This is a letter I sent to the Better Business Bureau in regards to my HP customer experience:
Complaint Description:
On May 30 my 79 yr. Old mother bought an HP Pavilion Computer from Best Buy for $529.98. She paid for it with her Visa card.in early November the computer suddenly would not turn on. I then went to her house to see if I could help. I first called Best Buy and they informed me that since it was still under HP's warranty I should call them. I called HP Technical Support and they walked me through some steps to determine what was wrong with the computer. One of the steps had me opening the computer to check on the power supply. They determined that the computer had a faulty power supply and since it was under warranty they were paying for us to ship it back to their service center to have it replaced. On November 19 Paul H -the Customer Relationship Manager with HP called my mother and also sent her an email stating that they couldn't honor the warranty because they "are not allowed to work on or repair units with insects, pests and/or insect droppings inside the computer. We are returning the computer to you un-repaired. Please do not attempt to return the unit for repair as this will not be covered under warranty and we cannot repair it." This was an absolute lie because I had to go into the computer to diagnose the problem before it was shipped and there was no evidence at all of any type of pest infestation. And even if there were, I certainly would have removed them before shipping it back. Not only that but my mother keeps her house spotless and completely pest free. When asked what type of pests they claimed that they wouldn't tell us.in other words they didn't have to prove it... Just their word against ours. I immediately called the next day to try and contest this situation and escalate the complaint. I was told at that time that they still had the computer and would escalate the issue. That was another lie because unbeknown to me it had already been returned to my mother's house. So I then went to her house to unpack the computer. Not only was there no evidence of pest infestation when I opened it but lo and behold there was a "HP Refusal of HP Bench Repair Service" document that stated the reason it was returned was due to " possible blood spilled". There was no mention of pests at all! So there was more proof of their lie. We couldn't figure out what they meant by "possible blood spilled" so we looked the computer over with a fine toothed comb and the only thing we could find that they MIGHT have been referring to was a very faint pink spot on the back of the computer-something virtually impossible to see (there was nothing on the inside). I can assure you that neither me nor my mother bled on the computer so this was a far fetched attempt to not have to honor their warranty. But even if that faint spot had been blood that had nothing to do with the power supply on the inside. Why didn't they at least ship us a new power supply if they couldn't replace it themselves? This whole episode smacks of outright fraud. Then it only got worse as we took it back to Best Buy to pay to get it fixed. They told us that they couldn't repair it even if we paid because HP had voided the warranty. I had to raise a ruckus to get them to repair it and they made me sign a waiver but we finally got it repaired. However, we should not have had to spend a penny to get this problem fixed but we paid a total of $102.98 because my mother needed her computer back. HP has no proof of their false claims but the honest consumer was left holding the bag. This was a much bigger hassle than it needed to be and the only thing we did wrong was stupidly buying an HP computer thinking that they were a reputable company. We were wrong. The service ticket number that HP refers to for this issue is: 8031535539
Your Desired Resolution:
We would like the cost of the repair and labor returned to us. $102.98
This case will be reviewed by a complaint specialist at the Better Business Bureau, and then forwarded to the business for their response. It is our policy to allow the business 30 working days to respond to your complaint. You will be notified when the business has responded.
0 comments