I will never buy another Hewlett Packard (HP) product again.

[storagemat]

Hi guys, just sharing my personal account of the inconvenience and dismayal level of after-sales customer service Hewlett Packard has shown while trying to fix my HP 5610 All-in-One Officejet machine.

Firstly, for establishing information, as of writing my printer was purchased 1 year and 4 months and 17 days ago. I bought it from Courts Toa Payoh for SGD 299. My 56 year old mother is the user of the machine. On average she prints about 20 documents, scans one or two photographs and receives four or five faxes a month. The machine started giving problems two months ago. It prints fine, receives faxes fine but only scans and copies only five percent of the time we want it to.

We have tried everything in the troubleshooting guide as well as the email guide which the customer service officer sent to us. Resetting the machine worked for awhile but eventually the problem returned and refused to go away.

Now for some shocking facts.

Shocker #1

After your one-year warranty is over, even if you make the trip to their service centre in Alexandra Technopark, Hewlett Packard (HP) charges SGD 50 just to inspect your machine. After hours of backwards and forwards on phone with the customer service officer, I manage to get them to waive the inspection charge.

At the service centre, the technician came out, plugged in our machine and tried the steps in the troubleshooting email guide. When faced with the same results, he simply turned to us and said, “Your machine is faulty.” I know the machine is faulty, thats why i am here, you mean I am supposed to pay SGD 50 just to hear a technician say that?

Shocker #2

Okay, so my machine is faulty. How much would it cost to fix it? He looks at me and says, “HP does not fix consumer printers.”

The physical components work, just not all the time. Surely there is a way to fix it. “This is due to wear and tear,” he countered. Wear and tear? If the machine was 3 years old and my mother was a bootlegger for Enid Blyton, I wouldn’t have bothered trying to fix it at all. But it started giving problems two months out of warranty and base on the stats above, my mother is hardly classified as a heavy duty user.

Shocker #3
So what are my options? “You can buy a remanufactured set for SGD 170 with a warranty of 3 months.” Remanufactured? “They are faulty sets from the production line which we have fixed, we will test them fully before sending it to you.” Why can you fix faulty sets from the production line but not my printer? “Because the printer has complicated parts inside and we can only fix it at the factory and not at the service centre. These remanufactured sets are as good as new.” Why then offer only three months warranty? “Because these are remanufactured sets which we are offering to you at half the cost of a new printer.” HUH? WTF? To be precise its 56.8 percent of the cost. And I wouldn’t pay ten bucks for a faulty set with only three months warranty let alone SGD 170.

Shocker #4
I don’t want a remanufactured set. I just want to fix my machine. “Or you can choose to trade in your faulty printer and purchase a brand new printer with a year’s warranty at a special discounted price.” How much discount? “We have a list of discounted printers and the closest one is the HP Officejet 6310.” Ok, how much is it? “SGD 399” What? “But you get a trade in discount of 50 dollars.” And what will you do with my traded in printer, Mr Wear and Tear? Ship it back to the factory and remanufactured it?

Shocker #5
This is unacceptable. I want to talk to your manager. “I am sorry but we do not have managers here at the service centre.” What? I want to speak to someone who can offer me a better solution. Do you have a supervisor? “I am sorry but we do not have supervisors here.” What? Where are they? “They are all in another office in Depot Road.” Okay then, give me the name and number of your supervisor. “I can’t give you that information but here is my email. I will get them to contact you right away.”

Shocker #6 (not much of a shocker here…)
It has been 2 days and still no response.

I, for one will never buy another HP product again and I strongly discourage anyone from doing so. I am not asking for a free printer. I am just asking to get it fixed at price in relation to its cost. It is ridiculous for a large IT company which posted US $104 billion in revenue last year to have such shoddy and inflexible after-sales service.

 

[Sjourn]

everything so corparatize..i guess the service staff only have to follow by the book, that is why its not so flexible.

Its not only HP, but some other products may also break down from time to time. My office HP monitor broke down and HP replaced with a new one, but i was lucky that is was still under warranty.

Just buy another brand and get on with life..

 

[garou12]

Hi guys, just sharing my personal account of the inconvenience and dismayal level of after-sales customer service Hewlett Packard has shown while trying to fix my HP 5610 All-in-One Officejet machine.

Firstly, for establishing information, as of writing my printer was purchased 1 year and 4 months and 17 days ago. I bought it from Courts Toa Payoh for SGD 299. My 56 year old mother is the user of the machine. On average she prints about 20 documents, scans one or two photographs and receives four or five faxes a month. The machine started giving problems two months ago. It prints fine, receives faxes fine but only scans and copies only five percent of the time we want it to.

We have tried everything in the troubleshooting guide as well as the email guide which the customer service officer sent to us. Resetting the machine worked for awhile but eventually the problem returned and refused to go away.

Now for some shocking facts.

Shocker #1

After your one-year warranty is over, even if you make the trip to their service centre in Alexandra Technopark, Hewlett Packard (HP) charges SGD 50 just to inspect your machine. After hours of backwards and forwards on phone with the customer service officer, I manage to get them to waive the inspection charge.

At the service centre, the technician came out, plugged in our machine and tried the steps in the troubleshooting email guide. When faced with the same results, he simply turned to us and said, “Your machine is faulty.” I know the machine is faulty, thats why i am here, you mean I am supposed to pay SGD 50 just to hear a technician say that?

Shocker #2

Okay, so my machine is faulty. How much would it cost to fix it? He looks at me and says, “HP does not fix consumer printers.”

The physical components work, just not all the time. Surely there is a way to fix it. “This is due to wear and tear,” he countered. Wear and tear? If the machine was 3 years old and my mother was a bootlegger for Enid Blyton, I wouldn’t have bothered trying to fix it at all. But it started giving problems two months out of warranty and base on the stats above, my mother is hardly classified as a heavy duty user.

Shocker #3
So what are my options? “You can buy a remanufactured set for SGD 170 with a warranty of 3 months.” Remanufactured? “They are faulty sets from the production line which we have fixed, we will test them fully before sending it to you.” Why can you fix faulty sets from the production line but not my printer? “Because the printer has complicated parts inside and we can only fix it at the factory and not at the service centre. These remanufactured sets are as good as new.” Why then offer only three months warranty? “Because these are remanufactured sets which we are offering to you at half the cost of a new printer.” HUH? WTF? To be precise its 56.8 percent of the cost. And I wouldn’t pay ten bucks for a faulty set with only three months warranty let alone SGD 170.

Shocker #4
I don’t want a remanufactured set. I just want to fix my machine. “Or you can choose to trade in your faulty printer and purchase a brand new printer with a year’s warranty at a special discounted price.” How much discount? “We have a list of discounted printers and the closest one is the HP Officejet 6310.” Ok, how much is it? “SGD 399” What? “But you get a trade in discount of 50 dollars.” And what will you do with my traded in printer, Mr Wear and Tear? Ship it back to the factory and remanufactured it?

Shocker #5
This is unacceptable. I want to talk to your manager. “I am sorry but we do not have managers here at the service centre.” What? I want to speak to someone who can offer me a better solution. Do you have a supervisor? “I am sorry but we do not have supervisors here.” What? Where are they? “They are all in another office in Depot Road.” Okay then, give me the name and number of your supervisor. “I can’t give you that information but here is my email. I will get them to contact you right away.”

Shocker #6 (not much of a shocker here&#8230
It has been 2 days and still no response.

I, for one will never buy another HP product again and I strongly discourage anyone from doing so. I am not asking for a free printer. I am just asking to get it fixed at price in relation to its cost. It is ridiculous for a large IT company which posted US $104 billion in revenue last year to have such shoddy and inflexible after-sales service.

Welcome to singapore! :sweatsm: at least they didn't forward you to a call centre in India to hear the same crap!

 

[whowhatwhere]

Welcome to singapore! :sweatsm: at least they didn't forward you to a call centre in India to hear the same crap!

That is what exactly happened to me. Half the time, i can't hear him clearly because i guess they are using VOip and the other half i can't make out what he is trying to say. Bought a three year onsite warrenty carepack but was told that it is a carry in warrenty when the machine is fualty. :thumbsd::thumbsd::thumbsd:

 

[garou12]

That is what exactly happened to me. Half the time, i can't hear him clearly because i guess they are using VOip and the other half i can't make out what he is trying to say. Bought a three year onsite warrenty carepack but was told that it is a carry in warrenty when the machine is fualty. :thumbsd::thumbsd::thumbsd:

you think that's bad? my friend had a bigger suay experience when he called to talk to the GMAT customer center, got forwarded to india and then they try to deny that they're india despite their THICK indian accent! :sweatsm:

 

[happyham]

I can sympathise with you. My old HP 3 in 1 broke down and they said I had to place an order for the part which cost almost as much as a new printer. Junked it.

Here's another one. I called HP to check when the new maps for my GPS unit will be out.

AAAs and digital life put it as sometime soon but the service support staff just refused to acknowledge it. She just practically read off the website and insisted that HP does not expect any map updates soon. She was polite but absolutely clueless. I asked her if HP had a contact for me to call NAVIGO(map provider) and she just went to the website and said that I had to login myself to check their distributors. I just gave up.
(If anyone wants to find out more about the IPAQ 312 GPS, can check with me)

 

[Big Kahuna]

So sorry to hear that...there is no guaranty that another brand will not give you the same treatment.....I have 200 HP and IBM PCs combine in my office and I really can't tell who is better than the other...all thanks to the cut throat business and thin margin.....some may say that should not be the excuse for poor service....sad but true....that is from a consumer point of view.....from a company director or share holder point of view....sustainability and improve bottom line the way a business run today :dunno:

 

[garou12]

So sorry to hear that...there is no guaranty that another brand will not give you the same treatment.....I have 200 HP and IBM PCs combine in my office and I really can't tell who is better than the other...all thanks to the cut throat business and thin margin.....some may say that should not be the excuse for poor service....sad but true....that is from a consumer point of view.....from a company director or share holder point of view....sustainability and improve bottom line the way a business run today :dunno:

the irony is that they think they're saving money outsourcing their customer service but i think it makes their customer satisfaction dive even more...sad that they dun care about customer satisfaction because that's what will get them repeat business for long term survival...o well...

 

[Goondoo]

Dear TS,
You may want to try this site
http://vatlnzpro.atlanta.hp.com/cchs/forms/SubmitCase_EU.asp

Regards,
Goondoo

 

[aeskywan]

It's normal to get such service nowadays..... cos seems that all companies nowadays do not manufacture their products to last. The faster it breaks down, the better for business as you will buy a new one.

However they don't realize that their machine breaking down and this kind of bad after sales service really pisses people off. The worst thing is they always tell you that the Managers or supervisors are not around.

I mean even if you know nothing can be done, having the manager as a sign of authority to defuse the situation helps a lot in PR and customer relationship management. We all know that the managers are there in that office but for some strange reason they just don't want to come out and handle the situation. Honestly how can it be an entire service center of that size has no supervisor or manager there? It's like an entire army division out in the field and when you ask the private where is your officer. The private tells you sorry the entire division are privates, no sergeant or officer here. We run on clockwork and cannot make any decision....

Recently my other half's dad's hitachi mini disk which he bought in Hong Kong for his digital camera broke down. The photos that he took just won't register in the card. I called Hitachi Singapore and was kicked from department to department. No one seem to know what I am talking about and kept saying "we only do household products....." Finally I spoke to a guy who is some kind of technician. What he said was he didn't know what am I talking about (the card is made by hitachi with the hitachi logo) and said that Hitachi manufactures household appliances. He suggested I go back to Hong Kong to the shop where the card came from and ask them to repair it..... Classic right? Till now I am wondering who can repair the card for me when the manufacturer claims they don't know they have this product...

 

[whowhatwhere]

Dear TS,
You may want to try this site
http://vatlnzpro.atlanta.hp.com/cchs/forms/SubmitCase_EU.asp

Regards,
Goondoo

FYI, that link doesn't work on my side. Probably overloaded with complaints.

 

[contaxable]

Wow, maybe u wanna cc to the HP head office and to the overseas HQ. This chap sounded like a robot if what you mentioned was true. You should have asked him if he was on duracell or energizer or some unicell brands from india. :bsmilie:

So far, hp gave me free replacement. Maybe i was lucky.

For your mom, try get her a laser fax machine. those works wonders and you never have problem with dried inks or clogged nozzles.

 

[behyx]

oh my! I got the same printer 2 months ago.. Hope mine will be fine..

As for HP, I heard that you can complain until somebody got fired. Heard it from somebody who worked in HP..

 

[Goondoo]

FYI, that link doesn't work on my side. Probably overloaded with complaints.

Its a link from here.
http://welcome.hp.com/country/sg/en/contact_us.html
http://vatlnzpro.atlanta.hp.com/cchs/forms/submitcase_eu.asp?CaseType=Complaint&country=sg

 

[velvetrose]

you could STOMP this!

tell me about it.

bought at laptop last aug at students' price of 1.5k. abt 2 months later it would sometimes show some crash dump error when i switch it on. sometimes it's ok after going into repair mode, but often it doesn't become ok. it would keep showing the crash dump screen even after restarting the laptop a couple of times, so much so that i don't dare to shut down or restart my laptop anymore, would hibernate it instead.

had no time to have it services, so i called cust service. they said my hard drive probably corrupted cause i downloaded something, but i don't remember downloading any thing that could have potentially harmed my computer. they taught me a temporal solution which didn't work all the time, the crash dump thing will resurface occasionally. my friend who has the same laptop experienced this as well.

i'm gonna have it serviced in one of the next few weeks. they're gonna get a hard time from me if they give me the kind of service they gave to you.

 

[jfoo]

you could STOMP this!

tell me about it.

bought at laptop last aug at students' price of 1.5k. abt 2 months later it would sometimes show some crash dump error when i switch it on. sometimes it's ok after going into repair mode, but often it doesn't become ok. it would keep showing the crash dump screen even after restarting the laptop a couple of times, so much so that i don't dare to shut down or restart my laptop anymore, would hibernate it instead.

had no time to have it services, so i called cust service. they said my hard drive probably corrupted cause i downloaded something, but i don't remember downloading any thing that could have potentially harmed my computer. they taught me a temporal solution which didn't work all the time, the crash dump thing will resurface occasionally. my friend who has the same laptop experienced this as well.

i'm gonna have it serviced in one of the next few weeks. they're gonna get a hard time from me if they give me the kind of service they gave to you.

just a thought, did you try using the recovery disk to restore the laptop. if you did and still have the crash dump error, most likely something wrong with hardware parts and not because you 'downloaded something'. this is the worst blatant sorry excuse any tech can give.

they are very fast to push blame onto customers. who uses a computer and doesn't download anything. an email needs to be downloaded for reading. a webpage needs to be downloaded for display.

i suspect your ram may be the issue. did you upgrade the ram yourself? if you did, remove the added ram chip and monitor your laptop.

if your friend with the same laptop is experiencing same problem with you, no need to say anymore.

 

[jfoo]

sorry to hear of your problems. don't just highlight it here. bring it up at hardware zone, stomp it, and that nokia killing lady's site as well.

 

[spindoctor]

HP service used to be very good. When I bought a printer in 1991 and had problems with it, they sent a repairman to my house to have a look at no charge. But things have changed drastically since.

I bought a laptop in 2004 and within months it gave problems. I brought it to the service centre and a few days later collected it. At home, I was doing my own checks to see if everything was OK and I just happened to check the RAM and lo and behold half of it was gone! When I opened up the casing, one of the RAM modules (it was 2x512MB) was gone. Charged back to the service centre and spoke to the manager. After a while he agreed to replace the missing RAM. No apologies nothing. Of course this was in KL but still.

 

[Elixirx]

For shocker #1, I posted about this about a week back.

http://www.clubsnap.com/forums/showthread.php?t=367680

You are lucky that they charged you $50 for it. Fujitsu wanted to charge me $80 for confirming that my WLAN card is faulty and this is despite that my notebook still has a parts warranty. Sadly the labout labour warranty has expired.

 

[Yappy]

I had a dealing with an International Bank.

I called for the manager but they told me that the manager was not available and they could not reveal the office phone number(business phone number cannot be revealed than what is office phone meant for? I did not ask for home number.)

I call the HR dept and told them that the dept manager(don't know who) was good for nothing as they hid behind junior staff who cannot make decision. The manager only knew how to collect salary and dare not face customer when there was a concern.

I got a call from the manager the next day.