Both warranty and guarantee are used in situations when one provides some products or services and, simultaneously, assumes some kind of additional obligation regarding such products or services. How can we differentiate between them?
First let's look at warranty. Warranty is a promise that the provider will stand behind its products or services if they are defective. A warranty is usually a written obligation assumed at the time of providing such products or services. The provider assumes responsibility to repair or replace a defective product or its parts, or to give a rebate, or, in certain cases, to cancel the agreement for the provision of such products of services.
Now let's look at guarantee. Generally speaking, guarantee is an obligation under which the provider assumes responsibility to perform, execute, or complete something and offering security for that obligation.
This is a very general statement. Let me highlight at this point that there are several types of guarantees, each having a specific meaning in the given field of law.
1) Guarantee may be a secondary obligation to secure a primary contractual obligation, such as a bank guarantee.
2) It may refer to a constitutional means of ensuring adherence to certain standards.
3) Finally, guarantee is a secondary (contractual or statutory) obligation to stand good for the damage occurred in product.
Therefore, it is very difficult to describe guarantee in a concise manner.
As far as guarantee is concerned in the above described meaning, it can be very similar to warranty. I cannot make any general statement concerning the difference between them, however, there may be differences in the light of the local jurisdictions describing various legal concepts, which, in the commmon law, all fall in the category of warranty.
