OK so for the past 9 weeks I’ve been battling HP over an accidental damage warranty issue.  It is finally resolved and so I will now proceed to keep my promise to them…

It day was April 8th, 2008.  I was studying for my upcoming Physics exam with my laptop and a Mega 100 gallon Big Gulp from the local Sev.  As I sat there trying to figure out the difference between radial acceleration and tangential acceleration, my mind fogged, my eyes glazed over and my proverbial “train” jumped the tracks and hit a wall.  After what could have been hours or only a few moments, I wiped the drool off my chin and reached for my beverage in hopes of getting my brain going again.  It was at this moment that all hell broke loose.  The cup evaded my grasp and tumbled over in slow motion towards my HP laptop.  As it landed, liquid splashed everywhere and I heard escape my own lips a sound that my roommate would later describe by asking me if “the queer [in the apartment behind us] had just been bitch slapped”.  The screen went blank and random lights flickered on and off and then nothing.  It was dead.  Good thing I had the foresight to pay $100 for the Accidental Damage warranty when I bought it… or was it?

The next day I went down to Best Buy, without the laptop, to ask them what I should do.  I was told that I could either bring it in or contact HP myself.  I was also informed that since Best Buy would have to send it to HP anyway, it would probably be faster and easier if I just went through HP myself.  So I called tech support.  The guy was barely understandable but troubleshot the situation and informed me that it would be covered under my warranty and they would send me a box and I would have it repaired or replaced in 2 - 3 weeks.

The next day, a box shows up.  I package everything up and drop it off at the nearest fed ex.  I get an email with a link to all the info and status of the repair and everything.  I have no worries at this point and promptly focus on more important things, i.e. Physics for Scientists and Engineers <vomit noise here>.  Time passes and I realize I hadn’t heard anything so I checked the website and it says I should be getting my computer back tomorrow.  So I used the 1800 number given in the initial confirmation email and I navigated via voice command to the “Check Repair Order Status” option. When the agent picked up he immediately told me to call a different 1800 number and hung up on me.  I barely had time to get the number down. I called that number, I got an agent who told me that I had to call the 1800 number I had just called. I couldn’t understand the explanation so I just hung up and dialed the first 1800 number again. I went through the voice commands again and was then put on hold for so long that I instead got on the internet to use the online chat support.

The chat agent couldn’t spell and continually gave me incorrect information. First he told me that my computer was fixed and should be on its way back to me.  When I asked for a tracking number, he gave me the HP Service Order Number and told me it was my FedEx tracking number.  I knew it wasn’t a tracking number so I asked him if it would work if I put it into the tracking page on FedEx’s website and he replied “yes, of course”.  Of course it didn’t so I called him on it and he disconnected the chat on me.  Besides lying to me about the tracking number, he was also unable to give me any information that I did not already have in front of me before I contacted him.

A few days later, I received a call from a woman who I could barely understand and she told me that my computer was NOT fixed and it wouldn’t be fixed for another 2 - 3 weeks. I wanted an explanation and she wouldn’t or couldn’t give me one.  Or at least that was all I could make out since she had obviously never spoken English before.  So I checked online again only to see that HP was STILL waiting on parts for my laptop. I still cannot understand why it would take over a month for a giant company such as HP to order, receive and install parts to fix a laptop. On top of this, I tried to inform this woman that the new date was after I was moving home and I needed to update my shipping address.  She told me that I couldn’t. (I think).  She said I needed to call back later to do that and that she wasn’t able to.  Eventually I was able to call back and change the shipping address.

The next deadline comes and I get another call from HP telling me that yet again my laptop is not repaired and won’t be for another 2 - 3 weeks.  I had many words for this person but they didn’t understand me and I barely understood them.  I told them that I needed a laptop and I was very very very dissatisfied with everything and I wanted a replacement since it seemed as though they couldn’t fix it.  She said she couldn’t do that and when I asked her to put someone on the phone who could she refused so I hung up.  I decided that I would wait for the next deadline, now May 20th.

May 20th came and so did my laptop.  I opened the box, plugged it in and turned it on.  Many of the buttons were still sticky and I couldn’t take the battery out because the slider was stuck.  I couldn’t turn off/on my wireless because that slider was too sticky.  I opened the RAM port and the hard drive port to see what was going on and I noticed that there was a ton of rust and white calcium corrosion inside these bays.  On top of this, the quick launch buttons above the keyboard didn’t work.  They didn’t even light up.  I decided to go to my other computer and write a letter.  There was no way in hell I was calling another 800 number and talking to some towel-head camel-jockey who couldn’t speak English.

I found a form mail on HP’s website to send a message to the office of the CEO of HP.  So I wrote a 4000 word rant detailing my experiences and sent it.  The next day I got a reply email saying they apologized and my email would be escalated to the proper people.  The next day I got a call from a man who spoke excellent English and resided in the good ol’ USA.  He was, however, just as unwilling to help me as anybody else.  He told me the best he could do was refund my 1 year phone support plan worth $130.  I told him that was unacceptable and that HP was going to either fix the laptop or give me one that worked.  He refused.  He went on to tell me that I didn’t have the accidental warranty and they had done all the repairs they did do as a “courtesy” for me.  So I told him where he could stick his refund and accidental plan and that I would never buy HP every again and that I would never recommend HP to any of my friends or family ever again.  So PEOPLE, don’t EVER buy HP if you can help it.  It just isn’t worth if, by chance, you end up having to deal with their customer service (if you can call it that) or technical support.

Finally I called up Best Buy here in St. Louis and explained the situation.  They told me that the Best Buy in SLC had informed me incorrectly and that I had to go through Best Buy and that is why HP treated me the way they did.  So I took my laptop into Best Buy here and told them that they would either have it fixed or they would replace it.  They said OK.  Two weeks later, I got a call saying that I needed to come in and pick out a comparable laptop since they couldn’t repair mine.

Yesterday, June 2nd, I went in and found a Dell Inspiron 1526.  It has a 2.0 ghz dual core AMD Turion 64 bit processor with 3 gigs of ram and 160 gig hard drive.  So its much better than the one I had.  Plus its a Dell.  However, they didn’t have any in stock at the store and because I went to that store for my repairs, I couldn’t go pick this laptop up at a neighboring store.  They told me they’d have one shipped over from another store and it would take 2 weeks.  Needless to say I had a few words for them and I walked out of there pissed.  Well, today, June 3rd, I get a call saying it came in and I could come get it.

So the saga ends, almost 9 weeks later.  I finally have a laptop back.  I have had Dell laptops in the past and I have had to deal with their customer service and tech support before.  I also have had to go to them to honor an accidental warranty and I have nothing but good things to say about Dell’s service and support.