macular degeneration, macular, diagnosis To a Good Home – My Macular Degeneration Journey/Journal

To a Good Home

This page is bad news, good news. First the bad news: my CCTV popped a pop rivet. For those of you who are as woefully ignorant of all things mechanical as I am, a pop rivet is a little piece of metal that goes through two holes to hold two pieces of metal together. They differ from screws in that you don’t screw them in and they stay in place because the tool used flattens them at both ends.

The pop rivet came out of the metal track my document tray rides on. The track kept sliding and allowing the tray to pull out a lot farther than it was supposed to. The whole machine nearly toppled into my lap a couple of times.

Looked like a fairly easy fix to me, but then what do I know?  I was raised on “good enough for poor people” when it came to home repairs.

That was my father’s version of DBT’s ‘effectively’ concept. If it gets the job done, who cares about right or pretty?

Anyway, I called my BVS case manager. I was thinking someone locally could pop in a $.03 pop rivet. He in turn called the equipment sales guy and the sales guy wanted me to send my machine back!

Hold on! Wait! Why don’t we just chop off an arm here? I NEED my machine. I am able to work because I have this machine!

We compromised. I get to keep my machine until a new one comes. Apparently there is a decent warranty on these things and it covers popped pop rivets.

I feel bad about it. Quite frankly I love my machine. It made me functional again. I feel sort of disloyal sending it back for a lousy missing pop rivet. Just the same, the new one is on its way. The company is making good.

Having this happen made me wonder if once they put a new pop rivet in my machine would it still go to a good home? I decided to look on line and see what the story is.

I went on line and found four or five places that sell “pre-owned equipment for the visually impaired”.  They were all companies and not individuals.  Most of the same sites came up when I also searched for “refurbished” equipment for the visually impaired.

You might, however, want to be careful searching for the word refurbished. When I looked at the sites that came up under that heading most of what I found looked new and had ‘new’ prices. Check things out well.

About the best selection I found was New England Vision and Blindness. They had a list of equipment with the age and a rating of the condition of each piece. The problem with this list was it was last updated nine months prior to my search.

On the other hand New English Vision and Blindness offered a link to – where else? – Amazon and the five or so pieces listed there were available for immediate shipping. The prices for used CCTVs were about $1200 less than my new one had been.

Again, no endorsement. I am reporting I found the site, not saying to shop there.

So, for what it is worth, my CCTV company is honoring the warranty. My CCTV is going back and hopefully will be repaired and sold to another good home. Pre-owned equipment is available. It is a tad cheaper. There might be something for you through a reseller. If it is my CCTV, give it a good home, please.

Next: hurry up and wait

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