okay need some info reg dell complete care.. issues

well a local freind of mine has a dell 1730 with the full complete care and accidental damage coverage. he came home saturday and it didnt power on at all. he has another battery he bought and uses at times but keeps it fresh by always using it here and there.. he swapped it with the original one. no go.

sunday morning he tries again this time the thing comes on. he was able to use it for a few hours before it totally shut down on him. and then after that we tried everything and it will not come back on at all. (of course not telling dell this) i opened it up for him and tested the power suply section of the mobo it is dead.

this morning he calls dell and tells them exactly what happened and that he can not power it on. they INSIST he has to test it before they can either repair or replace parts ??? wtf??? (i was there when he called them) they told him if he doesnt know to test they need to remotely connect to it.. (THIS WAS AMERICAN TECH ALSO ) WE BOTH ONCE AGAIN EXPLAIN you cant connect to it as it can not be powered on period..

they told him then we cant help you

we said forget it and hung up. then called back a bit later hoping to get someone who wasn't a idiot on the phone this time.. this guy fully seemed to be pretty cool at first and said he understood they can test anything and they cant remotely connect no problem. he puts us on hold and says the only thing he can do is send it in to the DEPOT for repair??? umm no he has full 3 year FULL coverage and even accidental damage coverage... we explained that to him.. he said he just spoke with the supervisor and they told him if they cant test it and cant connect to it they can at that point only have it sent in?? my freind said what about the replacement of the system that should be included with the accidental coverage. the tech said they can only do that at a supervisors discretion..

now being totally ticked off we hung up..

two hours later he came back over to my shop and again we got them on the phone this time asking right off the bat for a supervisor. once again we were told his only option was to send it out for repair.. wtf??

me and him both thought the complete care and accidental coverage allows for a system exchange and he fully understood it would be a refurbished unit when he got the new one?? why all of a sudden are they telling us this HAS to go back to the depot of all places.. and we even asked why they cant come to the house to fix it.. they told him if they dont know what parts to send out being it will not turn on they cant send parts to the tech to come replace.

so i guess my question is for those that have this warranty is this normal??

have they been cracking down lately i mean i knew people who had systems replaced (including myself) for something as stupid as a small cosmetic defect??

we have a callback request in to the escalations dept now and we should hear back hopefully tomm (ive dealt with them before and they usually get things done so i hope they do this time)

any thoughts or ideas why they would be such a pain in the a@@ about this??

i mean i remember so many people ive known actually purposely damaging the system to get it replaced and they never said a word about it???

 

Wow. That sucks.

Does his warranty include the on site part?

If it does not, then I can see where they are coming from.

 

he has the best warranty they offered at the time he took everything. its the 3 year "complete care" which even covers spills and everything else that could happen to it so i assume it would

 

If the warranty is 'on-site', then you can request (and argue) for them to send a person out to do repairs. If not, then Dell has to look at the laptop.

They won't just hand out a new laptop because you say it is dead.

 

how can we check to see?? i thought complete care covered pretty much everything there was??

edit-- i just called him he said when he bought the warranty it did say it included on site repairs so i guess he will have to pull his paper work now..

 

You might have to argue it a little bit, but insist they send a new mainboard and have a tech replace it onsite. Chances are that will do it.

If you can, also request they send you a new AC power supply just in case that was the cause of failure. Obviously you'll have to send the old one back...but that might eliminate the cause.

 

correct though that complete care should have covered that either way??

 

Here is the link to the legalize on the Complete Care Warranty--maybe that will help.

Reading it, I am lead to believe that it is their choice how the computer is serviced. But, I do not know if there are different types of the Complete Care Service.