HP accidental damage / on-site repair :::: VERY BAD experience

I paid extra for an "on-site" repair warranty as opposed to a "pickup / return" repair warranty. I thought the point of an "on-site" repair was so that my laptop was fixed "on-site" IE: my home.

Heres my experience dealing with HP and their "on-site" warranty, and its not a positive one! I cracked the screen on my DV7 2 weeks ago. I called up HP and they immediately set up a shipment for a new screen. They set it up to be delivered last Tuesday, November 20th by 10am and the tech was scheduled to come out to my house the same day at 1:00pm. Perfect...or so I though.


TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2012
I received the part on time but the tech showed up 30mins late. He opened the box from HP and said oh wow they sent you an entire top lid assembly (lid, bezel and screen). He said they dont usually do that and said this job will be very quick since its a complete lid assembly. Well an hour goes by and he still doenst have the old screen removed because he cant remove the keyboard? He had to call HPs tech help line and he kept telling the person at the other end that hes replaced many screens in the past 15yrs hes been doing this but he cannot get the keyboard removed. He told the tech line that he sees the two clips but when he releases the clips the keyboard is still held down by an adhesive or something. The HP tech help line says its not supposed to have any adhesive and the tech at my house said I know but it does...what should I do? The HP tech help line said just use pressure until it releases itself. The tech said he did but he didnt want to use so much force that it damages the keyboard but said he would give it another try. He did and it came up without breaking the keyboard.

He then tells me Im sorry its taking this long, normally I can replace a screen within 30-45mins. I said no problem, I just want it repaired right so if it takes a little longer Im fine with that. Well he gets the lid replaced but now he cant get the keyboard installed back. He tells me he thinks HP used an adhesive to hold the keyboard down on the assembly line and once you break the adhesive the keyboard will not seat properly. That sounds stupid of HP to do but what do I know, Im not a tech. All in all he was at my house from 1:30pm to 4:36pm. He said he will come back out Friday, November 23, 2012 to finish the job. I though to myself, what will change between now and Friday. If you cant put it back together now, why will you be able to do it Friday?

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 2012
Fridays and I waited all day for him (Black Friday I might ad) to come back out to finish up the repair and he never showed up. He didnt even have the common courtesy to call me and let me know he wouldnt make it to my house!!! Im pissed that I wasted an entire day at home for nothing when I couldve been shopping with my wife and kids! I called up HP at 4pm and was on the phone with the HP rep until 4:36pm at which time they told me to give the tech until 5pm to come out. I said ok I'll call back. I called back at 5:20pm and the HP phone rep said he was setting up another appointment for Saturday, November 24, 2012. He gave me a Service Ticket number and the call was ended at 6:01pm!

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2012
Saturday comes and I stayed at home again while the family went shopping and AGAIN no call, no show! Nice, another day wasted! I call up HP at 5:00pm and told the HP rep again what happened but the indian lady could not understand what I was trying to saying. She then says, Ok sir I will order another screen for you. I said order another screen..WHY, theres nothing wrong with the screen HP shipped me this past Tuesday? The problem is your tech could not put my laptop back together!! I was speaking with her until 5:28pm when the call was terminated from her end. I know because the timer on my iPhone was running a few seconds before it ended the call. I call them back again at 5:29pm and was speaking with a new HP rep until 5:34pm when she says she will transfer me because she doesnt know how to resolve the problem. So I get transferred to a wrong extension and an HP operator comes on and says what extension would you like to be transferred to. I said I dont know you tell me!!! I told her the problem and she transfers me...to the wrong extension again! After a few beeps, HPs phone system returns me back to an HP operator and she asks me what extension I would like. I said look this is starting to me off, get me to someone who can help me on a repair order! She transfers me to another HP rep at its now 5:58pm. I had to tell my story all over again (whats the point in HP giving a Service Ticket number if you have to repeat your story to every damn person you speak with!!??) and said Im not happy and want someone out to my house to fix my laptop. He said dont worry sir, I am re-scheduling a tech to come out to your house tomorrow. I started laughing and said every person Ive spoke with over the past few days has said the same thing, why should I believe you. He kept saying "dont worry sir, I promise a tech is coming out". I gave him the benefit of the doubt...big mistake!!

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 2012
Sunday comes and guess what, no show, no call...again! My entire 3 day weekend was spent waiting at home for an imaginary HP tech to show up!! I called HP at 6:10pm and said this is unacceptable and I wanted to speak with a manager. She said no managers are on duty today. I said ok, well put a note in my file that I want a manager to call me first thing Monday morning. She said we cannot do that. I got fed up and just hung up on her.

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2012
Monday comes and I received a voicemail from an HP escalation case manager. HP had sent me a "HP Support Experience Survey" on Saturday that I filled out and gave my experience. So I called her back and she was busy so I was re-routed to another case manager (Todd) and he was very helpful. I told him the problems I was having with the their techs not showing back up to fix a job they started and they their HP reps continually setting up no show tech appointments. He apologized and said I dont know why they set up new appointments because they are not do any scheduling of the techs. MAN my face was red. I said so you mean to tell me I wasted my entire weekend for nothing. He said yes, Im so sorry for the confusion. I said look, I just want my laptop fixed. I said he was supposed to replace the screen and now my laptop will not even turn on. He read some notes in my file and we spoke for a good 30mins. He said he will put a request for a new tech and will call me back to let me know what he finds out.

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 2012
Today, Tuesday comes and hes a man of his word because he calls me and says I cant get ahold of the tech. At this point, because its not put back together and because your laptop will not even turn on I think its best if you send it in and have us look at it. I asked if I had to send it back to China and if so how long would it take to be repaired because I needed my laptop for work (quickbooks). He said they have a repair center in the US and said I should have it back by the middle of next week. I said ok lets set up the new repair order. About an hour later I received an email shipping confirmation of the box Im supposed to put my laptop in to send to HP. Finally!! Something is getting done!



Ive never had to use an HP "on-site" warranty before and to be honest Id think twice about spending extra money for an "on-site" warranty vs a "pick-up / return". A screen replacement should be one of, if not the easiest repairs to do, other than replaced a memory stock or HDD / SSD. Regarding replacing a screen Im speaking from experience. I replaced a screen on my wifes Dell Laptop several years ago because it was out of warranty and Im not even a "tech" and I did it within an hour. If HPs techs cant even replace a screen, correction a full lid assembly, what good is a "on-site" warranty? Im a little upset that HP did not offer me any type of compensation for the BS Ive gone though. They couldve offered me a partial refund of the accidental warranty I paid extra for or have offered to refund me the difference between on-site and pick-up / return since I had to ship it in to be repaired in the end!

Fingers crossed I get my laptop back new week. I'll update this thread.....

 

I received the laptop back yesterday. Good news is the screen works, bad news is they damaged the lid and my palm rest. The lid was brand new and now there are several deep scratches on the black finish where you can you now see the raw silver aluminum coming through. Then around the palm rest / keyboard lid theres deep marring gauges all along both sides: VGA / HDMI / USBs / Mic & Headphone jack & the blu-ray / USBs side! It looks like someone took a screwdriver and pried against the plastic to pop it open. And theres scratches all over the speaker grill and around the number keypad.

I got a call into the same case manager and he said he'll call me back once he finds out more details. I told him the laptop was purchased back in Sept. of this year so there was no prior damage. Besides all of the damage deals with the dis-assembly of the laptop to replace the lid and screen.


LID SCRATCHES












PALM REST MARRING












PLASTIC KEYBOARD SURROUND CRACK






NUMBER PAD SCRATCHES WHERE YOU CAN SEE SILVER COMING THROUGH






SPEAKER GRILL SCRATCH

 

I think I understand the problem now... backlit keyboard. Original tech didn't know how it differs from a not backlit one. Jeesh...

I could have installed the new LCD in about 30 minutes or less.... installing just the LCD is ALOT easier than taking off the top cover et al.

One of the centers is located in Houston, and one of my DV6s is on the way there so I hope it gets handled better than apparently your laptop did.

Hope your situation turns out well as your DV7 is loaded and deserves better care than apparently yours got.

 

Mines going back to McAllen, Texas. The case manager said the techs said it arrived like that so that would mean the tech that came out to my house did the damage. I hope it looks like new, if not I'm going higher up and asking for the entire laptop to be replaced.

Hope your repair comes back without any issues!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

HP always damage the laptop during repair because of the way the chassis is designed. The marring is caused by the engineer trying to remove the clip-on sides from the top cover. LCD cover I would say they are just careless handling your laptop.

 

I beg to disagree--this is definitely the support people messing up their service. If you follow the service guide to the letter, you'd be able to remove the bezel, keyboard (I have a backlit one), top cover and LCD assembly without any marrings. It definitely looks like a tech pried it open with a screwdriver or something flat--clearly doesn't know how to unseat the top cover and the keyboard, which looks very much forced out.

If I were you, I'd request HP to replace it.

 

I don't know how my experience differs from yours except mine sent back was a DV6 and yours was a DV7 so maybe that matters? And my repair center was in town and got from me to them in one day so it didn't ride the FedEx rodeo for more than that. But, I got mine back in better shape than I sent it... that's for sure and they repaired stuff I didn't report as broken as well. My DV6 came back as a new unit and has been perfect for the week that we have had it being tested and used.

I can only imagine that a repair center in Houston might have techs which are more familiar than those in McCallen or other places since both Compaq and HP are kinda from here and these techs have probably been working on HP stuff for years and years? Could be wrong about that though?

Still, they did right by me and more and having the extended warranty on this DV6 was well worth it even though I waited to send it in after the HD failed early on.:thumbsup:

 

I had my dv6t sent into that damned McAllen, TX repair center 3 times with a new problem appearing EVERY SINGLE TIME of it being sent back to me (scratched/dented chasis in every possible way, scratches on lid, speakers being wired incorrectly (my sub was now a tweeter -_-), not fixing problem laptop was being sent in for, etc).

After 2.5 months of no laptop, I got someone I knew at HP to get me an elevated support case manager and she just sent me a new laptop.

If you have to send a laptop into the McAllen, TX repair facility, lord help you. Seriously, the laptop you took such great care for will all go to waste the moment it enters this facility.

 

It's finally being delivered today. They replaced:

BASE ENCLOSURE
BEZEL
SPEAKER KIT
BACK COVER
TOP COVER - TOUCHPAD
KEYBOARD

Hopefully it looks brand new as it looked before it was damaged by their home tech.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

good news! hopefully it comes back perfect! good luck!

 

I am about to send my DV6 -7000 away for repair because one of the hinges is snapped. I hope I get it back the way I have it now!