The Angry Laptop Man, P1
When Meerkat Musings began back in 2014, I was working for Staples. We sold office supplies, and this included laptops and PCs. As with most forms of electronics, laptops can be delicate, and unfortunately they break down from time to time. I have personally had laptops die on me, completely at random, so I appreciate how annoying this problem can be. In some cases, laptops can last years, and in other cases, they might fail within the first year. If that happens, the manufacturer’s warranty applies in most circumstances.
This is pertinent, believe me. Some people mistakenly believe that the retailer is responsible for replacing a defective laptop. It isn’t. There are some cases where if the laptop suffers a hardware problem within the first 30 days (at least, I think it’s 30 days), the store will agree to replace the product. Under the terms of the manufacturer’s warranty, replacing the product is never usually the first option, and instead the laptop has to go off to them for repairs. I can understand that this is frustrating to customers, but this is also the standard process for most electronic products, and it has been for many years. After all, the manufacturers are not going to merely give someone a new laptop, that would come at a considerable cost to them!
One such customer was quite disgruntled at this entire process, and he kept letting us know it. He had brought his laptop into the store due to a hardware fault (at least, I think it was a hardware fault), and thus began the process of arranging it to go back for repairs. There was a misunderstanding as to the timescale of this process, possibly brought on by a language barrier, but the gist is that he believed the laptop would be back from repair a lot more quickly, despite no assurances from us as to how long this would take. My colleagues and I had to put up with several snarky visits, despite informing this guy we would contact him when his laptop was back from repair. He simply refused to accept that the store, and indeed Staples, was not responsible for fixing or replacing the laptop. Mind you, he ultimately had no choice but to accept this, because with the laptop in the hands of the manufacturer there was nothing we could do at store level to affect anything.
What people need to understand is that with repairs, warranties etc, there is a procedure that at store level we cannot bypass, and cannot accelerate. When it comes to electrical goods, the staff in stores are not responsible in any way shape or form for the speed of repairing faulty items. They cannot snap their fingers and magic up a new microwave, vacuum cleaner, TV or phone. Yes it is irritating, and at times downright inconvenient to be without any given product, but there is absolutely nothing that store staff can do beyond processing the repair per the guidelines they are given. To do otherwise is to potentially put their jobs at risk. Whinging and complaining will not move a manufacturer to work quicker, and will not encourage a retailer to issue freebies. I wish more people would keep this in mind.