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 Office Depot Sold Me a Broken Computer
Posted Mon February 18, 2008 12:00 pm, by Joe B. written to Office Depot, Inc.
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I bought a laptop for my wife on December 17th. The model I wanted was on sale, but there were none in stock. The salesman offered to sell me the display model, and I accepted. He then found another one in the stockroom, which he said had been the display model but was otherwise new. I should have known better, but I trusted your company, with which I have done much business over the years.
I had to reload the factory image because it still had your store image on it. This was not a problem, just annoying, since the clerk had told me it had been reloaded already.
Within a week, my wife was complaining about the heat coming from it, and the fact that it would reset once or twice a day at random. Unfortunately, she went in for surgery a couple of days later, and I had not time to deal with it.
When she came home from the hospital she used it on a bed table to keep from burning her leg again. It would occaisionally shut itself down, and I decided it has serious enough cooling problems that it needed to be returned.
This is when the trouble started, since it was 18 days after I bought it. Your store people refused to do anything about it, citing your 14-day return policy on technology. If I had known it was so short (most places are 30 days) I'd have bought somewhere else. As it was I relied on the good name of Toshiba and Office Deport when I bought it as a display model, and I shouldn't have.
A few days later, my wife was again hospitalized and I was again pre-occupied with her care. As she came home, I became ill fo a week.
Finally this past week, it started failing every few minutes, hanging the CPU, not turning off, but not starting back up without pulling the battery and the power cord to totally power it off. When I called Toshiba to try to sort this out, they blamed Vista's power management and had me set the CPU power to 100% always, saying that that should fix the problem. They also had me upgrade the BIOS.
None of this helped. The machine started up a few times and then failed. Now it will not start up at all. This computer has now been in my possession for 8 weeks, and has not worked properly for 7 continuous day in any of that time period.
It seems clear to me why that machine was pulled from the shelf. No one wants a display model that won't display anything.
This is NOT a normal case of wearing out a computer in normal use. This machine had something wrong with it even before you sold it to me. You should have returned that machine to Toshiba, not sold it to a trusting customer.
I want you to take this one back and give me my money back. I don't want another computer from you. I have called my credit card company and disputed this charge.
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by Dave W. Posted Tue July 1, 2008 @ 2:29 AM
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Glad to see a happy ending!
Dave
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by Joe B. Posted Mon March 10, 2008 @ 9:45 PM
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Mrs. B is better thanks.
I was contacted by Office Depot corporate, who directed me to the
store manager, who gave me store credit for the machine, which I used
for what appears to be a normally functioning HP laptop. I'm happy to
have the issue resolved.
jlb
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by Shadowboxxx Posted Tue February 19, 2008 @ 10:00 AM
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I had similar problems with a Toshiba laptop I bought...for some
reason the heat being generated was excessive so the computer shuts
off automatically when it gets too hot.
I bought a laptop cooling unit which fits under the laptop and plugs
into it via UBS cable, which solved the problem of my burned lap and
the unit overheating.
The other issue is the fan in the laptop clogs easily and needs to be
cleaned, or will not cool the unit properly.
Since cleaning the fan and getting the cooling unit, the laptop has
not shut off or "hung" once.
Just wanted to mention that in the event you are unable to return it,
although my suggestion does not address the real problem mentioned in
your letter.
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by Gino Posted Mon February 18, 2008 @ 10:39 PM
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I have to agree with Bill to an extent, since you're disputing it on
your card is about the best option since the original warranty has
expired.
I don't know what the terms of the sale included, if a further
discount was given or if it was an "as is" type of
transaction, 14 days sounds like a store return policy, I'm wondering
if the manufacturer's warranty is longer, and possibly would cover it,
since it sounds like a possible defect.
Good Luck!
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