HP: horrible customer service

[resqmie]

Hey everyone,

I just want to tell you my story of the most horrible customer experience i ever experienced, I let HP collect my damaged notebook in order to repair it and the result was that my notebook was almost completly ruined.

Let me tell you this story from the very begin. It all started when my 1 year old HP notebook suddenly had a problem with opening and closing and as a result the frame of my computer started to open up. As a loyal HP customer I immediately decided to call the HP after sales service in order to receive a quick and speedy fix to this problem.

So when I called the customer support service I was helped by very friendly employees and they asked me to send a couple of pictures which showed the defect. So on august 6th 2012 I decided to send the photographs to the customer support staff with a little description of the problem. After a day or two HP called me back with the message that apparently the damage was covered by the 2 year warranty and that UPS would come and collect my notebook on august 10th 2012. The repairs would be completed in 10 working days. So on august 10th my notebook was collected and shipped off to a HP workshop in order to repair it.

On august 20th 2012 I finally got my notebook back, which was pretty quick and I was happy and viewed it as an excellent example of HP its after sales service. However, as soon as I opened the UPS box and opened my notebook I noticed that there was something terribly wrong. It was like someone had completely smashed my notebook and didn’t even bother of trying to fix it.

Completely shocked, I immediately took some pictures and I send them to the HP after sales service in order to sort this problem out. I was convinced that the problem would be sorted out rather quickly and I decided to call the after sales service of HP again. What followed was a heated discussion between me and the HP service team. It basically came down to HP denying that it was their fault and they gave some lame excuses why it wasn’t their fault. It basically came down to sorry but the condition of your notebook is the condition in which we received it and therefore we can’t help you. This was followed up by some vehemently protest by myself that it wasn’t true.

In response to my defense they speculated on some things that might have happened. They even implied that I used my notebook after I took the original pictures and therefore the additional damage was caused by me and so it wasn’t their fault.


Allow me to address some of their lame excuses

• In the email of august 6th that contained the first set of photos I described the problem and pointed out that I didn’t dare to open it further because I feared that I would cause irreversible damage
• If I mentioned that in the email of august 6th and there was a chance that the damages would fall under warranty why would I even dare to risk a free repair by continued use of my notebook.
• It isn’t my fault that they made a wrong decision to pick up my notebook for it to be repaired under warranty, that is their responsibility.

Eventually the HP service came with their lamest excuses so far. They came to the conclusion that the original damage of my computer wouldn’t even fall under the warranty protection and that the computer therefore shouldn’t even have been shipped out to be repaired free of charge.

Let me address that other lame excuse too:

• I think it isn’t my fault that the customer service team originally said that it would be repaired free of charge and that they send UPS to come and collect my notebook.
• I wouldn’t mind if they would have told me that my notebook wouldn’t be repaired free of charge and that they would return my notebook, but I believe it isn’t unreasonable to expect that my notebook was returned in the same condition as I allowed it to be shipped out.

After this discussion they let me know that I could repair the damages for a mere € 350, which is almost half of the price I paid for my notebook.

Now let me tell you what happened (according to me): My notebook arrived in the HP repair center in the same condition as i sent it since UPS does an excellent job of transporting its packages. My notebook arrives at one of the stations and the person who will repair it doens’t open my notebook carefully enough thus causing the irreversible damages which I indicated in my email of august 6th.

Lets analyse what went wrong:

• HP after sales service didn’t read the information I sent in my email
• HP after sales service didn’t forward that information to the HP repair center
• HP repair center didn’t read the information received from HP after sales service
• HP repair center employs people who dont know how to repair computers.

Now that last point seems rather improbable but in either case I fail to see why I get blamed for this.

So in short my advice to everyone would be: never send buy a HP product!

If your interested you can watch the before and after pictures of my notebook on this blog:

http://hpcustomerservicesucks.wordpress.com/

 

[corkyg]

That is truly pathetic on H-P's part. BTW - what was the locale? I noted the repair cost was in Euros.

 

[rsutoratosu]

Yeah the blame game. This is why I video tape my unboxing now in case of events like this. I film the box, all the seals, tapes, etc from all 4 corner and open the box. This way they can't blame you for this crap

 

[resqmie]

That is truly pathetic on H-P's part. BTW - what was the locale? I noted the repair cost was in Euros.

My notebook was bought in Ghent, a city in Belgium and the call center was located in the Netherlands judging from the accent of the operators.

 

[resqmie]

Yeah the blame game. This is why I video tape my unboxing now in case of events like this. I film the box, all the seals, tapes, etc from all 4 corner and open the box. This way they can't blame you for this crap

I wish i had done the same thing.
However I think they would just use an other excuse even if i had more pictures.

 

[superccs]

Don't we all have a similar HP CS story? Why won't we learn....?

 

[Abix]

Looks like a simple case of HP hinge explosion.

Careful disassembly and review of the damaged parts followed by searching on http://partsurfer.hp.com will give you part numbers for the damaged pieces. Some quick Googling will then allow you to purchase the parts and repair the laptop.

HP support blows and HP has had problems with terrible hinges for a long time.

 

[resqmie]

Looks like a simple case of HP hinge explosion.

Careful disassembly and review of the damaged parts followed by searching on http://partsurfer.hp.com will give you part numbers for the damaged pieces. Some quick Googling will then allow you to purchase the parts and repair the laptop.

HP support blows and HP has had problems with terrible hinges for a long time.

Thanks for the advice,
i hope i will be able to fix it.

 

[resqmie]

Don't we all have a similar HP CS story? Why won't we learn....?

I have learned from it,
I will never again buy a HP product and i hope i can
prevent people making the same mistake i made.

 

[Lanyap]

HP is lame

 

[ericloewe]

Reminds me of my (nowhere near as awful) experience with HP support.

After a few months, my DV-5 laptop developed a very annoying noise in the fan that only happened occasionally. So I did wht anyone would do and sent them an e-mail that made it clear that I wanted it repaired. Here's what they suggested i should try:

Step 1: Uninstall Vista SP2, because the computer shipped with SP1 and they claimed they didn't support Vista SP2.

Step 2: BIOS update.

Step 3: Some other semi-random driver update.

Needless to say, I never did manage to get a repair done on that thing.

 

[stevech]

HP: I learned. Not so much due to customer service as from declining hardware quality and software that went from awful to unusable, for HP Injets.

After owning 4 or so HP inkjets I went with Epson: same price range. Happy as can be. What a difference.

HP PCs and printers are on my permanent no-buy list.

 

[AlexAL]

Reminds me of my (nowhere near as awful) experience with HP support.

After a few months, my DV-5 laptop developed a very annoying noise in the fan that only happened occasionally. So I did wht anyone would do and sent them an e-mail that made it clear that I wanted it repaired. Here's what they suggested i should try:

Step 1: Uninstall Vista SP2, because the computer shipped with SP1 and they claimed they didn't support Vista SP2.

Step 2: BIOS update.

Step 3: Some other semi-random driver update.

Needless to say, I never did manage to get a repair done on that thing.

If you feel comfortable, open up the lappy and change the thermal paste wherever you have a heat sink. If the heat sink has become and little unseated or the paste dried/fried, this will make a huge difference.

 

[ericloewe]

If you feel comfortable, open up the lappy and change the thermal paste wherever you have a heat sink. If the heat sink has become and little unseated or the paste dried/fried, this will make a huge difference.

I've considered doing it, but since I've moved on to a non-HP laptop, I haven't had a reason to do so, yet.

A loose heatsink does make sense, since the problem tends to develop at or near idle temperatures.

HP: I learned. Not so much due to customer service as from declining hardware quality and software that went from awful to unusable, for HP Injets.

After owning 4 or so HP inkjets I went with Epson: same price range. Happy as can be. What a difference.

HP PCs and printers are on my permanent no-buy list.

HP's software is indeed as horrible as it gets, but their printers seem to work relatively well. Windows has basic drivers, so HP's software is usually redundant (I only need the "light" 150MB package to be able to scan over the network).

 

[stevech]

My all in one printer/scanner needs vendor software. HP's was absurd.

Epson's is great. WiFi printer/scanner. I finally have what I've long wanted, in scanning:
Document in feeder or glass
Push send to PC in PDF.
That's all.

I can even choose which PC to send to on the network.

Printing: never an issue.

 

[JohnGates]

Couldn't agree more. Their service along with their product quality has gone to the dogs.

 

[hans007]

i've never had a bad problem with HP, though i havent owned an HP laptop in a while.

i know i had a pentium 3 700 laptop once that was HP and they fixed a bad usb port with a 3 day turnaround, even shipped me a box to put it in.


i did just buy a probook 4530s (like a barely over $400 laptop).

hard drive started making clicking noises in an external enclosure (had ssd in laptop). email support, they overnighted me a brand new hard drive (it arrived 2 days ago... so tihs was very recently). seems pretty good to me