I have been an HP customer (PC’s and Printers) for many years. I had heard how Mr. Hurd had gutted a number of company functions to maximize profits and the impact on their product quality and reliability appears to be one of its first victims.
I purchased a C309a all in one printer a year ago. It failed seven months into the warranty period for a transceiver failure (wireless connectivity). HP sent me a new unit. Five months later the new replacement failed for the same thing. Since I was outside the warranty by a couple of weeks, I had to purchase my third C309a with an extended (2 year) warranty. In talking to one of the many technical support people I learned that HP does not do failure analysis of returned printers. They simply replace and move on. So if material or design issues crop up, they keep shipping the same problems. The third printer had the well documented “sleep” software problem. Once it went into sleep mode, it would not wake up with out a manual power recycle. I was unhappy with this third failure and this led to an escalation to HP’s Case Management program.
To be sure I would get a printer that worked, HP upgraded me to their C410a printer. The new unit was dead on arrival with a “carriage fault” that Tech Support could not rectify. I now had a bad C309a and a bad C410a waiting for HP to send me shipping labels to return them. This took two weeks. Once these units were returned to HP, a second C410a was shipped to me. I completed the set up on this fifth printer and was ready to print when the printer went into a mode that I could not get it out of. Tech Support spent an hour with me on the phone trying various possible solutions and then concluded it was a fatal firmware problem and the unit would have to be returned. I have been unable to print anything for over a month now.
One could conclude that when it comes to hardware and software, HP can no longer build a reliable color printer.
HP’s final disposition: They will refund the original purchase price as soon as I haul this fifth failed printer down to Fedex and they receive it. I am no longer an HP customer.
The other problem is the inconsistency of their “customer service” Every failure was handled differently.
At first they shipped a replacement printer as soon as Tech Support concluded my unit was broken. This changed to HP having to receive the defective unit before they would ship a replacement. Just waiting for them to send me a shipping document added a week to this process. Then they had Fedex come to my door to pick up the next defective printer. Now they will only refund my money if I haul this last unit down to Fedex and they receive the unit. When the third printer failed I had no box to return it. HP could not send me one and I had to pay to have it packed for shipment. I put this last (5th) printer in the original box, but their policy is now to ship me a box I don’t need or want to ship it back.
It is clear that HP has lost the quality and reliability recipe. The long waits (40 minutes +) for Tech Support or a Case Manager are further proof the company is in trouble. Buyer Beware!