Compaq Tech support going down-hill, anyone know why?

Just recently, the video output from my Presario notebook began to fail. The
LCD works fine, but the video feed is crap whether it's going to the LCD, or
VGA out.

Any who, my question is why is Compaq Tech Support seem to be incompetent
lately? Not that I have anything against the tech support personal, they
were great the first year I had my notebook. But it's just recently that it
feels like I'm pulling teeth, both mine and theirs, just to get somewhere.

I called Tech support 3 times, and 3 times they allegedly issued me an RMA
box (people with notebooks know what I'm talking about). Each week following
a call passed and no box. I live at the same address, same information they
have on record as it was with the other times I needed RMA. Right now my
notebook is on the extended warranty; and now I feel foolish for buying it
if I had known this is the type of support I would receive.

If there is Compaq representative trolling these post, I hope they can take
action to correct these tech support short-comings before it becomes
irreversible.

 

I hear ya...

Ever since the merger fully took place (signed in May 2002, but really took
hold in sep/oct 2002), HP's dragged Compaq's name through the mud. They
have so many problems internally with bickering between pre-merger compaq
people and HP people that no one is getting anything done... It's a darn
shame as Compaq had some excellent Notebook support pre-merger... Don't
think that there's much you can do really...

Deep

 

For starters, they need to bring tech support back in the United States of
America for United States of America customers. Last time I checked, I
didn't reside in India.

I feel your pain dude. This past weekend I spent almost all day Sunday
trying to get the correct driver update for my video card. The problem was
that on the drivers and software download page, they have like 8 drivers
listed for the same video card with 5 out of 8 of them having the same date,
however they were totally labeled as different items. It was very
confusing. I don't recall this ever being a problem before the two
companies merged together. I have had Compaq notebooks from the late 90's,
because I like their designs over the other companies designs. But I can't
deal with their crap any longer. The next computer I buy will NOT be from
Compaq. HP perhaps, only because I like their new widescreen notebooks but
even then I'm thinking it might be best just to stay away from both of these
companies all together.

Getting to the point of wanting to grab your computer and throwing it out
the window because tech support has got you so crazy isn't that therapeutic.

 

This is the first compaq I have owned (presario 734rsh) So I just assumed
that thier support was always a joke. When my hard drive died they were
going to send me a RMA box. well a month later and no box so I called again.
I got the typical " It was shipped 2 weeks ago" I asked for another. To make
a long story short like three months later and after buying myself a new
drive I get a delivery of 2 RMA boxes. Both with expired return labels.
Every other call I have made has consisted of at least 30 minutes on hold
followed by a "tech" that I can only assume is getting his info from a Best
Buy ad followed quicly by a "I don't have that information". What kind of
tech can't even tell you what your cpu temp should be?

 

Doh!... 3 months you say. So I should expect to get all 3 boxes around late
Jan to early Feb. Thanks for the heads up on the expected time window.

 

Dittos on the "heads up". Since my warranty runs out in about 2 weeks,
I guess I shouldn't be surprised when the box arrives in February and
the ticket expires. Then they can ship me out in the RMA box! =)

- pack

 

Pham,

I attempted to help you with Compaq HQ, but the lack of your:
email address
model number
serial number
phone number
case number

interfered with a successful resolution to your warranty issue. Feel free
to email me personally, and I'll pass the information along to the powers
that be at Compaq.

Mike Calkins
Houston, TX
(Retired-Compaq employee)

 

beating a dead horse......

......Chandigarh, where a starting call center operator makes roughly
7,000 rupees, or $150, a month. A starting worker in a "first tier"
would be paid as much as twice that, they said.


From The NY Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/20/i...00&en=2d6a81d3d642e8d9&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE