Recently took part in a "test" of Sony, Dell and Samsung

Widelats

All these companies were approached and asked for second hand machines or spare parts of machines from computers for a charity that helps people with blindness, as blind people can not see to type properly and get online the idea was a volunteer would do it fr them without the need for expensive speech recognition software.

None of the companies responded, except Samsung, who emailed back a copy and pasted reply of "give us your feedback on our machines" and as we didn't have a machine we found the reply to be both irrelevant and silly.

We did not expect to get any replies from them, it was just testing them all, and seems what we thought was correct, there big multi billion pound companies with big profits care nothing about charities or people with any disability.

Rant over.

Freddie_Snowbits

One would understand from your research efforts on this subject, that I should not bother to hand in my notice to become a consumer champion and stick with the day job in this instance.

Proc

Do you think you're the first person to write to these people and ask for free stuff in the name of blind/disabled/handicapped people?

I think you even said it yourself....they are businesses; not charities. I'm not entirely sure what you expected? "Oh, here's some free laptops. Cheers."

You're on a different planet.

Proc

Freddie_Snowbits wrote: »

stick with the day job in this instance.

He doesn't have one.

Freddie_Snowbits

Proc wrote: »

He doesn't have one.

I refer to my previous answer!

marleyboy

My mother and her OH are both blind, they have paid a fortune for specially adapted computers, with voice recognition software, Braille style keyboards, etc. I should add they have no problem getting online and sending\receiving emails, all via voice recognition software and tools.

There are charities that provide various computer tools or software designed to cater for all disabilities, its not down to the manufacturers to hand them out as freebies (businesses dont work like that). They may produce various hardware for various disabilities, but the materials and construction of such appliances cost money.

They may offer discounts to certain registered charities, who buy and pass them on to customers, but there is no way they could afford to mass produce them and simply hand them out AS charity, this is why we have charitable organisations.

The notion could be likened to a charity shop, people donate various items, which the shop then SELL to customers, with the profits going to their charity organisation, rather then simply "handing" them out as gifts to those people who need them.

Widelats

I do wish this Proc would lay off stalking me round the boards, i am serious, he has nothing good to say ever. He is creepy trying to find out all your personal information.

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Widelats

marleyboy wrote: »

My mother and her OH are both blind, they have paid a fortune for specially adapted computers, with voice recognition software, Braille style keyboards, etc. I should add they have no problem getting online and sending\receiving emails, all via voice recognition software and tools.

There are charities that provide various computer tools or software designed to cater for all disabilities, its not down to the manufacturers to hand them out as freebies (businesses dont work like that). They may produce various hardware for various disabilities, but the materials and construction of such appliances cost money.

They may offer discounts to certain registered charities, who buy and pass them on to customers, but there is no way they could afford to mass produce them and simply hand them out AS charity, this is why we have charitable organisations.

The notion could be likened to a charity shop, people donate various items, which the shop then SELL to customers, with the profits going to their charity organisation, rather then simply "handing" them out as gifts to those people who need them.

They were asked for items/components that are unsellable, like rescued parts, second hand cases, etc, and were told they would be paid for these parts in postage costs.

I know they are not a charity, but it would not hurt to help out by them.

I think Dell only do Paleantology related freebies to clubs and schools, i don't know any charity work that any of these companies are involved in.

BexInLondon

There are organisations who can provide IT equipment to charities but you'd need to write a good case for support and almost certainly would need to be a registered charity. To be honest I'm not surprised the companies didn't get back to you - they probably have requests like this all the time and most large corporations do their charitable work through a specific department. As an example, a few years back a charity I worked for was given a lot of free software from Microsoft. We didn't get this by sending them a general letter, we had to apply through a formal grants scheme.

Based on your "test" you have no idea whether they "care".

Widelats

BexInLondon wrote: »

There are organisations who can provide IT equipment to charities but you'd need to write a good case for support and almost certainly would need to be a registered charity. To be honest I'm not surprised the companies didn't get back to you - they probably have requests like this all the time and most large corporations do their charitable work through a specific department. As an example, a few years back a charity I worked for was given a lot of free software from Microsoft. We didn't get this by sending them a general letter, we had to apply through a formal grants scheme.

Based on your "test" you have no idea whether they "care".

That is why it was labelled "test"

Gertie_Walker

Maybe these companies recognised that modern thinking about disabled people is that they should helped to be independent, rather than have ' a volunteer do it for them'.