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 wouldnt 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 wouldnt pay ten bucks for a faulty set with only three months warranty let alone SGD 170.
Shocker #4
I dont 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 years 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 cant 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.
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 wouldnt 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 wouldnt pay ten bucks for a faulty set with only three months warranty let alone SGD 170.
Shocker #4
I dont 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 years 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 cant 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.