I purchased a Casio EX-Z75 digital camera about a year ago and for the most part it’s been working perfectly and it’s a very good camera. However, I didn’t use it for about 2 months or so and it seems the rechargeable lithium ion battery is dead (it’s a NP-20 battery). When I try to recharge it, the red light on the charger just keeps blinking. After 2 sessions of charging for several hours, I gave up. I searched online and found out a lot of people also had this problem with this camera’s battery.
Call Casio for a Replacement Battery
Well, all you need to do is call up Casio customer service at 1-800-435-7732, explain the situation to them, and they’ll send out a new battery free of charge. They’ll ask you for information like your name and address, the model of the camera, where you bought the camera, and the serial number (it’s on the box and on the bottom of the camera). I think the most important thing is the serial no. because that’s the only way they can verify you own this model camera. They can’t exactly just give anyone who calls a free battery.
Common Issue With Rechargeable Lithium Ion Batteries
They’re aware that this is a common issue. Apparently lithium ion batteries naturally lose their charge when not in use. So if you’re not using the camera for an extended period of time, you’ll need to take out the battery once in a while and recharge it. I didn’t think the battery would just die out like this and be completely unusable. My laptop battery is the same – it completely loses its charge when I don’t use it for a while but I’m always able to recharge it. The battery doesn’t just die out like the camera battery.
Great Customer Service from Casio
Casio’s customer service is US-based and very friendly. Hold time was extremely short too. A recording said that estimated hold time was 48 seconds and I was immediately connected. At first I was expecting it to say 48 minutes! I was pleasantly surprised when it said “seconds” instead. I also got the new battery very fast – I called on Monday and got the battery today. They said it would take 2-3 days to process and ship out so it’s nice to get it earlier than expected. Casio shipped it UPS 2nd Day Air which is also very considerate of them (it came from NJ though so that’s probably why it was so fast). All in all, a very painless and pleasant experience with Casio customer service. Although it would be even better if they used batteries that don’t have this issue.
They sent the exact same battery so I hope I don’t run into this issue again. I guess the lesson is if you’re not using the camera, at least take out the battery and recharge it every few weeks.
UPDATE: If Your Camera is Out of Warranty
According to many people who have commented, if your camera is out of warranty (usually 1 year), Casio will not replace your battery. My own camera was still within warranty so your experience with Casio may not be as pleasant.
A suggestion might be go to your credit card company (if you used a credit card to purchase the camera). Many credit cards extend or double the manufacturer warranty and may compensate you for needed repairs or replacements. You’ll need to check with your credit card company to see if they offer this.
Nov 2009 Update
So my battery died AGAIN. This time around I didn’t go to Casio because it was well out of warranty. I picked up a cheap replacement on Amazon.com (search for NP-20 battery). The fact that this happened a second time is pretty annoying. The Casio EX-Z75 is great, and I know it’s the battery that’s problematic and not the camera, but if the battery dies, you have a non-functional camera and I feel that’s a legitimate knock on Casio. If you’re looking into digital cameras I would suggest not buying cameras that use the NP-20 battery like the Casio EX-Z75.
Of course, if you use your camera on a regular basis, you likely will never run into this problem. But if you don’t use your camera for long periods (2-3 months) the Np-20 battery will die.
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