Aftermarket Color Toner, Yes or No?

[fixthecopier]

I responded to a thread about aftermarket toner for Lexmark. I stated that I recommended my customers not use them, and the other poster defended the practice, stating how much it saves his customers. Personally, I haven't found an aftermarket brand that would not fail, eventually. So what is the opinion of this forum?

[Tonerbomb]

No and HELL NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I had that nightmare before at my former employer. He didn't listen and bought large quantites of aftermarket color toner for Savin color boxes. We replaced over 70 toner pumps in a year......

[blackcat4866]

What symptoms do you want to talk about first?

1) overtoning/undertoning
2) poor drum cleaning
3) poor fusing
4) toner buildup on mag roller, fuser, other rollers
5) image quality
6) annoying messages (toner not installed, non-genuine toner, add toner)

Did I miss anything? =^..^=

7) Oh yeah! How about drive problems because the cartridge won't turn. Overfilled cartridges.
8) waste tone bottles packed full in days.

[fixthecopier]

What symptoms do you want to talk about first?

1) overtoning/undertoning
2) poor drum cleaning
3) poor fusing
4) toner buildup on mag roller, fuser, other rollers
5) image quality
6) annoying messages (toner not installed, non-genuine toner, add toner)

Did I miss anything? =^..^=

But according to the poster in the other thread, the massive cost savings to the customer endears him to his clients. But when my customers have to pay me to clean up the mess, they don't see any savings. I tell all my customers to go ahead and use the stuff, I need the work.

[blackcat4866]

I hoped that you saved more than $125 USD, because that's how much it's going to cost for me to remove it. Add to that any developer, drums, fuser rollers, etc. =^..^=

[slimslob]

I remember in the days of the coated paper machines that the paper pirates would call people selling paper at lower prices. If a customer who recently showed a large decline in the amount of paper they were purchasing from us called with a copy quality problem I wold take some of our paper with me. Usually the machine made good copies with my paper but not with the pirate paper. I would show the customer the difference. I would then offer to adjust the machine to the paper they had but would have to charge them to do so.

[tech28]

In this area, have seen many machines that are under contract with Authorized dealers using compatible toner for their color machines. I changed a couple of years ago and I have been using that same compatible and have found no issues to speak of, up to this point. Drums going and surpassing rated values, customers satisfied, have seen other after market toner(the one with the upside down V) being run in the same color machines, drums run 20K, if lucky, lines develop, lots of dusting. Like I like to mention to my customers, "Not all toner is created equal" OEM toner is the best though. Only use OEM on the B/W Kyoceras that we are placing.

[sandmanmac]

I ONLY use GENUINE toner in dual component machines, but in mono-component units like Lexmark, and HP, I've had pretty good success with remans /compatibles
With those machines you don't have the issue with trashing Dev, clogging pumps, etc. If it fails for whatever reason, just pop in another. I've seen no measurable reduction in fuser life

[leonardob]

This topic is a "Balance Act" , I've worked long for large Aftermarket Company managing a large portion of the globe, now I run my own Office Automation Business .

It all comes dow to what supplier you choose and how big is the price (cost) difference to the originals. There is a large amount of manufacturers of aftermarket products , but very few are serious, long in business and reliable. The biggest issues with aftermarket quality is reliability , quality is good today , but next shipment not, very few brands have a quality control system in place to safe guard a linear quality standard.

I run aftermarket on all parts and consumable on my MIF (Konica Minolta, NRG and HP) being these Mono or Dual components , Color or Monochrome. My cost on toner and parts are significantly less than OEM, the profit generated by these guarantee to keep my technical staff employed , well paid , (financially) happy with their profitability bonus and benefits Also by having a lower running costs allow us to perform the PM's and change all parts accordingly to the OEM PM schedules and in this way we do not extending the life of the parts/consumable or having to push the extra mile on them.

We've had very few issues with the aftermarket products, basically only on the silicone feeding components which we switched back to OEM and have little to no impact on the running cost. Recently we've been rebuilding image and Dev units for the color KM machines , they work like a charm.

[fixthecopier]

Aftermarket toner is kind of like buying really cheap tires. Sure they will work. For some people they will go the life, but don't be surprised if they blow out with half life left on them. It may be a matter of suppliers. Some may be better than others. The customer only sees OEM and everything else that is cheaper. I have told customers that if they insist on using it, use a brand name. I see boxes of this crap that just say "Compatable Toner" and assume it was filled in someone;s garage. I have had customers that when they call for an issue created by cheap toner, they will say it is the first time, and will continue to use it. I have others, that after paying me several times to show them it is the toner, still keep using it.

Things I have never had an OEM cartridge do...

Instant drum blade failure

Pull the clear plastic strip and have toner pour like water on the floor

New cartridge only prints one side of page.

Shades background of print

Cheap label sticker peals back and blocks laser

Brand new cartridge is only half full

Week old cartridge dumps contents on transfer belt {this was an OEM Lexmark, but I consider them crap also}

Ghost image or blurry looking print.


In many cases the military customers stock up and buy what they need for a year. They have to use what they bought, no refunds. I had one customer who, after paying me to tell him about the bad stuff, had a similar issue, swapped the cartridge himself, then called because the issue was no better. I show up, change the cartridge again, fix the issue and tell them, Lucky you, you picked two bad ones in a row.

Some people refill their own ink jets supplies with no issue, others quit after buying a new printer after the ink leaks all over the inside.