HP: outstanding Customer Service, finally!

I have read a lot of negative comments, particularly on this Forum, about Customer Service from HP.
I was ready to join my voice with those unhappy with the support they received from HP.
I am glad I did not do it, I am glad I was patient enough, and I am glad to report that HP was outstanding with my case.
Of course not everything was rosy (more about that later) at the beginning.
In May my dv9700CTO display started to show once in a while vertical rosy lines. Not everything was rosy as I already said but those pink lines were on and off.
In June it became a little more frequent but still acceptable. I used to move the lid a little backward and the pink lines will disappear.
With all the horror stories of other owners I started to think that the Nvidia video card was going to let me down. On the other hand the fact that moving the lid slightly will get rid of the pink lines made me thinking of a pinched cable in the hinges.
In August I decided to get in touch via e-mail with HP since the issue became more and more frequent.
It’s not the first time I have to deal with people located in India and it’s not the first time that they are useless.
They are useless not because they are located in India or because they are not capable. They are useless because the management does not train them approprietaly, correctly, and wisely and does not tell them to listen carefully to the Customer.
This is where the blame should be borne regarding the support coming from India.
Going nowhere with this kind of negative support I decided to report my problem to the CEO Executive Team. It changed everything and mainly the outcome.
At this level and as far as I am concerned HP shown its dedication and its commitment.
I am happy and sad.
I am happy because my issue has been solved to my complete satisfaction so far.
I am sad because HP is developping a two tier Customer Service.
One Customer Service, the basic I will call it, is located in India. You are better off forgetting it.
Here is why.
Going nowhere with the exchanged e-mail, I expressly mentioned to the representative that the hinges were the culprit (I did not even get an acknowledgment), I asked to deal with a Supervisor. At the end of a new round of e-mail I was offered - and I accepted – that a Case Manager will call me within two business days.
Two weeks later not receiving the promised call and tired of waiting I got in touch with the CEO Executive Team.
This is where is the real Support. And this is where it should be permanently located unless HP is decided to step in and clean its house in India. Real management in India should have the power and the skilled technicians to make the decisions. Maybe some investments, not only in money, will pay off on the long run.
Another sure good investment would be to move out of China where the manufacturing process is so so.
Not because of HP or the nature of the business but because of China long habit of producing and delivering subpar goods when they are not faked goods. It’s another story.
But the fact is that so far the combination of Factory in China and Support in India is not a good one for the American Customer. Unless the American Customer is also a HP shareholder.

A representative mandated by the CEO Customer Relations called me and offered a solution that I accepted in part. He first agreed with me that the hinges were mostly the culprit.
If the hinges are involved the repair is free, shipping to return the unit and send it back to me is free.
If it is the video card and since I am out of warranty (I bought the unit in January 2008) I will be charged all costs.
I accepted the first part of the proposal and declined the part involving my financial participation without giving up my rights.
It turned out that the right hinge (which started to click a month ago everytime I moved it) was the origin of the issue.
HP sent me a Fedex packaging. I sent the item 09/25. It was delivered in California 09/29. I got it back, repaired, October 1st. Since then, no more click on the hinge and no pink lines which makes the situation rosy. At no cost.
HP did very, very good. I am impressed.
As I already mentioned, so far the unit is working the way it is supposed to.

After a while, checking the state of the Computer, I called the Manager in charge of my case to thank him very profusely for his help. The way he assisted me means he greatly helped HP also.
He gave me a one year extended warranty. Maybe I should sell my computer: it is like new and it has a one year warranty!

 

I had an excellent service/feedback from HP recently when purchasing my new 8530W. Every single email was promptly replied back, to the hour feedback/updates and free over-night shipping etc. but again this was when purchasing a laptop from HP.. dont know about customer service down the road.

 

word...................

 

All good points, but here's the thing. First off, the two tiered support you are talking about is very real. What you did not add in to your equation is the exact nature of the "HP" departments you are talking about. First off, lets look at the laptop from its initial design. Impossible to say how much HP has to do with it (maybe a bit because they always are pretty stylish) but, the assembly of the unit and possibly much of its design is outsourced, usually to the lowest bidder. If you want to you could try to have some faith in HP and hope that they pick Quanta or Inventec because they know what they are doing. Next up, repair centers, yup those are outsourced too, usually to the same companies who build the units or whoever they choose to contract with in the USA/whatever market you are talking about. Last and certainly not least is the customer support/service. All outsourced to call-centers. You would think that HP would use EDS to do some of this, and maybe they do but, the results would be by and large the same. HP has "indirect" control over how well their contractors do the job, mainly because they do not have the same level of supervision as if it was done in-house. From what some of the people on here have said, I am beginning to think that case managers could be outsourced too, because a lot of people like yourself say that they are very successful in dealing with/ having less hassles from the Executive level, which is most likely internal HP employees. Not exactly the most awe inspiring business model is it, but heres the other thing. No matter how bad it sounds, the system works for them. HP is making $$$ now, building, selling, supporting, and fixing computers. They are the biggest computer company in the world for a reason. Another important thing is, for that whole business model I was just talking about, I could have been talking about Dell, or Lenovo, or Toshiba, its the same difference. Why this matters is, for HP to sit down with some of its major investors and tell them "Yeah, you know, we want to spend a lot more $$$ on operations because we want to make a better product and experience for the end user. So were going to get out of China, who everyone else uses for production at this point, roll heads at the out-sourced places, probably by hiring on more official HP liaison people to oversee what they are doing." This is the point where you would see the investors march out in single file. The old saying is "If you can't beat them, join them." and that pretty much sums up why all this outsourcing business got started and continues to perpetuate in the first place. If your investors know your competition spends much less than you do by outsourcing everything they can (all the while putting profit margins up because they are spending much less to pay people in India who sadly may or may not have indoor plumbing) why are they going to give you their cash if you are operating at such a disadvantage?? Answer is they're not, so all in all its an imperfect world. HP is probably not exactly happy that their support from those places really sucks, but the fact of the matter is, they get by (their low end support probably is about 50-60% effective, although I am being optimistic here, and not taking the language barrier into account) and all that $$$$ that they are saving probably makes it a lot easier for them, as a company, to swallow.

Edit: Accesskb, the reason that things will go smoothly for you (relativity speaking) is because you have a business unit and will get a different standard of service. Companies are usually volume customers, and while giving one of us consumers a hard time when getting service might pi$$ us off and make us stop buying HP and cost them something, a company that buys hundreds of units in mass from them is a lot higher on their list of priorities.

 

I've had my dv5t eight months, and had to have it replaced during the first 21 day warranty period. As you can imagine, in order to get to the point of having it replaced, I had A LOT of dealings with the various HP customer service, tech support, and repair departments. Even with the 2nd one, although almost perfect, it too had some 'issues' that needed to be dealt with by those departments. In regard to the level of support, I found, almost always, that even at the lowest level, if I could get to one of the US support centers, I always got bright, knowledgable people who were more than willing to go 'out of the box' to provide real solutions and the best alternative for my situation. As everyone else has pretty much agreed, the service help in India was appalling. So even at that lowest level, where we, unfortunately, all have to start our process, it helps to keep calling until you reach a US call center - for me, it made a world of difference.

Zukiki, I appreciated your suggestion to contact the CEO Executive Team. How, exactly, does one contact the CEO Executive Team --- is there a direct phone number or email address? Also, can we do so at the beginning, when we're at the lowest level, or do we have to go through the usual process first?

 

http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/execteam/email/hurd/index.html

there is the place to start. They can review whats going on, you can contact them first if you like but, they may just say that you need to go through support. I think since your issues are ongoing, you should be ok.

 

The answer by Bobthenailer, with the CEO executive team address, is the correct answer.
As far as I am concerned I was ready, out of patience, to write directly to the CEO himself (knowing that my mail will not reach him but one of the Assistant) when I discovered through this very valuable Forum the CEO Executive Team solution.

Good luck

 

My only issue with HP has been when my 2500 crapped out last year after only having it about a year and a half. The graphics card was fried (the faulty nVidia ones) and they didn't do crap about it, so now it's just a paperweight.

 

Thank you for a very interesting analysis. I agree with you.
Thinking that it was not a part of the issue, I did not want to touch the $$ aspect of HP business. That's why I felt it would be enough to just remind the low quality of goods manufactured in China to people living outside the US. Because, here, we know what it is: it seems that we find more goods "made in China" than goods made in America.
Amen!

 

Good example between business- and consumer support is my own experiences.

DV9014ea: motherboard graphics broke. After calling HP and opening a case I packed laptop in a box and took it to the nearest Post Office, free of charge of course. Roughly 2 weeks later I got my laptop back at the same Post Office.

8510w: Called HP (laptop didn't boot) to open case. Instead of HP callcenter arranging a pickup next day I told them I'd take it to the repair center myself since it's in the same city. Went there on late wednesday, got the laptop repaired back friday little after noon. If I had to use their courier service, it would have been 2 days longer total, plus weekend.

HP business laptops and desktops have multiple repair centers around the country here in Finland, while consumer latops are only repaired in one location near the capital city.

For example here Fujitsu is different, all consumer and business models are repaired in same shops/repair centers around the country. I used to work in one Asus is another nice example, their repair center isn't even in same country... I think it was in Netherlands? (at some time, few Acer models were repaired in Poland... sounds nice)