Awful Experience with my Portuguese Yacht Club Chronograph

I purchased the silver face Portuguese Yacht Club Chronograph a few months back and absolutely loved it. After reading a few posts on the forum I began to be skeptical of the durability and craftsmanship. Sure enough within 6 weeks of buying the watch and taking extreme care each day, the crown stopped moving the hands as if the inner crown wheel was stripped. I took it to retailer in HK and they told me that they would have to send the watch back to Switzerland and wait time could be up to 5 months!!! I just bought the watch! 5 months! I then asked if they could give me a replacement as I am in an industry where a beautiful watch is important. Answer was no. So here i am spending US$15k on a watch that breaks in the first 6 weeks. I could have bought a Timex. Its now 6 weeks since the watch has been shipped and after numerous emails, no update on the status of my watch. After what was a big and exciting investment in what I thought was a "timepiece" has been a very upsetting and frustrating experience. I would seriously reconsider my purchase of an IWC product after this experience. Extremely frustrated....

I feel sorry for you after learning what you have experienced and I am very sure IWC will get your watch back to original state soonest.

I have not encounter any problem so far but I think IWC would need to step up on the quality control of their production as lately I have heard of forum members reporting technical issue on their new purchase. But, in any production of any product, there bound to be some not able to meet the standard even with much care.

I hope you could restore your confidence soon and enjoy the many good years ahead with your lovely Yacht Club.

Sorry to read this - but this is a user error, owner misuse issue. You stripped the crown by not properly pushing the crown into position. It will not strip itself. If you had questions about the crown durability, and still wanted the watch - you should have spent another $250 on a simple winder to keep the watch set and running - and never need to loosen/tighten and twist the crown.

Couldn't bite my tongue long enough - afraid all these service/quality complaint posts are going to become the death of this forum.

Hi Ardoise,

Im not sure this is the case as I've had the time reset twice. Once by IWC where I was instructed on how to do it, and once by myself. I wore the watch almost everyday so there was never an issue of constant resetting. The crown itself is fine and disengages when untwisted and tightens when engaged and pushed into position. The actual hands will only move a few degrees for each twist of the crown which was not the case when I first bought the watch. I highly doubt there was any misuse or mishandling as it was set two times in 6 weeks. Pretty unbelievable if you ask me. For a brand such as IWC to make a watch that cannot be reset once or twice is pretty ridiculous if you ask me, but thanks for your comment. Ill think about the winder when/if I get my watch back.

Regards

Indeed, the forum rules ask that service issues be off-line, since they are usually individual and cannot be validated here. I have been asked by management to not use a heavy hand here, but this is beginning to change the character of the forum.

Rob, I'm sorry to hear of your problem. It will get fixed, and faster than they told you. Although I cannot see your watch, Ardoise is almost certainly right, although I'm sure you didn't realize you did anything. I have had similar problems with other brands, including Patek and Breguet.

I would ask that there not be follow-up posts here. If there are individual questions, feel free to E-mail me. Thanks.

Understood