About a year ago I purchased a Garmin 7612xsv from a guy selling them on TheHullTruth.com. Price was right, unit was in good shape, transaction went without flaw. Everybody happy.
Fast forward a few months later, I couldn't get Active Captain working so I tried Garmin help desk. They took an unusually long time to respond, even for them and instead of a resolution from Garmin I got an email from a Detective in a South Florida Property Crimes division wanting a call back.
As it turns out, the unit was stolen in a rash of electronics thefts in South Florida shortly before I bought it. She asked me if I could return it to the seller, and when I explained it was permanently mounted and would cost me $$/time to pull out she didn't push further. I gave her all of the info on the seller all of the transaction correspondence and things went silent for months.
I reached out to the seller, who appears to be a guy with a day job peddling used electronics, told him what I learned from the detective and asked him to replace the unit. I was extremely surprised when he had no knowledge of the crime, hasn't been contacted by the detective and futhermore that he offered to send me a replacement in kind.
Moral of the story. I suppose I lucked out and there are good decent people out there. Also, the original owner was meticulous enough to have documented the SN of his electronics then reported the theft to the Police and Garmin which ultimately led to the recovery of his property. I'm certain that he's already filed an insurance claim, has a new & improved unit installed and happy, but hopefully he gets his property back while it still has some residual value ($2k) and enjoys the secret honey hole GPS #'s from S. FL I loaded on the unit for him.
Fast forward a few months later, I couldn't get Active Captain working so I tried Garmin help desk. They took an unusually long time to respond, even for them and instead of a resolution from Garmin I got an email from a Detective in a South Florida Property Crimes division wanting a call back.
As it turns out, the unit was stolen in a rash of electronics thefts in South Florida shortly before I bought it. She asked me if I could return it to the seller, and when I explained it was permanently mounted and would cost me $$/time to pull out she didn't push further. I gave her all of the info on the seller all of the transaction correspondence and things went silent for months.
I reached out to the seller, who appears to be a guy with a day job peddling used electronics, told him what I learned from the detective and asked him to replace the unit. I was extremely surprised when he had no knowledge of the crime, hasn't been contacted by the detective and futhermore that he offered to send me a replacement in kind.
Moral of the story. I suppose I lucked out and there are good decent people out there. Also, the original owner was meticulous enough to have documented the SN of his electronics then reported the theft to the Police and Garmin which ultimately led to the recovery of his property. I'm certain that he's already filed an insurance claim, has a new & improved unit installed and happy, but hopefully he gets his property back while it still has some residual value ($2k) and enjoys the secret honey hole GPS #'s from S. FL I loaded on the unit for him.