EOS 6D Mark II Serial Number Verification

[eamontana]

Can someone please help me decipher this serial number 183052[xxxxxx]? It should not be this difficult, but I have not found an answer in the last few hours of digging. I purchased a used 6d mk2 from eBay. When purchasing it, I never considered the fact that it was from a different country or that it could be fake or something. What would help me out the most, is if someone could confirm that this serial number is in fact a true canon product, when it was manufactured, and what market it was intended for. I hope that is possible, and it is hard to believe that its not but it definitely has not been easy to find these answers.

Thanks,

[Serial number partially hidden to protect privacy.]

[Peter]

The first two numbers should be month of manufacturing. The third number, 3,  should be for the European market.

[shadowsports]

Greetings,

Instead of wasting time with potential counterfeit or gray market products, just return it. 

I suggest you purchase from a Canon Authorized Dealer and not bother with this headache,  

It's not worth owning a product that you don't have a warranty on and that you can't get service for if needed.  

[eamontana]

The gray market topic is 15% of my interest, the other 85% here is a way to decipher serial numbers. So, if you would like to be helpful, could you tell me from the serial number I provided some information about the manufacturing of this product?

[jrhoffman75 · Accepted solution]

If it was intended for the US market the third and fourth digits would be 20.

This site can check apparently verify European market products: Serial Number Checker - Canon Europe

I've never seen reports of counterfeit camera bodies. If the camera is used there is no Canon warranty, so your only risk would be that Canon could refuse to repair it for cost in the US. Based on reports by others that seems to be a low risk.

But, as Rick says, if you are at all concerned return it. On eBay, if something isn't being mailed from the USA it is most likely not a product intended for US market. 

[Stephen]

Hello, chat! 

John is pretty spot on!

Canon Warranties are non-transferrable (except CarePAK Plus ). However, all warranty decisions are at the sole discretion of the technicians at our factory service centers.

Since we can assume an EOS 6D Mark II will be out of warranty, our factory service center would likely repair a Gray Market camera unless the repair required parts that result in a change of model name or serial number (if the camera has a different name overseas).

You will not be able to register a Gray Market camera. We do not require a My Canon Account with a registered camera for technical support on EOS models, but this can change at any point in the future. A gray market camera would be ineligible for technical support if it does. 

TL;DR: You are welcome to purchase anything you like; however, a gray market or foreign camera may not be the deal you think it is. 

[eamontana]

Thank you for the quick and thorough response, it still however does not answer the question of actually deciphering a serial number. But it does help with some of the hesitations, overall, because the camera was purchased used, its going to be out of warranty regardless, so it doesnt seem like something to sweat over. I would still like a way to finding information from serial numbers though, it would just be interesting to know. 

[Stephen]

I have an internal system that can validate parts of serial numbers to verify that they can be registered in the US. There is no master database of all global serial numbers. If there is, it has not been made available to me or anyone I've ever interacted with in the 15 years I've worked at Canon.

This is what I use to validate serial numbers: