Being screwed by Fujitsu-Seimens

Scruff

One of my house mates bought a Fujitisu-Semiens laptop a couple of weeks ago and has had nothing but problems with it. Firstly they sent him the wrong laptop, then they sent him one with the wrong size hd and when they finally sent him the right one there was a pixel gone on the screen. He tried to send it back but they sad that under some ISO standard they can have up to 5 pixels gone on LCD screens before it is considered flawed.

Its a 1ghz celeorn model (can't remember exact model no.) and came with WindowsXP and only 128mb of ram. He bought another 128mb of ram for it, rang them up and said he wanted to install the ram himself as being an Electronic Engineer he couldn't see the need or sense in having to take a working day off so that some fella would call around and do the same job in 2 mins. So they said ok.

Now the laptop is shutting down, in some cases after as little as half an hour and he has to leave it a few hours to cool down. He has taken out the extra ram but its still happening. All he can really do on it now is surf the web and write documents. If he tries to play games or convert mpegs to divx the thing shuts down pretty quick.

They told him that the reason its shutting down could be a bios problem. He tried to flash the bios using ine provided on their website but thats giveing him an invalid dmi (i think) sting length.

I think that idea is bollox as it sounds to me like the machine is overheating and why would it boot properly in the first place if it was a bios error?

Anywho, he's sick to ****e of all the crap and wants them to replace it but their saying they'll only take it away to fix it, which will take upto a month.

Has he a leg to stand on in demanding a new laptop or not?
Regardless, he wouldn't recommend buying a fujitsu-seimens to anyone, especially seeing as the other lad in the hose has a Dell laptop and never had a problem with it or the customer service.

WhiteWashMan

he should be able to demand a repair, a replacement, or a repayment.
doesnt it come with a warranty?

personally never had a problem with any fujitsu machines, but there you go.

yossarin

I have a fujitsu B series Lifebook.
battery is terrible, and it overheats a LOT

spongebob

.....is that the manufacturer has 3 chances to get you a product in proper working order.

All your money back or Small Claims Court is the choice here. It is a gimme in court.

I would try a toshiba next time unless someone takes me head off for saying so, of all the CHEAP laptops they have given me the least grief.

Compaq and Dell cheap ranges (Inspiron and Presario) die or fault big time after 13 months...uncannily so I find.

M

eth0_

I have an Amilo D 6500 that I bought off dabs.com in February and i've never had any problems with it, its a PIII 1.1 with 256MB ram, everything is fine, great battery life.. it's crashed once, while burning a CD.
I think you've just been unlucky with this one, I reckon you're entitled to a replacement, just make an official complaint, I work in tech support and generally shouting and screaming will get you what you want!

Did he buy it off mypc.ie? If he did....the fool....you can get them so much cheaper off dabs, even taking into account the sterling-euro difference, I saved about 400 euro

amen

tell the under the Consumer Product Act
that goods sold must be of merchandisable quality and must perform the functiona for which they are sold.

If not the customer is entitled to a full refund

Xterminator

Originally posted by Muck
.....is that the manufacturer has 3 chances to get you a product in proper working order.

All your money back or Small Claims Court is the choice here. It is a gimme in court.

I would try a toshiba next time unless someone takes me head off for saying so, of all the CHEAP laptops they have given me the least grief.

Compaq and Dell cheap ranges (Inspiron and Presario) die or fault big time after 13 months...uncannily so I find.

M

Eh, In my job they buy Toshiba, and we've had our fair share of problems. And given the price, and the spec, they dont fall ujnder the catagory of cheap machine either.
I'd try the IBM A series when you get yer money back from the small claims court.
But before you do, call F/S one last time, escalate to a supervisor, tell them you have lost all patience witha machine that has never worked properly since you bought it, demand a full replacement.

If they dont accede, escalte again, to there manager and once again demeand your replacement. If he cant help you get the Customer Services Dept address, and send them a written letter outlining your experiences.
As them to contact you, and they will. They have the power to give you anything, and to keep a customer happy, they will generally give you anything you ask for.

(I worked in the industry long enuff to know how it works.)

X

Scruff

he bought the Amilo D6100......of mypc.ie, which is a celeron 1.2ghz, 128mb ram, 10gdhd, dvd, XP.
Just after checking dabs and for the same price he paid for it he could have got a C1010 PIII 1.2GHz 256MB 20GB DVD XP Pro
it looks like the spec for the D6500 which is €2269 from mypc.ie but only €1799 from dabs.

That the same one you got erth0_?

hmm... maybe he should have shopped around a little bit more.

Oh and since updating the BIOS it wont recongise any of his usb ports...

spongebob

......make good laptops.

not cheap but built like tanks.

HP are also worth a look.

One further point........Both IBM and HP employ 7-8000 persons in Ireland between them. Staff often get stupendous discounts on end of line stuff and being staff they get well treated under warranty as well.

Dell don't do end of line because they are brilliant at forcasting demand and never get landed with surplus inventory.

morgan.co.uk are good for end of line surplus too.

I am a fan of Dabs, I think their customer service is good, I always get me mails answered (properly so far) in about 2 hours.

I would recommend using a Gold Visa card when ordering off the UK coz your consumer rights are not 'enforceable' , you being an Irish consumer , but there are international warranties with Gold Card purchases. As well as that they don;t want to piss Visa off so they normally give in fairly quick.

M

eth0_

Originally posted by Scruff
he could have got a C1010 PIII 1.2GHz 256MB 20GB DVD XP Pro
it looks like the spec for the D6500 which is €2269 from mypc.ie but only €1799 from dabs.

That the same one you got erth0_?

hmm... maybe he should have shopped around a little bit more.

Oh and since updating the BIOS it wont recongise any of his usb ports...

Sounds like mine
Look, I don't think he should have to do all that stuff to his laptop himself, get him to be *ahem* "Forceful" on the phone and demand a replacement or he'll have to take legal advice.

Scruff

well they gave in and replaced his Amilo D6100.....with an Amilo D6500! So hes gone from a celeron 1.2ghz to a p3 1.2ghz, an extra 10gh hd space, extra 128md ram and got a dvd+cdrw.

Needless to say he's chuffed!

Lenny

I've had to get 3 Fujitsu harddrives replaces 3 times..