Is an Extended Warranty on a Rugged Tablet Worth It?

An extended warranty on a rugged tablet is worth considering if you plan to keep the device for three years or more, you would struggle to work without it for a week, and the plan price is a small share of what you paid. It is not worth it if you replace your kit every couple of years, if you could live with a cheap stopgap while a repair happened, or if the plan would cost more than the fix you are worried about. This guide sets out what the included warranty covers, what the 3-Year Warranty adds, what it costs as a share of the device price, and how to decide. It is general signposting, not financial advice.

What You Already Get

Every Tuga device comes with a 12 month warranty against defects in materials and workmanship, included in the price. If the device develops a fault that is our responsibility within that year, we repair it or replace it with the same or an equivalent model, at no charge. The battery is covered against defects for those 12 months too, though normal capacity loss is not a defect under any plan.

Two things it does not do. It does not cover accidental damage, so a screen cracked in a fall or a device run over by the van is not a warranty claim (Total Care, below, is the plan that covers that). And after 12 months it stops: a defect in month 14 is repaired at your cost.

Carriage depends on how you bought. Under the included warranty a business buyer pays to send a faulty device to us and we pay the return leg. A consumer with a faulty device has the postage paid both ways. The warranty page sets this out in a table, and the Plan Terms give the numbered clauses behind every line.

What the 3-Year Warranty Adds

The 3-Year Warranty is the included warranty for longer: it runs for 36 months from the dispatch date instead of 12, on exactly the same terms. Months 1 to 12 are the warranty you already have; months 13 to 36 are what you are buying. The same rules apply in the extra two years: repair or replacement at our choice, at no charge, with no limit on the number of defect repairs, the same carriage and the same ten-working-day workshop target.

Two details matter before you compare it against the price.

• The battery is covered against defects for the full 36 months. Normal capacity loss is still excluded, but a pack that fails rather than fades is a claim. On the Tuga W8 and Tuga W10 a replacement pack is sent to you by road courier to fit yourself. On the Tuga A6, Tuga A8, Tuga A10 and Tuga WH6 we replace the pack in our workshop and test the seal before the device comes back.
• It stays with the device. Pass the device to another UK user, tell us, and the warranty runs for the rest of the term.

It does not cover accidental damage, liquid damage, theft or loss. For a fleet of five or more, Total Care does; for one or two devices, cover for drops and losses is a conversation with an insurance provider, not a reason to buy this plan.

What It Costs, Against the Device

The 3-Year Warranty is one price per device, the same whether you buy one or twenty: £65 on the A6, A8 and A10, £79 on the W8 and W10, and £89 on the WH6. Scanner versions cost £15 more, because the scan engine is one more part to repair or replace: £94 on the W8 and W10 with 2D Scanner, and £104 on the WH6 with Barcode Scanner. No VAT to add. Here is what that comes to as a share of each device price, rounded to the nearest whole percent.

• Tuga A6: £65 on a £349 device. 65 divided by 349 is about 19%.
• Tuga A8: £65 on a £379 device. 65 divided by 379 is about 17%.
• Tuga A10: £65 on a £449 device. 65 divided by 449 is about 14%.
• Tuga W8: £79 on a £629 device. 79 divided by 629 is about 13%.
• Tuga W10: £79 on a £649 device. 79 divided by 649 is about 12%.
• Tuga WH6: £89 on a £699 device. 89 divided by 699 is about 13%.
• Tuga W8 with 2D Scanner: £94 on a £699 device. 94 divided by 699 is about 13%.
• Tuga W10 with 2D Scanner: £94 on a £729 device. 94 divided by 729 is about 13%.
• Tuga WH6 with Barcode Scanner: £104 on a £779 device. 104 divided by 779 is about 13%.

Another way to look at it is the cost per extra year of cover, since the plan buys you two more years. £65 over two years is £32.50 a year. £79 is £39.50 a year. £89 is £44.50 a year. £94 is £47 a year, and £104 is £52 a year. Set that against what a day without the device costs you, and what an out of warranty repair or a replacement would cost in year two or three.

The plan is proportionally most expensive on the cheapest device: nearly a fifth of the price on the A6, about an eighth on the W10. That is not a reason to skip it on the A6, which is also the device most likely to ride on a belt all day, but it is a reason to think harder there than on a tablet that mostly sits in a vehicle dock.

When It Is Worth It

You plan to keep the device for three years or more. Our guide on how long a rugged tablet should last explains why three to five years is a reasonable expectation for a sealed device looked after sensibly. If that is your plan, the plan covers the years you are actually in. If you expect to replace the device inside two years, you are paying for months you will not use.

The device is how you get paid. If your job sheets, quotes and signatures live on the tablet and a week without it means a week of paper, the value is in knowing a defect in year two or three is fixed at no charge. A sole trader with one tablet is in a different position from a firm with a drawer of spares.

The battery is doing hard work. A device charged every night and run flat most days stresses its battery more than one used for an hour a day. Battery defects are covered for the full 36 months under the plan, against 12 without it. Our guide to removable batteries covers the other half of this: on the A6, A8, WH6, W8 and W10 you can swap a worn pack yourself, while the A10's battery is not removable, so a workshop visit is the only route.

You want the cost settled on day one. Some businesses would rather pay £65 or £79 with the device than carry an unknown into year three. That is a cash flow preference, and only you know yours.

When It Is Not Worth It

You replace kit on a short cycle. Firms that refresh devices every 18 to 24 months get little from months 25 to 36. Spend the money on a spare battery or a screen protector instead.

Your main worry is damage, not defects. If what worries you is the device going off a roof, the 3-Year Warranty does nothing for you; for a fleet, Total Care does. The drop and sealing ratings on each product page say what the device is built to take, and our guide to MIL-STD-810H explains what a drop rating does and does not promise.

You could absorb the repair. If a defect in year two would be an annoyance rather than a crisis, and you could buy a replacement if it came to it, you may prefer to carry the risk yourself. Across several devices that is often the arithmetic a finance team does.

You need more than a repair. If a device out of action for a week stops a crew working, a workshop warranty is the wrong product.

For Fleets: Total Care

If you run five or more devices on any Tuga model, there is a third option. Total Care is quote only, with per device prices published on the warranty page. It is the whole package. It includes everything in the 3-Year Warranty and adds advance replacement: for a claim accepted by 14:00 on a working day, we dispatch a swap unit of the same model, carrying your software image, the same working day, and we pay carriage both ways. It also covers what the warranties do not: accidental damage (drops, cracked screens, crushing, liquid and fire), and theft or loss, with no excess and a published fair use limit of two damage claims per device each contract year and one theft or loss claim per device over the term. Batteries are serviced at month 18, there is a fleet support desk and a loan unit for trials, and at the end of life we collect, erase and certify.

That solves a different problem: not who pays for the repair but how the crew keeps working on Tuesday, whatever happened to the device on Monday. It costs several times the 3-Year Warranty per device, so it only makes sense when downtime is the expensive part. Our guide to buying rugged tablets for a small team covers the rest of the fleet decision, and the bulk page explains the automatic team discounts on the devices themselves.

The Small Print That Matters

Three terms from the plan are worth knowing before you decide.

1. Cancelling. Cancel within 30 days of purchase for a full refund if you have made no claim (45 days as a consumer), and after that at any time for a pro rata refund by full unexpired months. The decision is not final on the day you order.
2. Repaired or replaced devices. A repaired or replaced device, or a replaced part, carries the rest of the original term, or 90 days from dispatch of the replacement if that is longer.
3. Who stands behind it. Every plan is given by us, Destello Tech Ltd trading as Tuga Hardware, including Total Care's damage, theft and loss cover. No insurer stands behind it, and the remedy is always our repair, replacement or service, never a cash payment.

A Simple Way to Decide

Answer three questions. How long will you keep the device? Could you work for a week without it? Is the plan price small against what a defect in year two or three would cost you in money and lost time? Three yeses and the 3-Year Warranty is probably sensible. Three noes and keep the money. One or two, and it comes down to whether you prefer a known cost now or an unknown one later.

Whatever you decide, the included 12 months is there on every device, delivery is free to UK addresses in 7 to 10 working days, and there is no VAT to add. The three tiers are compared on the warranty page, the clauses are in the Plan Terms, and if a question is not answered there, ask us before you buy rather than after.

Compare head to head: A6 vs A8 · A8 vs A10 · A10 vs WH6