A Manufacturer that pays return shipping

If you purchased the speakers at retail from a dealer, I would expect the dealer to take care of the return for you. Otherwise, I think it is reasonable to expect to pay return freight. What if you think it's warranty, but an examination by the manufacturer finds you overdrove the speaker motor and it is fried? If they have a free return freight policy they have already lost money on something that is not their fault.

Most speaker repairs can be completed in the field except maybe electrostats and planars. So, maybe just buy speakers from a local dealer and/or stay with conventional driver speakers.

Fine then how about a refund of shipping cost once its found that its the fault of the manufacturer why be penalized for something that is not your fault

Agree that the dealer take care of the shipping if you purchased them at full price, not at 40 to 70 percent of retail, because that is not a reasonable arrangement.

Full retail equals dealer or manufacturer. Deep discount and you are on your own.

Not sure how that makes any sense the manufacturer usually sells them to a dealer for for a wholesale price so their getting their money no matter what the dealer sells them for

Terrybbagit, the fact that manufacturers don't pay for return shipping ('return shipping' meaning that the shipment is going from you to the manufacturer) is quite simple: they are not responsible for where you choose to live. Even so they split the deal with you; most manufacturers will pay for shipping back to your home.

This is how warranty is handled all over regardless of the field of endeavor. It is not a sign of poor service.