Consumer Product Portability as Related to Warranty Rulemaking

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has the responsibility for determining what may be reasonably expected of consumers in their fulfillment of the terms of a consumer product warranty. The problem of defining consumer product portability within the context of a consumer product return activity is discussed and the results of a controlled experiment which directly relates to the task of establishing maximum reasonable product weight for a consumer product return activity are presented. Distributions of maximum reasonable weight for product return are presented and recommendations are given for warranty rulemaking. Continuing research aimed at developing a consumer product portability index is summarized.