Anybody have experience with HP repairs?

pdoherty76

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I cannot believe the experience I have just had with HP repairs.

I bought a laptop in september and the touchpad key stopped working. I sent it for repair to HP and was assured that it arrived in perfect condition and it would take 10 working days for the repair.

6 weeks later I was told they were waiting for a part, a top cover, and if it reached 8 weeks I would get a new laptop.

My laptop has just been returned to me, a few days before the 8 week deadline and it has dents in the top cover caused by screws and no top cover replacement has occured.

It is clear they have caused this damage and tried to pass it off as damage caused by me. I thought it was strange when they were waiting for a top cover even though it wasn't related to the original fault.

As you can imagine, I am livid. I have just spoken to complaints who said they would ring me back in 20 minutes but haven't.

Anybody had experience like this? And what on earth can I do if they refuse to sort this out?
 
Havn't had to send much back to HP but when we have it has been a nightmare, mostly communications... our returns have always gone to Holland and it takes a long time until I send them an email saying that the time estimated is not acceptable and will be billing them for the time our developers are losing due to this.

However all repairs have been fine, no damage etc - once had a small form factor pc returned that got obliterated while in shipping but that was sorted by the courier and HP we got a replacement machine within a week.

So no complaints with there work here from me, just their communications/time.
 
I have just tried to ring them 10 times and every time the line either went dead or the person on the other end just kept saying hello and that they couldn't hear me.

I phoned somebody else to see if there is a problem with my phone and it is working fine.
 
Wow, now I am really livid.

I just spoke to the case manager, who told me that they wont replace the computer despite me having already been without it for 8 weeks, they will only repair it again so I have to send it back to them.

This awful woman I spoke to even tried to argue that they hadn't had it 8 weeks and I had to run her through the calendar to show her it was.

I asked to speak to a superior and was told I couldn't. I asked for a postal or email address for her department and she refused to give it to me.

She then guaranteed to me that I will have my computer back again within 10 days but the technical guy she put me through to told me she should not have made any such guarantee and I could be waiting ANOTHER 8 weeks for it......and this is all because their technicians damaged it while repairing a minor fault with the touch pad.

In fact, to say I am livid about this is an understatement. It could turn out that in 6 months of owning it I will only have had it in my possession for 2 months and all because they damaged it. I have asked them to replace the laptop and they refused, I asked them if they would send me the part for self repair and they refused, I also asked if they would consider compensation for the fact that I may be without it for a further 2 months because of their damage and they have refused. Despite several requests they will not even give me a contact name or address of a superior who I can report this too.

In short, I certainly, will NEVER buy a hp product again.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
That is absolutely shocking treatment, I would call up again and ask to speak to the complaints manager. They have no right to refuse this. Try to stay calm on the phone - you usually get better results, as hard as it can be at times.

You could also try:
HP Executive Team: Mark Hurd email

I have edited the last line of your post as you're not allowed, under forum rules (and for legal reasons) to advise other users to avoid certain products, however you are perfectly fine sharing your experiences, people can make their minds up from them.
 
That is absolutely shocking treatment, I would call up again and ask to speak to the complaints manager. They have no right to refuse this. Try to stay calm on the phone - you usually get better results, as hard as it can be at times.

You could also try:
HP Executive Team: Mark Hurd email

I have edited the last line of your post as you're not allowed, under forum rules (and for legal reasons) to advise other users to avoid certain products, however you are perfectly fine sharing your experiences, people can make their minds up from them.


Thanks for your response.

I have emailed Mark Hurd with the entire story. I have also named the case manager in that email.

She was truly awful. She claimed that any complaint I tried to send would only go back to her anyway and we would end up having the same conversation. Fortunately i did remain calm. It has cost me a fortune in ringing them though. The discaimer at the beginning of the call said it was being recorded, lets hope someone higher than her gets to listen to it.

She actually said "There is a manager who controls the complaints department but he doesn't take calls or emails from the public".:eek: I think she may regret saying that.

What is wrong with these people? As documented on these forums, I recently had a sales person from tiscali tv say to me "Go and get sky then" when I complained about the exorbitant charge for moving home. Needless to say, I went and got sky.

/Rant over.
 
Yeah I have had endless run-ins with rude staff on support lines, it's shocking.

Oddly enough I couldn't find any details about making a complaint when googling etc :suicide:

Hopefully you will get somewhere with your cause, remember to keep us updated :thumbsup:
 
Yeah I have had endless run-ins with rude staff on support lines, it's shocking.

Oddly enough I couldn't find any details about making a complaint when googling etc :suicide:

Hopefully you will get somewhere with your cause, remember to keep us updated :thumbsup:


Looks like I am making progress. Mark Hurd's office has emailed me back saying my complaint has been forwarded to the relevant manager and will be investigated.:smashin:

Just have to wait and see now. If I don't hear within a week, I will resubmit the complaint.
 
...The discaimer at the beginning of the call said it was being recorded, lets hope someone higher than her gets to listen to it...


Unfortunately for you you'd be hard pushed to find a company that does actually record all of their (non-abusive) calls. If you think in terms of the amount of storage required for the calls it's just not feasible.


As far as support from HP goes, the majority of the time I've needed it for enterprise hardware it's been perfect. The only issues we've had are either the courier shipping to the wrong end of the country (on a 4-hour response contract, seriously...) or couriers missing delivery timescales. Enterprise desktop support is a different matter, though we've not been treated as badly as you have. The problem we've had here is that the 30 or so workstations we bought in the most recent batch seem to all have faulty hard drives. It took us buying new drives and running diagnostics (about 10 days in total) before HP would acknowledge the problem and replace all the disks - though this is happening so the problem is being resolved...


I hope they resolve this for you, the way they've treated you is definately not right.
 
Well this situation has just gotten a whole lot worse...

When hp repaired my computer they had to change the system board and it appears they have put a different OEM copy of vista on the hard drive. That in itself is not too much of a problem, however it now means that the recovery discs I burned will not recognise the computer. It won't let me burn any more and if I ever needed to order some then I wouldn't get the right ones. My vista acrivation key is now different to the one printed on the COA sticker.

Now all this sounds quite trivial but I am always thinking of resale value when I buy a computer and this computer now does not have a COA sticker corresponding to the OS. It also has no recovery discs and no chance of getting anymore.

Even more bizarrely, when i go to the hp website and use their auto detection tool to detect which laptop I am using they detect a completely different model.

All this, I presume, is because they have replaced the system board.

I bought a perfect computer just a few months ago but now, because I asked them to repair a touchpad button that had stopped clicking properly, I have got a laptop with actual physical damage, no recovery discs and no COA sticker.

I just can't beleive it. I really will never buy a hp product again. £400 I paid for this laptop and it feels like a piece of junk now.

And they still haven't got back to me about my complaint after saying it will be looked into.
 
OEM installations of Windows are pre-activated and never match the COA anyway - there is one standard image for all laptops of a particular model - they don't install each one individually using the licence key. You only need the COA when you install a fresh non-OEM copy of Windows. I am sure you can order the appropriate reinstall DVD from HP.

- Simon.
 
Complaint procedures do take quite a long time with any company as they have a lot to go through to deal with it. Usually they will give you a rough time of how long it will take, sometimes 28 days... sometimes more.
 
Complaint procedures do take quite a long time with any company as they have a lot to go through to deal with it. Usually they will give you a rough time of how long it will take, sometimes 28 days... sometimes more.

I emailed the CEO office again and they have assured me it is being looked into and i will be contacted again.
 
OEM installations of Windows are pre-activated and never match the COA anyway - there is one standard image for all laptops of a particular model - they don't install each one individually using the licence key. You only need the COA when you install a fresh non-OEM copy of Windows. I am sure you can order the appropriate reinstall DVD from HP.

- Simon.


Oh, well thats good news about the COA sticker. I assumed they matched the activation key inside the computer.

But how do you explain that the recovery discs worked before they repaired it? And why is the automatic detection tool on the hp website telling me that my laptop is a completely different model than the one I have. It used to work and bring up the right model.

I also noticed that the BIOS was updated during repair to version f.21. It turns out f.21 doesn't even apply to my model of laptop and the latest release for my model is f.12.

They definitely did a factory install of vista when they repaired it because all my settings have gone and the screensaver is the default compaq one.

I will phone them today and see if they will send me new recovery discs, but I suspect they will try and charge me for them and they will probably send me ones for my old system board and not for the one they have replaced it with.

By the way, I got a windows 7 upgrade disc from them which still works fine and will allow me to do a fresh install of windows 7, but does anybody know what would happen if my hard drive needed replacing? Would the windows 7 upgrade disc allow me to install without a copy of vista already there???
 
Maybe they replaced the motherboard with a slightly different model - difficult to know as you haven't actually posted any details of your laptop model.

You can install the Windows 7 upgrade on a new hard drive:

Clean Install Windows 7 With Upgrade Media and Product Key on Formatted or Empty Blank Hard Drive » My Digital Life

- Simon.

Thanks for the link.

My laptop model is compaq presario cq61-222sa.

I think I may have found the problem:

dv6000 - "This PC is not supported by the System Recovery Di..." - HP Support Forum

That is the exact same error message I get when i try to use the recovery discs I burned.

It seems they didn't tattoo my motherboard, whatever that means.
 
Right, I might be making progress. I just phoned technical support and actually spoke to someone who seemed to know what he is doing.

He got me to read him the UUID number from the BIOS and he said it didn't match the UUID that my computer should have. I have no idea what the UUID is.

He said he will send me, free of charge, a new set of recovery discs which should work. He said if they don't work then I should ring back and they will presumably do something physical to the laptop.

I told him that the hp auto detection tool is detecting a different laptop. he seemed very surprised by this and said "that is definitely a concern". Yeah, too right it is.
 
Right, I might be making progress. I just phoned technical support and actually spoke to someone who seemed to know what he is doing.

He got me to read him the UUID number from the BIOS and he said it didn't match the UUID that my computer should have. I have no idea what the UUID is.

He said he will send me, free of charge, a new set of recovery discs which should work. He said if they don't work then I should ring back and they will presumably do something physical to the laptop.

I told him that the hp auto detection tool is detecting a different laptop. he seemed very surprised by this and said "that is definitely a concern". Yeah, too right it is.

The UUID is a Universally Unique Identifier, basically an ID that is (as good as) guaranteed to be unique, a good way to identify things.
Seems strange that it's not recognising your laptop, I assume as Simon has mentioned they have replaced the motherboard with something different.

You could try running CPUID and see what it says your mainboard is, this may help shed some light on if this is the problem.
 
The UUID is a Universally Unique Identifier, basically an ID that is (as good as) guaranteed to be unique, a good way to identify things.
Seems strange that it's not recognising your laptop, I assume as Simon has mentioned they have replaced the motherboard with something different.

You could try running CPUID and see what it says your mainboard is, this may help shed some light on if this is the problem.


Right I have run that CPUID and the attached picture is a screen shot of what it gives for my motherboard.

I have also run Belarc advisor and that says my motherboard is a Quanta 3069 21.12.

Image - TinyPic - Free Image Hosting, Photo Sharing & Video Hosting
 
Just seen a similar problem on the hp forum. Somebody there seems to think that the motherboard is right but the people repairing it haven't flashed it properly with the p/n, s/n and UUID. Sounds right because the 3069 is the motherboard my computer is meant to have.

It seems they just haven't flashed the UUID onto the new one.

So what are the odds of these new recovery discs i am being sent working?
 

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