Good customer service from a big company?

K

Knife Outlet

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Jan 4, 1999
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It has been literally years since I've experienced great customer service from a large company but it happened this week. Kudos to Hewlett Packard.

My 5 year old file server blew up on Thursday. On Friday morning I called HP and spoke with a sales rep. I told him I needed a quick replacement for my server and wondered if they had any computers built or a cancelled order or something they could ship quickly. He asked me what I needed in the computer and what my budget was. Then he found something pretty close but $100 over my budget. So he simply knocked $100 from the price. It was a model they sell to the dealers and I would have to load the O/S etc. He said it would ship from Indianapolis on Monday and I said "great" it's one day service from Indy by ground.

The machine showed up today (Friday.) I was amazed. He had sent th 68 lb. computer next day air (130 miles) with no shipping charge.

I had some trouble with the machine after I got the O/S generated. I couldn't get much video resolution so I called the support center. They understood the problem immediately. I had connected the monitor to the video cable 2 instead of 1. He had me switch the monitor to the other cable and reboot the system. Why you need support for two monitors on a computer system is a mystery to me. Well, I guess it's useful for CAD and some applications like that. No problems after that. The server is up and connected and I'm accessing BF from it right now. And, as usual, computers have gotten faster and better over the past 4 years. This Pentium 4 with a 2.8Ghz clock and 800Mhz bus is downright fast. The video performance is stunning. The hard drive is incredibly quick. Very cool.

Big company. Great customer service. I'm going to replace my 6 year old graphics workstation right after Christmas. You can guess which brand I'll choose. A tip of the hat to the folks at HP.
 
Thanks for the tip. That's more than amazing. They really wanted a happy customer, didn't they? :D
 
Yeah we bought a bunch of HP servers a year or so ago at work, one Hard Drive died during setup (6 per server). I think I had just go a cup of coffee when a motorcycle currier turned up with the replacement! I just looked at him like he had stepped off an alien space ship!

Leatherman are superb too FWIW
 
It is really amazing when a company goes clearly beyond the levels of customer service that you expect.

Several years ago I took a Steiner binocular to a college football game in the rain and it fogged internally. The following Monday I called their customer service and talked to a very pleasant lady. I expained that I was sending it in for warranty repair, and since our deer season was starting that Saturday, I really needed it back ASAP. Imagine my surprise when a new binocular showed up on Thursday! Three days! She must have shipped the replacement immediately, without waiting for mine to arrive.

My son's bulldog chewed in half a strap on my Bowflex equipment. I called Bowflex, explained what happened and asked to purchase a replacement, since it was absolutely clear to me that Bowflex had no culpability or responsibility for this occurance. The rep I was talking to said that he was going to send me a new one, and treat it as a no-charge warranty replacement.

Of course, I have experienced plenty of customer service horror stories as well, but these two companies treated me in an outstanding manner.
 
It's really great to hear of companies with customer service like this. It's all too rare anymore.
 
I've had good luck with HP, too; I used recycled paper in an HP printer--my mistake--and of course it tore in such a way as to make it impossible to retrieve all the bits that broke off. So being impatient as well as a smart @ss(a very bad combination ) I tried to get them out with a needlenose.

Not surprisingly this led to a number of streaks and flat spots. I tentatviely gave HP a call since I wasn't sure if it was under warranty or not.

Very much to my surprise HP's customer service(waiting not even two minutes) jumped on it and sent me an advance replacement, two day air, and a label for free shipping of the damaged unit back to them.

I have to admit I was stunned, since I think most of us have the experience of waiting 20 minutes plus for "premium" service at any number of vendors. I'll always give HP first crack at any other printer purchases as a result.
 
Wow, sounds great... I guess HP achieved their goal: I'm definitely going to take a look at what they have to offer next time I need anything computer-related.

Knife Outlet said:
Why you need support for two monitors on a computer system is a mystery to me.
Click to expand...

Two monitors are really convenient. I'm using two right now and all of the four computers we've got at home have 2 each (we have a home-based internet business). Very useful if you need to keep an eye on something while doing other work or if you need to manually compare two things, like spreadsheets, graphics, etc. Plus it's actually easier on your eyes, since you keep changing focus as you look from one monitor to another.
 
All the computers in our house are HPs. :)

Also, a great place to get HPs are the warehouse clubs if they carry them, I work at Sams Club and we have HPs and their joint brand Compaq. You can get some smoking deals when there is one returned with nothing wrong with it, and also when they cancel the model you want, which happens often enough. :)

Another interesting note is that even Apple is working with HP now to distribute the IPod. They are also available at Sams in a car kit form(car power adapter, and FM transmitter, 20gb IPod) for only $320!
 
It's nice to hear about a company with good Customer Service, especially large companies who still care about customers. I don't have any HP computers, but they make a great calculator compared to TI, in my opinion.
 
Another HP story:
Shortly after we bought our very first computer, the monitor started to go bad. (one of the color "guns") The local electronics place we bought it from told us we had to bring it back so they could "work on it". Our friend, who's a tech-type, said this was nonsense, no one "worked" on defective monitors.

By chance, we had just gotten the "welcome to HP" letter from one of the VPs. I called the lady, and she said, "nonsense-nobody works on those things. The store is just trying to bill us for service work."
HP Fed-exed us a new monitor, and included a shipping label for the old one. We stuck it in the box and sent it back. No money involved.

Oh, and the local electronics house now tells you up front that if your "whazis" goes bad in the warranty period, they'll just replace it.
 
I've had the same great customer service from HP. A couple of years ago I bought an HP scanner with a USB hookup. I couldn't get the thing to work for the life of me, so I called HP customer service.

It appeared that the problem was on my end - the USB port wasn't working. Because the model scanner I bought didn't have a serial interface, HP sent me a new scanner (an upgraded model that cost $100 more than I paid) by FedEx, and included a pre-paid return label to send my unit back. All I had to do was put the box on my front porch and call FedEx.

You can't beat customer service like that!
 
Senator said:
.....I've had the same great customer service from HP.....
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, I've had the opposite experience with HP. :(

A few years ago, I bought a HP laptop and a docking station to match. The laptop was a dud, so I was told to just send it in for a replacement. I asked their Sales department if I could 1) order a better model and pay the full retail difference, and 2) would the new model work with the same docking station? The answer to both questions was "Yes, definitely." (and I asked TWICE and kept copies of the email replies.) I didn't want to keep a $160 docking station that wouldn't work with the new laptop.

Well, the new laptop took over 30 days to get to me (after all the paperwork was done). No problem. However, when I tried the docking station with the new laptop, guess what? Of course it DIDN'T work.

I then tried to get a refund on the docking station.

The answer: "Sorry, can't do. It's been over 30 days." I explained to them that I had bought the *better* laptop SPECIFICALLY on the advice of their sales rep to me that it WOULD work with the docking station I had just purchased for the other laptop....and that 30 days had expired because of the paperwork involved. Otherwise I would have kept the same model.

The answer was. "Too bad. There's nothing we can do about it."

I wouldn't hesitate to buy another HP product. But I'll never take advice from their sales department again. :mad:

(PS: anyone want to buy a brand-new HP laptop docking station? ;) )
 
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