RishiGuru - will check with someone where its available and let you know if I find info where the Mitsubishi Heavy Industry invert AC is available. As far as I know, I am sure one of my friends mentioned he had got it installed at his place around a year back so will recheck if its inverter based or non inverter based as the cost he had mentioned was also very steep at over 60k
So nice of you. Thanks.
You snagged a pretty good deal. Dealers in Chennai aren't going below 49K.
I am also surprised with the pricing of 41k on the 1.5T Sharp Inverter AC. The best deal I could find with installation was 45k
I always snag a good deal. Atleast while buying consumer electronics product. There are some reasons behind it as stated below:
1) Starting extensive market research via web and personal presence in showrooms few months prior to the target buying date. This will enable you to know the real flow of market other than getting brainwashed by the sales representative.
2) Never go by what the sales representative says or insists to buy. Avoid hype. Sales representative are always going to push for products which gives them the best incentive.
3) Build an extensive technological knowledge base, what is currently going in the international scenario rather than Indian context, which consumer companies are the technological leaders in their field and their offering.
4) Pinning down your requirement based on study and availability along with after sales service.
Once I have decided the product I need to buy is Sharp Eco-Inverter 1.5 Ton Air Conditioner with in-built Plasmacluster Ion air purifier, I enter the market to strategically gun for the lowest price.
Here also there are some rules I follow:
1) Knowing the dealers of our city and constantly communicating via phone. In Kolkata there are at around seventy Sharp dealers. I called all 70 of them.
2) Take the lowest quote from an established on-line store as a starting point to bargain. In my case it was INR 44.5K.
3) Step by step go down by 500 rupees and see how the dealer responds.
4) After I called at around thirty dealers the price have plummeted down by 44.5K .. 44K .. 43.5K .. 43K .. 42.5K .. 42K
5) Now the job gets harder since dealer profit is very minimal now, so lot of them starts refusing the 42K offer.
6) The strategy to follow now is to gun for small electronic shops who are also dealers. There daily expenses to run the store are 1/20th of a king sized fully air conditioned showroom and they truly chime for customers knowing very well they have to offer products at rock bottom prices or else customers are not going to come.
7) Targeting these shops price same down even further down to 41.8K .. 41.5K .. 41.3K and was becoming a constant now.
8) Lastly there was one who said 41K and it was his final offer challenging nobody in Kolkata can beat his price. He was right.
9) With my bargaining boat coasted in the appropriate dealer harbor, I got two of them at 41K each.
10) Mission accomplished with free delivery to home.
... you can save some money as you need to pay in EMI's that too 0% so even if you keep money in bank at 7-9% you can gain some part of it. I calculated that could save around 1500-2000 (the interest you could get on the money in the bank) till the EMIs are paid. But no one was ready to offer upfront offer / discount.
Going by EMI’s with 0% interest is not going to reap the best deal. The banks/ insurance comapnies providing such schemes do not do business for free. The interests are hidden and are not taken from the customer but from the dealer. So the dealer raises the price of the product since he is also here doing the business for profit making.
CASH is the best. For my case INR 43.5K was the best price I got for 0% EMI schemes, in cash 41K.
Not sure if I missed this. How much did you pay for installation? What extras did you need to get - Voltage stabiliser, brackets, etc?
In Kolkata we are blessed by Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation (CESC). CESC is a private organization. We do not have blackouts, power failures or voltage fluctuations here. Last year there was one single power failure in my home for 5 mins. I cannot remember the date. Since there are no major power fluctuations, ACs here run without stabilizers. No one buy stabilizers here. But this Godly service comes at a price and cost per unit is high. Hence Inverters.
Extras that came free with Sharp air conditioners are:
1) 4m Copper Tubes for both gas and liquid side of class leading 0.8mm thickness
2) 4m XPE insulation for both gas and liquid side tubes of white color which reflect heat
3) 4m 4 core electric copper cables to connect IDU with ODU
4) 4m drain pipe
5) Surgical gloves to be used by installers. Our installer was very happy to see that atleast one company in India are including this with their kits.
6) Cleaning cloth
7) A packaging box that contain all of the above accessories.
Our installer is no ordinary installer. While uncertified air conditioner installers are available from Rs.600, ours are a professionally trained air conditioner installer with over 30 years of experience in Dubai. Naturally I knew it is going to cost me a good deal more and it did. I wanted a zero compromise installation as it is the key area where performance of any air conditioner goes down the drain when fitted with sub standard installers. These guys use surgical gloves while performing installation, use extensive tools, drills and pumps sets that I have never seen in other AC installations. You see the professionalism in them.
Including two pairs of best quality ODU brackets (INR 1.6K) available in the market, total expenses of installation for my two air conditioners was INR 5K. Five stars to my installation.
. The scenario completely changes if you run your AC for longer hours - then definitely yes, inverter ACs save a lot of money and you can recover your investment faster. 
