Rent-a-LED

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Perth, 2nd May 2014

The story of the day at work today has to be about how LED and its lighting manufacturers are starting to high-jack the way we do our business. I met up with a local supplier this morning to discuss some project requirements and we gradually got into a big discussion about the LED Cowboys and how the whole LED tsunami is changing the way we work, the way we look at things when it comes to lighting. When we started to discuss about LED warranty I was told of how property agents are now more or less forced to re-write the rental contracts of their properties to include clauses about LED and its maintenance in case of failures!

LED manufacturers pride themselves about the longevity of their LED systems so when new developments are being fitted out with LED lighting together with 5 to 10 years warranty obviously one would expect not to have to replace any LED’s if you sign a 5 to 10 year lease. In the older days (not so far behind!) the tenant takes care of replacing blown or faulty lamps, for a few dollars it’s done. Now, with the need to replace complete LED fixtures when they fail, you can be up for several 100’s of dollars, so not surprisingly big property agents like JLL in Australia are resorting to inserting specific clauses in the rental contract in regards to the maintenance of LED lights making the owners responsible!

This of course is opening Pandora’s Box! This means that the property agent needs to get the manufacturer/suppliers endorsement on the warranty together with the procedures to replace faulty fittings. But as we all know the LED Cowboys, have 100’s of ways to wiggle themselves out of these kind of situations! First of all does warranty actually mean 5 or 10 years from day of installation or does it mean 50,000 hours? There is a big difference! Then does the warranty accept lights being used 24 hours a day? We all know the small lettering on some manufacturers LED packaging with a disclaimer that the 50,000 hours is with a maximum use of 4 hours a day! How to police that? I will be very interested to see one of these rental contracts which has a LED clause in it! For now it is just hearsay for me but I can fully sympathise with the situation!

Light Watch 5-73: Here are just some applications in and around the house with LED! Have a great weekend! I am off to celebrate my big six-o tomorrow! Cheers!