Computer Hell.
In early October I was working for a U.S. Senator managing databases. I needed a fast power horse of a computer and I needed it fast. HP had a Media Center m7680n ready to ship on site so I bought it. Worked like a charm until January 21st, 2007 when it simply shut down. It made no sense. I was a computer engineer at Johns Hopkins, I tried every trick I knew. Finally I caved and threw myself upon the mercy of HP Customer support.
The customer support rep immediately submitted an order for a new hard drive (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GEB800&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=05655&country=US) and set of recovery disks (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GEB804&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=05655&country=US) to be shipped to my home.
If you click the above links you will notice one specific difference between the two. The hard drive had a tracking link, the CD’s do not. This is because that order of CD’s was never shipped.
The hard drive arrived on time. I was told that HP had a hold up at their distribution center, the CD’s would be delayed five days, pushing delivery back to 01/27/2007. I called again after the CD’s still had not arrived. I was told there was an indefinite delay.
February 5th I started a new job and moved to a new state. Two weeks and still no CD’s. My computer was back at my old place but I knew I still needed those CD’s. I called again on February 12th to see what was going on. I was told that the Cd’s were still not available but that a distribution manager would be contacted and asked to send the disks to me immediately. (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GNE883&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=05655&country=US)
Unfortunately it wasn’t until March 4th that the movers delivered my computer and CD’s. Now normally this three week delay would be my fault, however, the ultimate solution from HP’s end was still a week and a half away so I could have been locked in a basement with HP recovery CD’s and it would not have mattered.
March 4th I sat down with the recovery CD’s and the supplemental disc was incorrect. I spent three hours reformatting it and reinstalling (half of that with a technician on the phone, yes it took two hours to get a tech on the phone).
Finally I was told, you have the wrong CD’s, we’re going to send you a new set of recovery disks. (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GWS683&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=15237&country=US).
The disks were sent, I got them, I reformatted and reinstalled, another night lost, they didn’t work!!! Two sets of disks and they didn’t work, what could the problem be? HP told me I would have to ship the entire system back to them. (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GYG604&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=15237&country=US). This was 03/12/2007.
I dropped the computer off with FedEx the evening of 03/14/2007.
03/16/2007 I got an email from HP 03/16/2007 titled “IMPORTANT ALERT FROM HP REGARDING DESKTOP PC RECOVERY KIT DISCS.” It said “We wanted to let you know that there may be a problem with the 3-disc Recovery Kit for Desktop PCs (Part Number: 5092-5268) shipped to you. We are sorry for the inconvenience. It appears that the kit you received has some missing files….We are in the process of remanufacturing the kits and will ship a new kit out with overnight delivery at no charge”
So, regardless of how much time & energy I put into this problem, HP was going to continue sending me and trying to use the wrong recovery disks. There was no possible chance of a solution from 01/21/2007 when the system first crashed to 03/16/2007 when they finally discovered their error.
At long last my precious computer returned from HP Repair 03/21/2007. Friday night I took it out, plugged it in, booted it up. However, not all was right…. One of the network drives did not have its drivers installed and HP Repair didn’t install the video driver software when they reinstalled the machine.
At this point if I have a DVD movie in a drive, the computer will not boot and forgets that the hard drives exist. If I plug in the Ethernet the computer will not boot up, if I plug the Ethernet cable in after I’ve logged into windows the machine immediately shuts down.
So here we are 03/24/2007 and I’m being shipped a new box to send the computer away yet again. (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=HDE209&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=15237&country=US).
At best the box will arrive on Wednesday 03/28/2007. I’ll drop it off that night at FedEx, it will leave 03/29/2007 and get to HP Repair 03/31/2007 if I am lucky, but that is a Saturday. The nice man sitting behind a computer on the other side of the planet told me that it wold be 4-6 business days before being shipped back, four business days would make it 04/05/2007. Two more days for transit, factor in the Sunday, and I’ll be lucky to have my computer back between 04/09/2007 and 04/11/2007, almost three months after the initial problem and not a single delay at the feet of anyone other than HP. 79 to 81 days after the initial problem which should have been resolved in just 5 days.
I would hope you’re about to sit back and think to yourself, amazing. How could HP do this? However, it gets better. I left out the financial nightmare of this. Financial? But its brand new and under warrenty… well yes. However, if you’re anything like me, you hold on to your old hard drive so you can recover your data once you have the system working again.
I tried installing my version of XP onto the computer but the HP system is designed to not allow that to happen some how. I faced a hard choice, loose the data I hadn’t recently backed up or be charged $318.00 for not sending the hard drive back immediately. I choose to hold my ground, the data was worth it. I was promised I would not be charged because HP failed to send me the disks.
When I was charged $318 anyway I was not surprised. I expected it, I accepted it. It was when I was double charged $318 that I complained. You can even see the screen shot of the billing at http://www.aseltine.com/hd.jpg. I called, they insisted the double billing didn’t occur. However, my bank called asking if it was fraud, they certainly saw it. After a week of calling people and demanding the $318 back I was credited back the extra amount on 03/03/2007.
The case manager in the U.S. assigned to try and help figure out what was going on, Tim, always had a full voice mail box. He didn’t respond to emails and never picked up during his office hours. A few weeks later a new case manager named Mike called me, apparently Tim was “no longer with the company.” Tim might have been unreachable but at least he was pleasant to talk to and tried to help. Mike was arrogant and rude. All he did was say I was wrong and knew nothing. He insisted I was never double billed despite the evidence at hand. He said it was a temporary hold. I don’t care what you call it, removing $636.00 was never part of the agreement and was a violation of ethical standards. Mike decided to do me a “favor.” He made the shipping of the box to pickup the computer overnight. However, he didn’t effect the overnight status on any other leg of the journey, the trip to the repair center was still two day. Back when I had an IBM laptop I remember everything was over night.
The customer support rep immediately submitted an order for a new hard drive (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GEB800&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=05655&country=US) and set of recovery disks (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GEB804&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=05655&country=US) to be shipped to my home.
If you click the above links you will notice one specific difference between the two. The hard drive had a tracking link, the CD’s do not. This is because that order of CD’s was never shipped.
The hard drive arrived on time. I was told that HP had a hold up at their distribution center, the CD’s would be delayed five days, pushing delivery back to 01/27/2007. I called again after the CD’s still had not arrived. I was told there was an indefinite delay.
February 5th I started a new job and moved to a new state. Two weeks and still no CD’s. My computer was back at my old place but I knew I still needed those CD’s. I called again on February 12th to see what was going on. I was told that the Cd’s were still not available but that a distribution manager would be contacted and asked to send the disks to me immediately. (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GNE883&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=05655&country=US)
Unfortunately it wasn’t until March 4th that the movers delivered my computer and CD’s. Now normally this three week delay would be my fault, however, the ultimate solution from HP’s end was still a week and a half away so I could have been locked in a basement with HP recovery CD’s and it would not have mattered.
March 4th I sat down with the recovery CD’s and the supplemental disc was incorrect. I spent three hours reformatting it and reinstalling (half of that with a technician on the phone, yes it took two hours to get a tech on the phone).
Finally I was told, you have the wrong CD’s, we’re going to send you a new set of recovery disks. (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GWS683&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=15237&country=US).
The disks were sent, I got them, I reformatted and reinstalled, another night lost, they didn’t work!!! Two sets of disks and they didn’t work, what could the problem be? HP told me I would have to ship the entire system back to them. (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=GYG604&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=15237&country=US). This was 03/12/2007.
I dropped the computer off with FedEx the evening of 03/14/2007.
03/16/2007 I got an email from HP 03/16/2007 titled “IMPORTANT ALERT FROM HP REGARDING DESKTOP PC RECOVERY KIT DISCS.” It said “We wanted to let you know that there may be a problem with the 3-disc Recovery Kit for Desktop PCs (Part Number: 5092-5268) shipped to you. We are sorry for the inconvenience. It appears that the kit you received has some missing files….We are in the process of remanufacturing the kits and will ship a new kit out with overnight delivery at no charge”
So, regardless of how much time & energy I put into this problem, HP was going to continue sending me and trying to use the wrong recovery disks. There was no possible chance of a solution from 01/21/2007 when the system first crashed to 03/16/2007 when they finally discovered their error.
At long last my precious computer returned from HP Repair 03/21/2007. Friday night I took it out, plugged it in, booted it up. However, not all was right…. One of the network drives did not have its drivers installed and HP Repair didn’t install the video driver software when they reinstalled the machine.
At this point if I have a DVD movie in a drive, the computer will not boot and forgets that the hard drives exist. If I plug in the Ethernet the computer will not boot up, if I plug the Ethernet cable in after I’ve logged into windows the machine immediately shuts down.
So here we are 03/24/2007 and I’m being shipped a new box to send the computer away yet again. (https://warp1.external.hp.com/CSO_Status/Order_Status.asp?CSONumber=HDE209&ItemNumber=01&Zipcode=15237&country=US).
At best the box will arrive on Wednesday 03/28/2007. I’ll drop it off that night at FedEx, it will leave 03/29/2007 and get to HP Repair 03/31/2007 if I am lucky, but that is a Saturday. The nice man sitting behind a computer on the other side of the planet told me that it wold be 4-6 business days before being shipped back, four business days would make it 04/05/2007. Two more days for transit, factor in the Sunday, and I’ll be lucky to have my computer back between 04/09/2007 and 04/11/2007, almost three months after the initial problem and not a single delay at the feet of anyone other than HP. 79 to 81 days after the initial problem which should have been resolved in just 5 days.
I would hope you’re about to sit back and think to yourself, amazing. How could HP do this? However, it gets better. I left out the financial nightmare of this. Financial? But its brand new and under warrenty… well yes. However, if you’re anything like me, you hold on to your old hard drive so you can recover your data once you have the system working again.
I tried installing my version of XP onto the computer but the HP system is designed to not allow that to happen some how. I faced a hard choice, loose the data I hadn’t recently backed up or be charged $318.00 for not sending the hard drive back immediately. I choose to hold my ground, the data was worth it. I was promised I would not be charged because HP failed to send me the disks.
When I was charged $318 anyway I was not surprised. I expected it, I accepted it. It was when I was double charged $318 that I complained. You can even see the screen shot of the billing at http://www.aseltine.com/hd.jpg. I called, they insisted the double billing didn’t occur. However, my bank called asking if it was fraud, they certainly saw it. After a week of calling people and demanding the $318 back I was credited back the extra amount on 03/03/2007.
The case manager in the U.S. assigned to try and help figure out what was going on, Tim, always had a full voice mail box. He didn’t respond to emails and never picked up during his office hours. A few weeks later a new case manager named Mike called me, apparently Tim was “no longer with the company.” Tim might have been unreachable but at least he was pleasant to talk to and tried to help. Mike was arrogant and rude. All he did was say I was wrong and knew nothing. He insisted I was never double billed despite the evidence at hand. He said it was a temporary hold. I don’t care what you call it, removing $636.00 was never part of the agreement and was a violation of ethical standards. Mike decided to do me a “favor.” He made the shipping of the box to pickup the computer overnight. However, he didn’t effect the overnight status on any other leg of the journey, the trip to the repair center was still two day. Back when I had an IBM laptop I remember everything was over night.