Watch after-sales subcontracting
CLD Design SA carries out after-sales service for watch brands, retailers and other watch subcontractors, in its workshop in Plan-les-Ouates, Geneva. We draw up a written diagnosis and, once you have approved it, repair the watch, inspect it and send it back to you with a service report. You keep the relationship with your customer, and the warranty.
The stages of a return
Every return follows the same sequence, wherever the watch comes from. No work starts until you have approved the written diagnosis.
Every stage is carried out in our workshop except one, and only when it is needed: remaking a component, which goes to our partner machining workshops in Plan-les-Ouates.
Receipt and diagnosis
The watch is registered on arrival and photographed. Its condition is assessed under the stereo microscope, then recorded in a written diagnosis listing the work proposed.
CLD workshopPlan-les-Ouates
Disassembly
The movement and the case are taken apart. Case components go through ultrasonic cleaning before any rework.
CLD workshopPlan-les-Ouates
Repair
Defective components are replaced. Depending on the condition of the case, polishing or satin-finishing is redone in our workshop.
CLD workshopPlan-les-Ouates
Remaking a component
Only if a component has to be remade: it is machined by our partner workshops in Plan-les-Ouates, then checked on arrival in our workshop, before finishing.
Partner workshopsPlan-les-Ouates
Reassembly and adjustment
Reassembly to the original specifications, dial and hands refitted if required, functions and rate adjusted.
CLD workshopPlan-les-Ouates
Inspection and return
Instrumented water resistance test, functional check, final visual inspection, then packaging and dispatch. The service report goes back with the watch.
CLD workshopPlan-les-Ouates
The batch file follows the watch from receipt to return.
After-sales service for a watch we developed
If we developed the watch, its drawings are already on file with us when it comes back for service: the dimensioned drawings and 3D files of the case, bezel, caseback and crown, produced during case engineering.
If a case component has to be remade, our partner workshops in Plan-les-Ouates machine it to those drawings.
The full route of a watch, from the first drawing to after-sales service, is set out on our Swiss watch development page.
Frequently asked questions about outsourced after-sales service
What is after-sales subcontracting in watchmaking?
An outside workshop takes charge of the watches that a brand’s or a retailer’s customers send back: diagnosis, repair, inspection and dispatch. The brand or retailer keeps the commercial relationship and the warranty, and hands over the technical work and the workshop logistics. It therefore does not have to tie up watchmakers and a test bench for an irregular volume of returns.
Who outsources their after-sales service?
Three situations come up. An independent brand whose volume of returns does not justify an in-house workshop. A watch house whose after-sales department is overloaded during a production peak. A retailer or a subcontractor that has to return a watch in working order but does not carry out every case operation itself.
What does the end customer see?
Nothing from us. We appear neither on the documents given to the end customer nor in any exchange with them. The watch comes back packaged, ready to be handed over. We do not name the houses we work for, and we sign a non-disclosure agreement on request.
Which operations are covered?
All those carried out in our workshop: jewellery work on case components, polishing and refinishing, case assembly, sapphire or mineral crystal bonding, movement assembly, adjustment of the functions and the rate, casing, water resistance testing and final inspection.
What happens if a component has to be remade?
We have it machined by our partner workshops in Plan-les-Ouates; we order that machining and we are answerable for it. The part is checked on arrival in our workshop, before finishing and reassembly. Like any other work, remaking a part is proposed in the diagnosis and only goes ahead once you have approved it.
Does the watch have to be one you developed?
No. We also service watches developed elsewhere, and reassemble them to their original specifications. For a watch we developed, the drawings are already on file with us.
How is traceability maintained?
Every batch has its own file: registration on arrival, photographic inventory, diagnosis report, work carried out, inspection results. The file is available on request. The same person handles the batch until it is returned to you.
Is the work carried out in Geneva?
Yes. After-sales work is done in our workshop in Plan-les-Ouates, in the canton of Geneva; a component that has to be remade is machined by our partner workshops, also in Plan-les-Ouates. A Geneva provenance claim and the Geneva Seal (Poinçon de Genève) have conditions of their own, which our Swiss made and Geneva Seal page explains; we do not issue any certification.
Let’s talk about
your returns.
Tell us about the watches to be serviced: references, number of pieces, faults found and the checks you expect. We sign a non-disclosure agreement on request before any technical discussion.
Chemin du Pré-Fleuri 15
1228 Plan-les-Ouates
Switzerland