thats true on the tag heuer and some others they sell. if the watches have there serial numbers intact, tag will do repairs, but not under warranty. if the numbers are erased, forget it. tag won't touch one. the gray market debate is a long one and for many reasons. amazon offers a warranty as does other gray market sellers. on a low end watch, thats fine as they can handle the service. but when you get into tag heuer, omega, when a warranty is offered from the seller, lets say amazon, what can you really expect? well, not much. thats the big debate. buy gray market and save some money, but take a risk about getting it repaired if it breaks, or buying it from a ad. lets say you bought a omega gray market and it breaks and requires parts. well who has omega parts? omega does and they don't sell them. so what did your warranty get you? well nothing. chances are if its fixed, its going to be with non omega parts. so now you have the snowball effect. you saved some money on the front end, but your watch breaks and amazon repairs it with non omega parts. after the warranty runs out, you need to get your omega serviced. guess what. that money you saved up front is now going to cost you big time. why? you send your omega into omegas service center. omega opens the watch, finds non omega parts in it. they give you a estimate for the service. its twice what it would have been because they won't service it unless they can replace those after market parts with omega parts. I know this is a long post, but saving money on the purchase price of a watch your going to keep, will end up costing much more than if you just bought it from a authorised retailer.
