Does a Foreign Military Sale come with a warranty?

6.1 The USG does not warrant or guarantee any of the items sold pursuant to this LOA except as provided in section 6.1.1. DoD contracts include warranty clauses only on an exception basis. If requested by the Purchaser, the USG will, with respect to items being procured, and upon timely notice, attempt to obtain contract provisions to provide the requested warranties. The USG further agrees to exercise, upon the Purchaser’s request, rights (including those arising under any warranties) the USG may have under contracts connected with the procurement of these items. Additional costs resulting from obtaining special contract provisions or warranties, or the exercise of rights under such provisions or warranties, will be charged to the Purchaser.

6.1.1 The USG warrants the title of items sold to the Purchaser hereunder but it makes no warranties other than those set forth herein. In particular, the USG disclaims liability resulting from infringement or other violation of intellectual property or technical data rights occasioned by the use or manufacture outside the U.S. by or for the Purchaser of items supplied hereunder.

6.1.2 The USG agrees to exercise warranties on behalf of the Purchaser to assure, to the extent provided by the warranty, replacement or correction of such items found to be defective, when such materiel is procured for the Purchaser.

Section 6 describes the warranty provisions of the LOA. Under FMS, the international partner is purchasing from the USG, rather than from a commercial company. This section defines what warranties the USG provides on FMS materiel. Section 6.1 discusses warranty provisions for items obtained from procurement, and Section 6.2 concerns items delivered from DoW inventory.

The USG itself warrants only clear title. This simply means that there will be no financial claim or lien against the materiel delivered. For procured items it obtains the same contract warranties for FMS as it does for itself and exercises them on the purchaser's behalf through the Supply Discrepancy Report process; a performance warranty can be requested and is paid for on the LOA as a defense service.

This does not mean that the international partner has no method of recourse if an item from procurement does not function properly. International partners with defective items from procurement should submit a Supply Discrepancy Report (SDR) to the USG. The USG may be able to rectify the problem by seeking resolution through the contractor under the provisions of the USG procurement contract.

This condition also provides the international partner the option of identifying specific warranty requirements when they request an item via the FMS process. Based on the international partner’s specific warranty request, the USG will attempt to procure the desired warranty from the vendor in conjunction with the procurement of the materiel or service. The international partner will pay any additional costs necessary to acquire the desired warranty. The USG agrees to exercise the warranty rights on behalf of the international partner. The international partner must submit an SDR within the time limitations of a warranty applicable to an item.

6.2 Unless the condition of defense articles is identified to be other than serviceable (for example, “as-is”), DoD will repair or replace at no extra cost defense articles supplied from DoD stocks which are damaged or found to be defective in respect to materiel or workmanship when it is established that these deficiencies existed prior to passage of title, or found to be defective in design to such a degree that the items cannot be used for the purpose for which they were designed. Qualified representatives of the USG and of the Purchaser will agree on the liability hereunder and the corrective steps to be taken.

This condition states that the U.S. will repair or replace damaged or defective items delivered from DoW inventories when it can be determined that the defect or damage existed prior to shipment. This can be a difficult determination. The IAs have SDR offices that evaluate SDR claims and make decisions regarding the appropriate corrective action.