Samsung - appalling customer care

techno12

Hi, I am at my wits end here!

Bought a Samsung NC10 netbook online 3 weeks ago, but it's one of those that suffers from the dreaded "screen botches" (two large dark patches to the lower left of centre - horrendous screen flaw affecting loads of NC10s). Rather than face the lottery of receiving a similarly affected unit from the retailer, I thought I'd go to Samsung direct, having heard, on this board, that they have great after sales service.

Well the upshot is over 2 weeks later I have no NC10 - as it's a xmas present that's just great. Apparently they've fixed it (via Digicare, the 3rd party I was told to send it to), but it's been delivered to the wrong address and some random has signed for it. I left a note in the box saying "deliver it to my work address", as I'd got UPS to pick it up from there, but Digicare didn't, citing that they couldn't, they could only deliver to the address Samsung gave them (more random red tape). The thing is, the dopey operative at Samsung (he seemed 99% asleep when I called) also got my home address wrong it seems - though as the postcode is correct it should have got to me anyway. Now I know these things happen, but it's the attitude of the people I'm contacting at Samsung that annoys.

It's like "we have to get approval from head office to send out a replacement", then "We have to wait for UPS to chase it up which can take weeks", and now an angry representative returned my call and it was like talking to a brick wall - "there's nothing we can do, we can't email you the UPS tracking number (err, why not?!!), we have no supplies of NC10s, you will have to wait weeks. " etc

I would have expected the repair in the first place to have been a straight swapout anyway (like you get with monitors) as the unit is defective and I'd imagine that's what Digicare did anyway (swap it for a blotch free one). It's the fact that Samsung are blaming Digicare/UPS/anyone instead of making sure the customer is happy. I really don't care who lost it - at the end of the day I used their much touted guarantee and it's failed me as an end user

Not pleased, and a disappointed sister and nephew awaits me as they have no present, and I can forsee months of hassle.

Maybe I'm used to the utterly amazing service Kettler gave me (see my post on the 5* Service board - they must have lost loads having swapped out my unit twice, sending spare parts, 3 engineer visits etc, but they have glowing recommendations and a customer for life from me). Looks like it's back to your !!!!! Currys/Dixons/Good Old British !!!!! service with Samsung.

techno12

It just gets better.

Turns out my repair was completed within a day by Digicare, but there was no communication back to Samsung, so they made me wait a week for the "5 working days, plus 2 for the courier" before doing anything. Grr.

Now I find out that Samsung had written my address down incorrectly, they had it as 8 Acacia Rd, rather than Flat 8, 37 Acacia Road. Unbelievably, UPS don't use postcodes (they've just informed me of this), so blindly delivered the parcel to number 8, even though that address has a totally different postcode.
I thought nowadays everyone used the "first line of address, and postcode is all that's required" routine, as that's all that's ever needed when filling out address forms online, ie the system knows that the postcode pertains to my block of flats only, so will realise that 8 can only be flat 8.

Anyway, I'm now currently awaiting UPS to retrieve the parcel from number 8 - though I suspect whoever signed for it has long since eBay'd it (surely they'd have phoned up UPS and said "err, I didn't order this laptop" if they were halfway decent).

There's a lot more to this story (blatant lies by some parties to cover their own !!!!!!) but as it's still ongoing I wanna get my laptop back first!

DrATty

What a nightmare. I feel for you. Whatever happened to Samsung's legendary aftercare?
It's too late now but my advice is to deal with the retailer that sold the goods if possible. You can expect new devices to be perfect and not need repairs so early in their life. I'd go for a replacement during the first month at least. If you do accept a repair of new items, approaching the seller means there's just one responsible party if something gets 'lost.'
The problem today is that retailers really don't like the law as it stands and sometimes seem to go to extraordinary lengths to avoid complying with it. I have found a number of threads concerning netbooks, for example, where users say 'I can't return my defective

---

because

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doesn't replace defective gear. Rubbish; they aren't exempt from the law.
Anyway. Good luck.

techno12

...and a month later and I'm *still* waiting, having been given the runaround and lied to by all parties concerned. I had to use the electoral roll to find out all the people on my street with the same surname as the person who signed for it. Knocking on doors, I found out he had it for 3 weeks and dropped it off at a post office. Trail gone cold after that.

The latest is that 10 days ago, after I finally managed to get a claim form from UPS, head office has allowed me to have a replacement. It's meant to be here by the end of play today at the latest. Call me cynical, but I reckon that was just to fob me off.

Whenever I call the call centre, one robot or another just trots out the "it'll be here by friday 23rd, it's with the courier" etc. They refuse to contact head office to find out when it's due to be shipped - one of the senior customer care people even gave me the number for head office. Err, isn't it their job to liaise with them on the customer's behalf?! I'm sure head office don't want random punters calling them up to check on the progress. (though I may well try and do that later)

Bloody ridiculous - remember this was meant to be an xmas present! They should have arranged a replacement back on 12th dec when it was first lost - not faff around for months waiting for me to do all the donkey work.