Thursday, March 31, 2011

I fought the law and... I won???

You may have read about my rants on Hewlett Crappard/Comcrap in the past. If not, where have you been? Are you not reading these things? Why am I wasting time putting them out there??? Check this out if you want to be updated quickly:

http://patrickphoto.blogspot.com/2010/10/comcraphewlett-crappard.html

So, it's been a while since I've been willing to chat about this online, mainly because when discussing it, I tend to chip all my teeth from clenching my jaw. But I am determined when it comes to money, just ask my brother and sister in law; I am Mr. Craigslist to them.

I spent a lot of money on a laptop that wouldn't turn on, and to say it wasn't fun, is putting it mildly. I won't review it but let's just say I also received the crappiest of usual crappy service from WorstBuy. The 14-year-old female manager (I won't tell you her name but her name tag said Jess B) from WorstBuy who told me that she didn't have to tell me her name kept telling me to go back and read my contract instead of listening to those rascally, jokester sales people told me. What do they know? They only represent the company, WB, on the stock exchange.

Anyway, after several emails and letters to both companies, Worst Buy and Hewlett Crappard/Comcrap, I received nothing but heartache. About a month ago, after tons of Internet research (they don't want you to find their names) I wrote even more letters to each of four high level executives at both mega corporations. I didn't want to give up as they sold me a lemon. Reading the Internet, I discovered there were thousands of other people who were just as upset as I was about the 'quality' of their products. The sticker on my laptop says, "BUILT TO LAST", of course, in fine print it says "one day past warrantee'.

I finally did hear back from WorstBuy and he was very nice. He apologized for all the problems and told me to go pound sand as they didn't care enough to back their products. When I reviewed the rude treatment by his store manager, he told me "We don't care. We don't have to. Circus City is gone and we're the only game in town." or words to that effect. To be honest, he actually offered me a $40 gift certificate from WorstBuy. I believe I told him to cram the gift certificate somewhere as I never intended to step foot in their store again. He told me to have a nice day and I told him I'd have whatever kind of day I felt like having.

The next week, as we were finishing dinner, the phone rang. We didn't answer as family time is family time. However, when the voice said "This is CeCe from Hewlett Crappard." I picked up the phone. As we talked, she apologized for the problems but she told me that they could not give me a new laptop. She said, however, that she was willing to repair the laptop for free and even send me a pre-paid Fed-Ex box to ship it. I told her that that would be lovely as it's all I wanted was a laptop that actually turned on when you hit the on/off button and worked for more than five minutes. Hey, I'm easy to please.

Amazingly, within two days, the box showed up on my doorstep and I shipped my laptop back. I checked the tracking form two days later to make sure they received it and to my surprise, they were already delivering it back to me that day!

I opened up my box, turned it on, and it actually worked! For a full week now, it has worked fine every time, something it had never done previously.

I didn't pay a dime, except for stamps for all my numerous letters. Paula and I are still in shock but as I've found before, it pays to be a squeaky wheel.

So, Hewlett Crappard/Comcrap has changed slightly in my mind and shall no longer have that name but a new one: Hewlett Crappard/Compaq. They have earned losing half a crap from their name. We'll see how it works over the next few months as I have a ninety day warranty. I may eliminate the Crappard portion too, but I doubt it.

However, WorstBuy continues to be WorstBuy and I shall not be visiting them any time soon.

My Mom used to tell me that the squeaky wheel gets the grease. I'm sure she's be happy to know that I got a little bit of satisfaction from not letting a major corporation get away with selling me a lemon.

And if she see Jess B next time you're in Worst Buy, tell her Pat Henry says hey!

4 comments:

Jaugie95 said...

I have always believed that when you make enough of a stink, people will listen. Good for you! You hit the nail on the head when you call them Worst Buy-they are terrible, they don't care, and they are proud of it. Kind of like the giant corporation Wal-Fart, where they could care less, and it shows. Right on Patrick!!

Shari Chrestler said...

Can you hear my applause? Good for you! Keep on squeakin'!

Pat Henry said...

Julie, it just stinks that you have to jump through hoops and spit nickles out your nose just to get companies to do what they should do in the first place... I shall never buy anything from WorstBuy again... they not only didn't care, they were rude to me, and this was the supposed manager.

Pat Henry said...

Shari, you have to stand up for yourself, they don't care... unlike Target, who cares enough to give us good quotes on a daily basis...