Rodent Regatta

You can see the other entries in this series by clicking on The HP Way. It’s the story of a laptop repair under warranty at HP. It’s not a pretty picture. When we left our last volume, we had faxed twice, called nine times and spoken to seven people, not including the FedEx driver who picked up my laptop on July 29th.

Wednesday, the 30th of July had me very busy until late in the day. I had been staying home for the prior two days waiting on HP to arrange for the pickup of my computer. By Wednesday, I had cabin fever and was needing to get out of the house. Some areas of Memphis had power. I sought and found food, air conditioning and a modicum of comfort.

By the evening I decided to use FedEx’s voice response system to track the shipment to HP. Sure enough, J. Rivera signed for the shipment at 9:03 a.m. on 7-30—03 in Milpitas, CA. I was relieved.

This went so well that I decided to use the 800# provided to me the prior night by Ryan. I called the number. After a lengthy hold, Alice seem really dismayed that I had called. She said she wasn’t authorized to open my CSO# which meant that the shipment had not arrived or there was a problem with it. She abruptly transferred my call to ”Pavilion support” as if I had violated a federal statute. (F2/C10/P8)

I was on hold forever. Alice returned to the call and said she was still on hold with Pavilion tech support. I sympathized and waited.

After another long hold, Theresa got on the phone. Theresa scolded me for not sending in my proof-of-purchase. She said she could help me, but I’d have to fax it to her. She said I couldn’t ship my computer until she, Theresa, had my fax in hand. I explained that HP already had two faxes and my computer and she nor anyone else at HP was getting anything more from me. She protested, so I referred her to FedEx’s web site and the FedEx airbill number.

Theresa then accused me of shipping my computer without authorization. She backed off when I asked her how I could have possibly guessed all the right address and shipping information. By now, I was hot – physically and emotionally.

She put me on hold for an enormous length of time. When she returned to the phone she assured me that the service was all set up and ready to go. She closed by saying, ”I’m sure they’ll find your laptop in Milpitas somewhere.”

My confidence sank, but with the score standing at F2/C10/P9, I caved. I went to bed in a hot house once more. Frustrated with the city government and the local utility company for having such poor preventative and disaster preparedness plans, I was now hopping mad at HP.

You’ll not believe how much madder I would have to get.