When Brands Deceive!

Brands are getting dominated in the arena of IT products presently. The government as well as private institutions have been usually purchasing branded PCs right from the beginning. Now it is the term of home segment too to opt for branded PCs. Laptop market is exclusive for branded items. Even in assembled PCs, parts are from some monopoly brands! For instance, Samsung, LG and Viewsonic lead in the monitor field. But if the leading brands cheat the consumers, what can be done from the part of consumers? Cheating, I mean selling substandard products in the power of brands, not to render deserving service after the sale, not to resolve the issues arouse within the warranty period in proper ways etc. This is my experience with Hewlett Packard, one of the leading computer brand in India.

I am instigated to write this note because of the ill-treatment from HP, one of the foremost brands in Indian Laptop market. It was one and half years back and exactly on June19 2006, I bought a Laptop from HP. The purchase cost for HP Pavilion dv8216TX was Rs 82,000/-. HP offered only one year service for such a cost. Since the laptops could not be serviced locally like PCs, I extended the warranty period for 2 more years by paying Rs 8,000/- to make sure the service facility.


Problems started in September 2007. Firstly, it was a line along the screen. Gradually, the number of lines increased as shown in the picture. I took the Laptop to one of the authorized service centres of HP at Thiruvananthapuram on September 26th, 2007. The solution was to replace the display panel since it was a hardware problem. Replacement was made in two weeks, but the new replacement also showed the same problem. After waiting for two more weeks for the next replacement, I contacted again on October 9th to HP Service Centre. They informed me to call HP Customer/Sales Service in Chennai but it was futile. Their only suggestion was to wait more. And the delay prolonged day by day. There was no real action from the part of HP, for the whole month of November.

In December I received an intimation from HP Customer/Sales Service, Chennai that the system could be replaced in full. But there was no further steps from HP's part for weeks together. And at last, after three long months, the new replacement laptop came. The new Laptop is much ahead in performance and features when compared to the one I was having earlier. But, as a professional I suffered a lot. Lot of projects got pending, I skipped a few projects, my goodwill got affected, I failed to keep my promises; and these things cant be resolved easily. There's big difference doing things in time and doing it very late. From my point of view, HP should have settled the issue with in a period of two weeks; one month to the extreme.

The HP Chennai behaved to the customer(me) in such poor ways that not to lift phones, avoid me by telling some lame excuses whenever they attend my calls or not to reply my mails etc. Note that this heinous attitude is occurred from the staff of a brand like HP which claims great tradition and quality in computer hardware manufacturing, sales and service.
HP Website says:

Trust and respect have always been the cornerstones of HP's success and they always will be. The values that Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard established nearly 70 years ago are as relevant today as they've ever been:
1) We are passionate about customers;
2) We have trust and respect for individuals;
3) We perform at a high level of achievement and contribution;
4) We act with speed and agility;
5) We deliver meaningful innovation;
6) We achieve our results through teamwork; and
7) We conduct our business with uncompromising integrity.

But in my experience 1), 2), 4), 5) and 7) proved wrong!

I doubt HP's staff could behave to a consumer like this, just because it is in India! Would a customer in any developed country in which HP makes sales and service experience this kind of grievance? A product priced and paid Rs 80,000/- became useless just after 15 months of its purchase! It shows sheer low quality for sure. And the delay in resolving the issue clearly shows their negative attitude in product support. They have not even provided an external display on temporary basis though the case delayed so long.

An allegation has been surfaced in Cola issue that the multinational companies are imparting products and services of low quality in India compared to the same in developed countries. It is just the same in computer hardware too, we realize now. The Indian situation is helpful to such exploitation. The high talk that "Customer is King" is mere befooling the customers by MNCs. It is essential that we, the consumers should aware of the rights of consumers and how to act in these situations.

• Indian Consumer Complaints Forum - I registered a complaint regarding the same issue in Indian Consumer Complaints Forum as well. Click here to view the complaint page.

Post a Comment

Keywords: HP Pavilion Laptop Issue, Review, Poor Customer Service, Care, Support Failure, Pavilion Series, Business Laptops, Entertainment Laptops, dv8200 Family, dv8216TX.
--