Case Study 5

What are the relative costs of OEM versus refilled cartridges for a typical printer?

Anything OEM is always going to much more expensive and sometimes going for “off brand” or “cheaper version” works just as well for some things. In the case of a typical printer, let us use for this example any Kodak printer using #10 ink cartridges.

If you are just printing at home simple things like word documents or something in which picture quality is not needed, in all honesty use refillable cartridges (also not being lazy is a plus). The reason being is that you save a lot by getting refillable cartridges more than 50% sometimes compared to OEM products. Only thing is as stated u lower cost on ink but you also lower picture quality prints. So this option is meant more for the average Joe who is not printing pictures on their home computer.

On another note OEM products are just easy. Plain and simple there is no need to pull out any tools just unwrap and insert into the printer and you’re good to go. So for those of us that are lazy and don’t mind paying the couple extra bucks at home go OEM.

What factors other than cost should be considered in making a decision about OEM versus refilled cartridges? What are the pros and cons in this decision?

OEM

Pros Easy just unwrap and go Better quality prints in regards to pictures Some type of limited warranty Cons Expensive

Refillable

Pros Large savings on the cost of ink Comparable prints in regards to word processing Cons Toner leakage / messy No warranty (at your own risk)

I think one of the biggest factors other than cost that should be considered would have to be time. You must ask yourself will I have to time or do I want to put out the time to actually fill these cartridges when it comes to the refillable ones. Also refilling those cartridges can be very messy and if you have animals or children around that can be hazardous.

http://www.ehow.com/how_6908165_refill-kodak-_10-ink-cartridges.html

Do some printer manufactures discourage printer users from purchasing refilled cartridges? How?

Many printer manufactures discourage use of refillable cartridges because of leakage of ink, if not filled correctly it can get on the other components of the printer and cause other issues. 

Most printer manufactures will void your warranty if any use of refillable cartridges is noticed.

How might the purchase and use of refilled printer cartridges impact the work of the support team? Are the users in book production likely to experience increased problems with refilled cartridges that will result in more incidents for the user support team?

Using the refilled cartridges will impact the work of the support team greatly due to the fact that they will now have to be refilling those cartridges as well as any other support they normally do, thus taking up valuable time for other things to be done.

The users will also experience increased problems when using the refillable cartridges because having to have the support team come out to refill the cartridges will cut into production time and be a hassle. As well as the quality of prints may not be the same. Using refillable cartridges for this business may not be beneficial it will cause more headaches and cost more because the support team will be stuck trying to solve printer issues when they could be solving other pressing issues.