Not trying to pick a fight here but even if your statement "ACTUALLY FIND A PROBLEM PLAYFIELD ON A GB PREMIUM MANUFACTURED IN THE PAST 2 WEEKS OR NEWER" is true, that doesn't mean that it's safe to buy a machine today. If you buy one today you could get a playfield from more than two weeks ago. I bought an LE and I have numerous ghosting inserts and cracked clear on my machine. I don't regret my purchase one bit and I have faith that Stern will fix it but everyone buying right now should just keep in mind that there's a chance that they'll have to do a playfield swap in a few months and that they'll be down for a little while. And that's best case. Worse case, you are stuck with a bad playfield forever but I just don't see that happening.

Bottom line, if you don't want to be hassled them wait a little longer.

I haven't seen that discussed on here that I can remember but I can say this. I remember someone posting warranty info for a Stern machine and there was a disclaimer about the warranty only being valid for the original purchaser. But that doesn't mean that Stern won't help you. It just seems that they don't HAVE to help you if you are a buying a used machine. I think I'd buy a new one or call Stern first and feel them out on how they'd handle something like this. I emailed them about my playfield issues two months ago today and I haven't received any kind of acknowledgement from them so email may not be the best way to reach them. I'm following this thread and waiting til others here more info on the program before I start pestering them. I figure they are keeping a tight lip on it because they don't have the program ironed out or ready to launch yet.

But on a positive note, GB is a great game. It's worth getting in my opinion just maybe not right now until they get these playfield issues fixed.

Quoting myself here. Hah. I found the exact verbiage for the warranty that was posted:

STERN PINBALL INC. SELLER WARRANTS ONLY TO THE INITIAL PURCHASER OF ITS
PRODUCTS THAT THE ITEMS LISTED BELOW ARE FREE FROM DEFECTS IN MATERIAL
AND WORKMANSHIP UNDER NORMAL USE AND SERVICE FOR THE WARRANTY PERIOD
SPECIFIED; WARRANTY PERIODS ARE EFFECTIVE FROM THE INITIAL DATE OF SHIPMENT
FROM SELLER TO DISTRIBUTOR.

But now that I'm re-reading it I'm thinking that we might not be viewed as the initial purchaser of the machine since we all purchase from re-sellers. So maybe there's not as much to be worried about in that wording. I'm not an attorney so I don't know. Maybe someone else can be of more help?

Signed!

What's been everyone's experience with the playfield replacement program? Or is there another thread for that somewhere?

I have an LE and it's been ghosting and has cracked clear in the shooting lane since before August of last year. I contacted my dealer in August and they CC'ed Stern in but no one ever replied. I knew the program wasn't in place yet so I left it alone. I just wanted it documented that I was having issues that early on. Then I heard the program was rolling out but people were getting bad replacement playfields. So I held on some more to let that sort itself out.

I finally reached back out to Stern and my dealer a month ago and I've barely gotten anywhere. Sometimes they respond to emails, sometimes they don't. The latest word is that they don't have any playfields at the moment but hope to in the next month and I can do the swap then.

My biggest question is this: what's the downtime like for the swap? I know several have said they did an instant swap at their dealer (Stern mails new playfield to dealer, you take your old playfield and swap it at the dealer) and that's what I'm pushing for. But if they insist on going to mail route I'd like to know if we're talking several weeks of a down game or what. Any insight would be greatly appreciated!

I finally got it squared away but man...dealing with Stern was an awful experience. It wasn't until my distro got involved that things were fixed. They literally had everything worked out within hours. New playfield is being shipped to my distro and I'll swap there so I don't have to deal with mailing mine back and having an empty cabinet sitting around for 2-4 weeks.

I'll be honest...This was my second NIB purchase from Stern and probably my last. Customer service means a lot to me and the way I was ignored over and over and over again really bugs me. I don't blame you for sending the game back. Ghostbusters is a dream theme for me though so I wasn't going to go that far personally. Had it been a game that wasn't a dream theme though...I think I would have done the same. I was probably going to be in on a SW but now I think I'll use that money and buy a few Williams games instead.

I've found that Stern either won't reply to your email at all or they will take days/weeks to reply. The only thing that's worked for me is to force my distro to get involved and email them. Whenever my distro stepped in, several emails were exchanged in an hour or two. Might be worth a shot getting your distro involved. Either way, good luck on getting it all squared away!

Again? Pat was out for a week when I contacted them last month.

I haven't been taken care of by Stern. I was a day one LE purchaser and one of the first people in the US to get an LE. I reported my ghosting issue on August 18th of last year. We're weeks away from the one year mark and I still have my ghosting and chipping playfield. I've emailed (many, many times), called, got my distro involved, etc. I keep either getting completely ignored or told it'll be resolved in the coming weeks. The last time I heard from anyone at Stern was June 30th when I was told I'd be taken care of in July. We're in the final days of July but so far, nothing.

Will Stern eventually take care of me? Probably. But the fact that I've been trying to get this resolved for a year is simply unacceptable. The lack of communication by the Stern team is also unacceptable. I've had multiple emails outright ignored for weeks until I have to step back in and remind them that they have a customer that's waiting to hear from them. Even then those emails will sometimes to ignored.

I'm not so much upset about the problem as I am the lack of a timely resolution. That's why I won't be purchasing another NIB Stern. It doesn't make any sense to me that some have had their playfields replaced within a few weeks but I've been waiting around for a year. And yes, I've emailed Gary about the issue multiple times as well. No response.

Man...what really stinks about this is all of us with games from last year that have playfields that need to be replaced. I've been waiting on a replacement for my GBLE for over a year now. I was trying really hard to get one a few months ago when everyone was reporting the issue was gone but now here we are again.

It'll be very disappointing if I get a replacement playfield and have ghosting again.

The year long wait has mostly been due to Stern flat out ignoring most of my emails. I finally got sick of them ignoring my emails and got my distro involved. Interestingly enough, Stern was quick to respond to all of their emails. They agreed to a replacement in June of this year and said that they don't have an ETA on playfields yet but were hoping to have more in stock in July. We're past July now obviously and inching closer to being past August. My plan was to contact my distro again the first week in September but now I'm worried that I'll just end up with another bad playfield. My current playfield has been ghosting since I got it last year and has been progressively getting worse. I also have chipped clear in the shooter lane.

And I finally got my GBLE playfield yesterday! It only took them 13 months to resolve mine.

Here's what a bit shady...this whole time they've been "waiting" for playfields to be done and then we received an email last week saying the next batch was being finished as we speak and they were mailing them out right away. But the playfield I received yesterday (which again is supposedly brand new) was signed by JT. Given the recent news about JT, I'm a little confused as to how this playfield is "new". It was also pretty dusty but I'm not sure if that was dust from it sitting for a while or dust from being in a factory.

I looked at the playfields side by side (I wish I would have taken a picture for you guys) and the difference is astounding. The colors are WAY more vibrant on my new playfield.

I got her installed last night and there weren't any issues. Even Slimer works properly this time. I was one of the first to get an LE last year and I had to mod my Slimer so he didn't drag all that metal plate above the GHOST newton ball.

I do see what could be ghosting on one of the inserts though so I'll have to keep an eye on that. I hope I don't have to go through this process a second time. This first time was already enough for me to never want to buy a NIB Stern again.

Thanks for the info. I didn't know that!

Just a quick picture I took with the glass on but you can see a little something going on to the left of the "g" in storage facility. Hopefully that's not ghosting.

storage (resized).jpg