HP's Service Disaster 7
Posted Tuesday, February 17, 2009 22:50
I’ve had HP printers for a long, long time, since the earliest LaserJets. The latest is an all-in-one printer/fax/copier that we bought a few years ago. It is the last HP machine I will buy until I hear that they have completely revamped their service department.
A month or so ago, my wife’s PC’s hard drive starting acting up. I replaced the drive and decided to take this opportunity to “upgrade” the machine from Vista to Windows XP. For some reason, the XP install decided that the machine’s built-in memory card readers were drives C, D, E, F, and G, and the hard drive was H. By the time I noticed this, I had reinstalled a bunch of apps, and although it is an odd configuration, everything worked fine. I did a brief google search looking for an easy way to change the drive letters, and it appears that there’s no easy solution for changing the letter assigned to the boot drive. So I decided to leave it.
The only problem I’ve had is with the drivers for the HP all-in-one printer. HP’s installer appears to be hardwired to look for drive C, and the install fails. I tried various tricks, even putting in a memory card into “drive C” and trying to install from there, but nothing worked. After hours of frustration, I decided to call HP service. That was the beginning of the real frustration.
Turning “service” into sales
After navigating through a circuitous voice menu system and waiting on hold, I finally got to a live person. After providing my serial number, they told me that they would be glad to help me, but that it would cost $35 since the printer was out of warranty. I asked if I would have to pay the fee even if they couldn’t resolve my problem, and the “support” (really sales) rep assured me that they would connect me with an expert who would work with me until the problem was resolved. With some trepidation, I agreed to the charge.
They then transferred me to a woman who seemed to be starting over. She had no idea what my problem was, or that I had paid for the service call. After another 20 minutes, we got this worked out, and started in on the actual problem.
She then launched into a sales pitch for how for “just a few dollars more” than the $35 service call fee they would exchange my printer for a new model and refund the service call fee. I asked how many dollars. She ignored my question and kept on with a pitch for the new printer. After asking literally five times for the exact price, she finally gave it to me: $250. That’s more than a few dollars above $35 in my book, and the printer works just fine with the other computers on which the driver software will install.
I told her I didn’t want to do the exchange, but wanted to solve the problem. After a very brief discussion, she concluded that my printer was just too old, and wouldn’t work with the “new” drivers, and that was my problem. This is total BS—the issue had nothing to do with compatibility between the drivers and the printer, and the driver software on their site was dated 2007, just a year newer than the printer. The problem is their software’s brain-dead installer can’t deal with the hard drive being something other than C. Not only could she not propose a workaround, she couldn’t seem to even understand the problem. Some expert.
She launched back into the sales pitch for selling me a new printer. At this point I said I wanted to speak to a supervisor. She tried again to get me to buy a new printer. I said I wanted to talk to a supervisor. She said none was available then, but one would call me back tomorrow.
“We’ll call you back”—never
I waited three days, and no one called. Finally I called back, went through another 10 minutes of voice menu hell, and explained the situation once again to a live person, who once again was no help. I asked for a refund on the service call fee, since they weren’t able to help me, and she said she had no way to do that. I asked again to talk to a supervisor, and she said one would call back.
No one ever did. After a few more days, I contested the charge with the credit card company and bought an Epson printer to use with that computer. It just wasn’t worth any more time or grief trying to get that printer working with that computer.
HP’s service operation is broken. They don’t understand what they’re talking about. They don’t seem to care about solving your problem. They push expensive upgrades on you even after you’ve paid for a service call. And the policy for responding to requests to speak to a supervisor seems to be to say one will call you back, but no one ever does.
My first job out of college was working at HP. I used to have a great respect for the company. I’ve been loyal to their printers for 20 years. And because of their ineffective and irresponsible service operation, I am unlikely ever to buy another one.
Update—HP Follow-Up
After a couple weeks, I started getting phone calls from HP folks in the U.S. who were apologetic and eager to help. I believe these calls originated from a complaint email I sent in, but maybe this blog post had something to do with it too.
By this point, I had replaced the printer, and all I wanted was a refund of the service call fee, which they gladly provided. In fact, they called back repeatedly when I was slow to gather the information I needed to give them. These people were typical of the HP of old (albeit engaged in damage control). If I could have reached them when I asked to speak to a supervisor the first two times, all of these problems would have been avoided.
One of the HP people I spoke with acknowledged that my problem with “someone will call you back” and then no one ever does has been an issue with this call center.
So my conclusion: HP has a big problem, not at the core, but with the way they have offshored their support. The offshore support organization does not reflect the values or quality of service for which HP has been known for decades. Maybe a better-managed offshore operation could solve these issues. Or maybe the savings from sending support offshore are offset by less tangible, but very real, costs. One cost: I remain disinclined to buy an HP product in the future, because I don’t want to have to deal with this support organization.
We had a different experience recently, not perfect, but we did get resolution. My wife bought a wide carriage photo printer, from a reseller on Amazon. This is not the most common consumer product, so it took a bit to get to someone who knew the product. Once we went through the crappy phone tree, 2 or 3 people and a day waiting for a call back, we got someone who decided that the print head would not calibrate and was defective. We got a new printer from HP, installed it and shipped the bad one back to them. I would say that they have a long way to go in providing the service, and I would not have given up so easily as you, but surely understand your frustration.
And no, I don’t work for HP ;’)
Are you sure with your information..?
“hp computers”—of course I am sure, all I’m doing is relating an experience.
Let me add my current experience that still unfolds. I have on-going issues with new HP purchase (email HP ref # 337427-45035). Dropping a printer from my original laptop order was not the least of them. Well, my new compromise printer (I had to pay again, exhausted after 4 hours on the phone that day and 2 hours a day before), the J4680 printer, came without a backlight for its display. Since the overall quality of that product is pretty low, one should consider the likely possibility to reach for HP Service.
It has been over six frustrating weeks and 40 hours of my personal time and I still can not get my brand new printer to work (HP ref # 8023642430) with a brand new HP computer. Worse, during the course of “fixing” the problem (last session included 5 hours remote control operation by HP technician), my new Pavilion HDX has new problems. I have various channels of communications open (different people/sub-organizations) without any success (including promised call backs that never happened). Beside these communication channels there are apparently other people involved like none responsive Sales Supervisor and mysterious Case Manager that I can not access.
If you like to follow excessive useless long laundry instruction lists (looked canned to me) of re-installing existing software that works fine, email HP Support and ask for help. If you enjoy long aimless frustrating discussions with mostly nice people but with lack of knowledge, ability, responsibility, or authority (probably the combination of all), than buy HP products. I can assure you that you will meet many people from the Philippines and India with various impressive job titles.
Any idea where can I post my story for maximum impact?
For every HP story, there is one from another maker – I have a Dell story. To say you won’t buy another from that maker is a human reaction, but probably not the right reaction. We all have had our problems with customer service, but I feel you need to look at who, in total, has the better products and hopefully adequate service. With products, if it doesn’t do what you want, it won’t work for you. With service, there is always a chance that you can elevate until you get satisfaction.
Bill, I have to disagree. HP’s service infrastructure has fundamental, systemic problems, and multiple attempts to escalate failed. They may well fix them, but until they do, I wouldn’t buy from them.
I am finished with HP. I bought a psc all-in-one that lasted several years, but I constantly had to power-cycle it or uninstall the driver and reinstall it. It would freeze up in the middle of a big print job, but the printer monitor would not let me cancel the job, nor would it let me skip over the ‘hung up’ job and start a new one. Yes, I configured it to not do jobs in a set queue. It has caused me great distress trying to prepare for meetings and classes on many occasions. HP customer support was consistent with the orginial post. Eventually, I broke down and bought a new all-in-one… a more compact, less expensive, highly rated machine (Deskjet F4180) psc with photosmart essential. All these features were necessary for me. Didn’t need a fax feature. I have had it for two and a half years and have NEVER been able to print a photo on it using glossy photo paper. It won’t feed. It stops at the back of the roller (as if it’s too stiff to curve up and around it) but it will take thicker non-glossy card stock without a hitch. It will even eject the glossy paper smoothly when I cancel the job. I tried to contact HP on at least 10 occasions without any response. Was on hold one time for 1 hour and 23 minutes before I hung up. Just today I tried to print a photo sympathy card on matte card stock, which was always possible before, and it printed the inside portion of the card, but did the same stall-type behavior that it does with glossy stock when I tried to print the outside portion of the card (the surface on both sides are identical). When it ejected the paper, upon cancelling the job, I noticed that it was so badly marred with black stuff that I couldn’t even finish it on a different printer. It has ruined lots of expensive specialty stock, and for a printer that boasts “Photosmart Essential,” and forces you to download half a gig of software in order for it to work, HP is taking way too much of our time and money for a sub par, no pride, incompetent outfit. They are of the ‘money for nothing’ mentality. They don’t make any money selling printers. It’s the INK! The $200+ printer that the sales rep (poorly disguised as a tech expert) tried to sell the orginal post person is probably one of those ridiculous models that requires 4 cartridges for the print and copy feature and 2 insanely expensive separate cartridges for the fax feature. It’s the ink. They couldn’t care less about the machines. I know, they’re shooting their own collective foot to have this mindset. That is their problem, and they don’t have a warranty with me either, so I am free to go. I think I’ll try Epson too. Canon was my first printer and it was a nightmare too. As for Dell, I swore never to buy another and I won’t. They are a jackass company. Acer is the way to go. They are not new, they have just been behind the scenes till recently and it is almost invisible to me. Always doing what I expect it to do. There is everything I have to say about HP and Dell.