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Toshiba`s Warranty Service Pain
shewhoguards
Posts: 153 Forumite
Late last year my beloved laptop took a bit of a knock of a train and died. I mourned it, but fortunately it was covered by my Home Insurance with Tesco. As they could not supply that model, they offered me a new Toshiba laptop instead. I smiled and said thank you, and all was well.
Unfortunately, a couple of months later the charger died. The issue was very obviously with the charger - it was making a loud ticking noise when I plugged it in - and I called Toshiba`s repair centre. They told me I would need to send the whole laptop in, but that it should be a fairly quick fix. In fact, it turned out that they did not
stock such rare items as chargers. Weeks went by and I called up repeatedly asking, pleading and begging until finally I called Toshiba customer service and a girl from there called the repair centre. Finally, after a month and a half, I was sent a refurbished charger from the workshop.
Skip forward a few months, and the laptop started having issues in August of this year. Blue Screens of Death started to appear with increasing regularity. I suspected faulty RAM and, again, called the repair centre and sent it away.
Within a couple of days I received an email saying that the issue was indeed with the RAM but that it was out of stock. This all seemed eerily familiar. I called to ask about it and was told to wait a week and call back, which I did, and found they still didn`t even have an estimated ETA. I started to call back daily. It was now September, I needed a working laptop for my university work and had no idea as to
when I might have one. The repair centre blamed Toshiba for not supplying the part, Toshiba blamed the repair centre for not ordering enough. I asked if I could have a refurbished one - just so I could have something to do my work on - but they don`t do that apparently. I tried calling Tesco, who didn`t see how they could help, but pointed me towards Powerplay Direct, the company they had ordered it through.
I emailed Powerplay Direct who, while very friendly, weren`t sure what they could do either. Several phonecalls later, I had the number of a reseller helpline for them, and they called me back with an ETA (why I couldn`t have that before I don`t know). By calling back to complain, I also managed to speak to a lady at Head Office at Toshiba who assured me that it would be back with me shortly, and all fixed.
I received the laptop back in midSeptember. Sadly, all was not fixed as promised. While it had stopped blue-screening every five minutes, something was clearly still badly wrong with it. Several times it requested I roll it back to a last working configuration, and now my wireless internet would not connect.
By now, my University year had already started, so I called the lady at head office. She offered me two years extra warranty (what good two extra years where they fail to fix my machine will do me I am not sure) and asked me to return it directly to her, which I did. This time, it was at least dealt with quickly. They diagnosed it as needing a reinstall of Windows and crashing because it was full of dust (how they missed it was full of dust when changing the RAM I am not sure). A clean-out and a re-install and it would be back to me in apparently full working order on Friday.
It did indeed come back to me on Friday, and arrived in a box that I eyed warily as it had very obviously been damaged en-route. I took a photo just in case, but the laptop inside seemed to have been cushioned from harm. I hoped that finally we were done.
The answer, sadly, was no. The wireless is now fixed, but the laptop has developed yet another new problem - the colon, apostrophe and m keys (all of which worked perfectly when I sent the machine away) have now mysteriously failed. Or perhaps not so mysteriously - when I called Toshiba they said that it was likely because they were dirty as the tech had had to clean under the Enter key already while it was away. I didn`t ask them to do this! I hadn`t complained of the keyboard at all, as I was quite aware that it was full of muck, and was in fact intending to replace it myself when the warranty was up. As it was, I suspect they`ve screwed up removing the keys as they have no "sticky" feeling or anything to them - they just don`t work!
On top of that, the machine has crashed twice, once more giving me the Blue Screen of Death. I called to complain, and the woman claimed this was most likely to do with my data which they had put back on. This resulted in an email where I attached screenshots showing that the system had been erroring and even FAILING tests on 15th Sept... and they didn`t replace the data to return it until the 16th.
I`ve now had to go away for a week with this beast as my only working machine - not good when I was meant to be emailing homework in last Thursday. Powerplay are saying that as it`s an insurance replacement Sale of Goods doesn`t apply. They`re trying to contact Toshiba but not getting a response. Tesco Insurance have been promising to email Powerplay since last Wednesday to see what they can do and haven`t (and every time I call to chase I sit through another rep asking if I`ve tried Toshiba - YES I HAVE). Toshiba have actually stopped entirely responding to my calls and emails - getting in touch involves calling several times until the girl who has been dealing with it is at her desk (this usually involves me saying "Well, if she`s away can YOU deal with it then..." at which point whoever answered suddenly realises this person has just come back.)
Anyone have any advice, OTHER than never get a Toshiba again?
Unfortunately, a couple of months later the charger died. The issue was very obviously with the charger - it was making a loud ticking noise when I plugged it in - and I called Toshiba`s repair centre. They told me I would need to send the whole laptop in, but that it should be a fairly quick fix. In fact, it turned out that they did not
stock such rare items as chargers. Weeks went by and I called up repeatedly asking, pleading and begging until finally I called Toshiba customer service and a girl from there called the repair centre. Finally, after a month and a half, I was sent a refurbished charger from the workshop.
Skip forward a few months, and the laptop started having issues in August of this year. Blue Screens of Death started to appear with increasing regularity. I suspected faulty RAM and, again, called the repair centre and sent it away.
Within a couple of days I received an email saying that the issue was indeed with the RAM but that it was out of stock. This all seemed eerily familiar. I called to ask about it and was told to wait a week and call back, which I did, and found they still didn`t even have an estimated ETA. I started to call back daily. It was now September, I needed a working laptop for my university work and had no idea as to
when I might have one. The repair centre blamed Toshiba for not supplying the part, Toshiba blamed the repair centre for not ordering enough. I asked if I could have a refurbished one - just so I could have something to do my work on - but they don`t do that apparently. I tried calling Tesco, who didn`t see how they could help, but pointed me towards Powerplay Direct, the company they had ordered it through.
I emailed Powerplay Direct who, while very friendly, weren`t sure what they could do either. Several phonecalls later, I had the number of a reseller helpline for them, and they called me back with an ETA (why I couldn`t have that before I don`t know). By calling back to complain, I also managed to speak to a lady at Head Office at Toshiba who assured me that it would be back with me shortly, and all fixed.
I received the laptop back in midSeptember. Sadly, all was not fixed as promised. While it had stopped blue-screening every five minutes, something was clearly still badly wrong with it. Several times it requested I roll it back to a last working configuration, and now my wireless internet would not connect.
By now, my University year had already started, so I called the lady at head office. She offered me two years extra warranty (what good two extra years where they fail to fix my machine will do me I am not sure) and asked me to return it directly to her, which I did. This time, it was at least dealt with quickly. They diagnosed it as needing a reinstall of Windows and crashing because it was full of dust (how they missed it was full of dust when changing the RAM I am not sure). A clean-out and a re-install and it would be back to me in apparently full working order on Friday.
It did indeed come back to me on Friday, and arrived in a box that I eyed warily as it had very obviously been damaged en-route. I took a photo just in case, but the laptop inside seemed to have been cushioned from harm. I hoped that finally we were done.
The answer, sadly, was no. The wireless is now fixed, but the laptop has developed yet another new problem - the colon, apostrophe and m keys (all of which worked perfectly when I sent the machine away) have now mysteriously failed. Or perhaps not so mysteriously - when I called Toshiba they said that it was likely because they were dirty as the tech had had to clean under the Enter key already while it was away. I didn`t ask them to do this! I hadn`t complained of the keyboard at all, as I was quite aware that it was full of muck, and was in fact intending to replace it myself when the warranty was up. As it was, I suspect they`ve screwed up removing the keys as they have no "sticky" feeling or anything to them - they just don`t work!
On top of that, the machine has crashed twice, once more giving me the Blue Screen of Death. I called to complain, and the woman claimed this was most likely to do with my data which they had put back on. This resulted in an email where I attached screenshots showing that the system had been erroring and even FAILING tests on 15th Sept... and they didn`t replace the data to return it until the 16th.
I`ve now had to go away for a week with this beast as my only working machine - not good when I was meant to be emailing homework in last Thursday. Powerplay are saying that as it`s an insurance replacement Sale of Goods doesn`t apply. They`re trying to contact Toshiba but not getting a response. Tesco Insurance have been promising to email Powerplay since last Wednesday to see what they can do and haven`t (and every time I call to chase I sit through another rep asking if I`ve tried Toshiba - YES I HAVE). Toshiba have actually stopped entirely responding to my calls and emails - getting in touch involves calling several times until the girl who has been dealing with it is at her desk (this usually involves me saying "Well, if she`s away can YOU deal with it then..." at which point whoever answered suddenly realises this person has just come back.)
Anyone have any advice, OTHER than never get a Toshiba again?
0
Comments
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Just be glad you never used the tech guys0
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Sale of goods should apply because you need a product fit for the purpose it was purchased.
I'm not sure this is the right forum for you to be honest?
Good luck with it, sorry I can't advise where you should go next - I'm sure someone will soon thoughNo chocolate, cosmetics or clothes to be bought before xmas day 14! ~ NPower eBay target £541.670 -
They never paid for the laptop Tesco did. so how does sale of goods act applySale of goods should apply because you need a product fit for the purpose it was purchased.
I'm not sure this is the right forum for you to be honest?
Good luck with it, sorry I can't advise where you should go next - I'm sure someone will soon though0 -
They didn't say where they'd purchased the first laptop, just that they received another. Presumably the spec would 'do' for the purpose purchased originally or OP wouldn't have agreed to receiving it?
The laptop they received was through Tesco insurance which was there for the purpose of a failed product. We pay insurance to repair/replace products so that we can continue using them for work/pleasure etc.
Tesco provided the laptop but it isn't suitable for the purpose which the original laptop was originally provided, hence not fit for the purpose it was purchased.No chocolate, cosmetics or clothes to be bought before xmas day 14! ~ NPower eBay target £541.670 -
doesn't apply, the rights would have been taken away.
He technically swopped it with tesco new for old. Any rights would have also been transferred0 -
First, I`m a she not a he - figured I`d get that in before I changed gender permanantly!
I posted in venting because I`m honestly at the stage of throwing things so it seemed somewhat appropriate!
Powerplay Direct are claiming pretty much as d.edna says - Sale of Goods doesn`t apply as it`s a switch (I did have to pay £100 excess, but apparently this is classed differently). I`m fairly sure something should apply, but working out what, and who is responsible seems to be the nightmare. Currently I`m working at a policy of bugging all three companies on a daily basis in the hope that someone decides it`s easier to give me a new machine that actually works (my phone bill is going through the roof due to this).0 -
post screenshots on techie forum, backup data, reinstall windows, check keyboard ribbon cable, and regional settings, restore data.
The problem is that with it being under warranty, I`m limited in what I can do.
I`m actually a techie myself (the irony is that the last week`s fight has occured while I was on my A+ certification course). However, the laptop is on Vista, and Toshiba now don `t supply the disc to reinstall Windows yourself unless you pay for it. They HAVE reinstalled Windows the last time it went back - and this hasn`t helped.
The keyboard issues aren`t a regional settings issue, and I doubt it`s a cable issue as most keys do work. It`s just three (m, colon and apostrophe) which suddenly don`t.
I`ve researched the bluescreen error messages, and I`m confident this is a hardware issue. Were the machine out of warranty, I would have taken a screwdriver to it months ago. But taking it apart will in itself invalidate the warranty, and I`m not prepared to pay for new parts due to a fault that should be covered.0 -
they'll never know
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...but even assuming I did, tested the thing and found out what was faulty, what am I going to do after that? I`m fairly certain that "I know that this component is faulty under your warranty due to the warranty-invalidating action I just took to check, please replace it" won`t get me far, and considering the rep I spoke to was convinced that putting my data (which incidentally consisted of *.txt files, *.doc files and *.jpgs) back on the laptop was what started it crashing even after they reinstalled Windows, I`m not sure they`d even understand that explanation if I gave it!
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3 keys failing is highly unlikely to be a fault with the switches.
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All three keys worked perfectly until it went away. I actually initially suspected someone had spilt something on it (I`ve killed keyboards that way before) until I called and they said "...oh well, the notes say we took keys off to clean it".
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bsod's are usually software/drivers, unless it is a generic nvidia overheating fault, which also affects the wireless.
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This particular BSoD seems to be memory related.
http://pressf1.pcworld.co.nz/showthread.php?t=539470 -
doesn't apply, the rights would have been taken away.
He technically swopped it with tesco new for old. Any rights would have also been transferred
Insurance is still a product. Bought for a purpose intended to INSURE oneself against mishap. Just because it has the Tesco label does not mean it's infallible :rolleyes:No chocolate, cosmetics or clothes to be bought before xmas day 14! ~ NPower eBay target £541.670 -
Remember if you record any conversation you HAVE to advise them prior.
Denial is the best method of attack when it comes to insurance. Just because they 'say' they aren't liable, does not mean it is so.
You've purchased insurance in case the worst happened and the goods you paid for, for a certain purpose were covered. Tesco, being the replacement company are liable to ensure you get a product which is the same or similar to the product you purchased (bearing in mind the original product was suitable in the first place).
You need to check your insurance policy to the bare bones, and get onto CAB (citizens advice bureau) before you do anything else. Obviously I'm advising in the dark as it were, so anything I'm saying needs to be taken with a pinch of salt until you read/post the policy.No chocolate, cosmetics or clothes to be bought before xmas day 14! ~ NPower eBay target £541.670
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