This is great information and thanks for sharing it. I hope it helps people who are in the market for new AC.
In my case, I don't know what to do with this information. I have been trying to buy a 1.5 ton inverter AC for last 10 days and today I bought one just out of sheer frustration and not because I believe it's best value for the money or best suited for my needs.
In Lahore, the biggest market place is Abid Market. If you go to any of the bigger shops and ask the sales men for specification, they'd look at you like if you have asked them to solve kashmir dispute, they'd have no clue. They only know the price of the unit, how many ton it is and in some cases they know where it is made, that's it.
If you ask them about the difference between two units from the same brand, they'd say 'bus design ka faraq hai'.
I wanted to buy samsung inverter AC because I had bought a samsung inverter fridge last year and it's awesome, but different shops had different models with prices starting from 90k up to 125k for 1.5 ton and I couldn't tell the difference and the sales men were clue less. Also the guy I bought the fridge from told me that samsung ac are not that good which put me off of samsung.
I did some research and decided to go with good chinese brand that some family friend had recommended, GREE. On their facebook page the CITH2 model was priced at 74,900 but in the market every vendor was asking for 78-79K. I went to their display center in cavalry ground lahore, they offered a discount of 1400 on the retail price of 74,900 and free home delivery, but there were no units available. They said they will get some the next day and I should come back next evening. Next evening, it was the same story, they didn't have any units, they were all sold out before I went there. I told them to take my booking which they refused but took my number and said that they'll call as soon as they get more units. I didn't get any calls for 3 days so I paid them a visit. Again it was the same story. I asked why didn't they call me, they dug up my number in back pages of the registered and folded it and promised they'd call this time but they never called.
Today I decided to visit them again. When I got there, they had a fresh delivery of units and I was like yes, finally I am getting the new AC but when asked at the counter, they were like 'han jee mil jayee ga, but 78,000 ka'. I was like what the hell man I was quoted 73,500 a week ago, and they said price has gone up today, I asked about the discount but they said 'nope', on top of all this they charge 3000 for installation.
I called Abid Market and found out it was available for 76k asking price, but when I got there I was told that it's an older model and the newer version CITH1 is also available for 79K. I was previously told that CITH2 was the newer model and again sales men didn't help.
Anyway, at this point I was really pissed and was like 'warr gayee pandey ich' and bought the silver CITH1 for 79K including delivery to DHA and additional 1000 for the installation. I could also have just stood infront of the huge AC display section, closed my eyes, raised one hand in the air and done 'aker baker bambay bo, 80, 90, purra 100' and at the end bought the one my finger would have been pointing to.