I'm Shaking My Fist at Benelli Marketing

[RiverRat]

OK, so yesterday I picked up a Benelli shotgun that I ordered through a local gunshop. Today, I went to fill in the online registration, thinking that is usually easier than mailing a form.

I was shocked to see that required input fields for online WARRANTY registration included:
Annual income range
Education level
Employment
Marital status
Birthdate and age
Phone number
email address

What the heck?

I wanted to notify Benelli that I purchased one of their products, so if it fails they can uphold their obligation to repair it. What I get is a bombardment of mandatory fields whose only feasible use is marketing demographics. My income range and marital status have nothing to do with servicing my shotgun.

In the grand scheme of things, this really isn't worth getting as worked up as I am. I will be providing a much abbreviated warranty card through the mail and have already sent Benelli a separate email suggesting that they decouple marketing efforts from their service department.

Nonetheless, this experience left me with a very bad taste in my mouth for Benelli.

[Waveman]

It is standard marketing, they want to know as much as possible about who their customers are. Usually the fields you( or any one else) object to are voluntary. These days we are all in someones data base and that means we are in everyone's data base.

[RiverRat]

You'll note that whose are required fields for the Benelli online registration. The can dig as much as they want for optional information, but when the fields become mandatory it's pretty wrong (IMO)

[Hmac]

Like most warranties, the Benelli warranty is based on a copy of the purchase receipt, not the "warranty registration card". Like most "warranty registration cards", Benelli's is nothing more than a marketing survey. In order to get you to fill it out, they leave you with the impression that you have to jump through that silly hoop or your warranty will be void. Bullshit. That's not even close to legal under the Magnuson-Moss warranty act. Keep your receipt, throw the warranty registration card away.

[UWone77]

Whether you're purchasing a television or a mop, seems like those kinds of questions are always asked. I don't have a problem filling them out. If they ask a question that I don't feel like answering, I just skip over it. Not much to it.