Leaders and Laggards II
A scorecard of 25 products to assess how easily and thoroughly consumers can access repair documentation and spare parts
Some one-third of Americans live in a state with a Right to Repair law that requires manufacturers to provide fair access to repair materials including spare parts and service manuals. But our report finds that, despite these requirements, many manufacturers do not provide the things people need for repairs
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When things break, you should fix them. But oftentimes, we struggle to get what we need to get repairs done. That’s why every state has considered Right to Repair legislation: To remove barriers to fixing modern products.
Right to Repair legislation has been in place for many consumer products in Minnesota and California for one year now, and New York for 6 months longer. The goal of the new laws is to ensure that product owners and independent technicians have access to the parts, tools and manuals needed to repair electronics.
This report examines whether manufacturers provide necessary repair materials. Unfortunately, our investigation found widespread refusal to provide access to service manuals, and continued issues accessing spare parts.
We created scorecard for a set of products to gauge how manufacturers are supporting our Right to Repair. Some products fared well, but most are lagging behind. We graded 25 products, five each in five different categories: dishwashers, phones, tablets, laptops and gaming devices.
Of those products, 40% received a D or an F, 28% received Bs or Cs, and 32% received As. Of these products, we could not access a repair manual for 48%, and 44% had no spare parts available.
Some other notable findings:
- No dishwasher scored above a C.
- Laptops all received As or Bs, reflecting the improvement in repair programs for laptops across the board.
- Even though consumer electronics companies are doing well with repair material availability for smartphones and laptops, tablet repair materials lag behind, even for the same manufacturers.
- MSI, Atari, and Sony all fail to provide any repair materials for the game consoles we reviewed.
In addition to the products we scored, we reached out to companies to gather information about how they respond to people requesting service information or spare parts. We found that many customer service agents would claim repair materials are not available or that they were “not able to provide a repair manual,” despite the laws requiring exactly that.
The bottom line: Enforcement action is needed
While some companies have clearly adjusted to the requirements of Right to Repair laws, and recently released manuals and spare parts to the public, far too many of the companies we reached do not make those materials available.
In order to achieve the goals of Right to Repair — that consumers and independent shop owners can get what we need to repair our products — we may need more forceful intervention from attorneys general in states with active legislation. We also believe additional states should pursue legislation, strengthening to address any shortcomings we find, and increasing the pressure on manufacturers to provide the repair access we seek.
Topics
Authors
Nathan Proctor
Senior Director, Campaign for the Right to Repair, U.S. PIRG Education Fund
Nathan leads U.S. PIRG’s Right to Repair campaign, working to pass legislation that will prevent companies from blocking consumers’ ability to fix their own electronics. Nathan lives in Arlington, Massachusetts, with his wife and two children.
Lucas Gutterman
Director, Designed to Last Campaign, U.S. PIRG Education Fund
Lucas leads PIRG’s Designed to Last campaign, fighting against obsolescence and e-waste and winning concrete policy changes that extend electronic consumer product lifespans and hold manufacturers accountable for forcing upgrades or disposal.
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