cans of 25 L each. Each can cost ( with door delivery cost is Rs 35/-). Monthly cost = 420/-. It is cheaper than to maintain kent peral machine.
Campaign by kent “Zero wastage” :
Recently , kent started a ad campaign stating that ZERO water wastage. As of now no RO on earth can produce purified water with out venting out waste water. Then , I am wondering how this is possible which is beyond the scientific principles. How , their RO systems became zero liter wastage from above mentioned performance.
So friends, please take a informed decision on the RO system before buying . It is not only the money, but, wasting the precious water with out the knowledge of user. After all, we should not abuse nature in the by wasting 60 liters of water for producing 8 liters of drinking water. !!!!
Now, I have decided to buy the water cans which is economical. I searched the ebay and local market, there are many RO models with FILM TEC RO membrane, Philips UV lamp which costs around 10, 000/ with same one year warranty !!!!. For these items, you will get spares at half the price !!!!.
Have a good day.
Sreenivasa Rao
Email : sreeniya@yhoo.com
Hyderabad