HP Laptop Customer Service, the ultimate oxymoron
Dear Bill & Dave,
First let me say for the past 30 years, I've loved the company you created. Working there was a wonderful experience, and in those days the HP Way was something to be proud of. But I have to tell you, things are seriously broken. It's not in the hand-held group. Ken Dobbie there is doing a great job. He solved my iPAQ issues professionally, quickly and successfully, winning me back as a fan of the iPAQ. From the time he heard of my problems to the time he solved them was exactly 24 hours. That is responsiveness the HP Way.
Then there are the laptop folks. You need to know that I've been buying HP printers, ink, paper, handhelds and laptops ever since I worked there. As it happens, I bought this HP Pavilion dv6000 laptop because we were working for HP and they wanted us to use their products. I can only imagine how you guys would have reacted if I'd told you that the the report you commissioned from me would be three weeks late because the product that you designed, produced and sold me didn't work. The good news is, I'm no longer working on the HP account, so I guess it doesn't matter. But you really would be appalled by how they respond to loyal customers these days. First they told me via email it would be back on July 27th. They lied. On July 27th as I waited in the office until dark thinking that maybe FedEx would come, they emailed me to say that it would ship August 3rd. On the 3rd, I once again made arrangements to ensure that if Fed Ex were to deliver the laptop, someone would be there to sign for it, only to find out that no, they lied again. It hadn't been shipped at all. And in fact, due to screw ups in logistics, no one seems to be able to tell me when it WILL be returned. The obvious truth is that they bought bad parts, should have recalled them or at least ordered more replacements, and when they started to fail in large numbers, got overwhelmed in support and are now in utter chaos. I know that this is NOT the HP WAY you had in mind. And it probably isn't the HP that Mark Hurd envisioned either. But its a bit hard to say that he inherited these guys.... The problem is that this does seem to be the new HP Way. I"m clearly not the only one with this kind of problem. I know what you would have done. You would have taken a new working laptop, put my old hard drive in the new machine and sent it back to me. Their latest email to me indicates that someone will contact me in the next three working days to let me know what is up. Of course by that time I will have bought a new Dell laptop and HP will have lost a die-hard fan of some 30 years. Sorry Bill and Dave.