Saturday, April 16, 2005
eBay Store - hp marketplace: An adventure in online buying
Back in December when Ol' Paint, the Celeron HP Pavilion I had blown smoke into for a number of years, finally bit the dust I was left scrambling for a computer. I walked into a local computer repair shop, finding the case for a similar model that I was able to slap in my HDD and RAM. For $15.00, Ol' Paint's heart and soul rode again. But I knew I was just forestalling the inevitable. I had been contemplating a hyper-local web project and decided now was the time to buy the equipment needed for a small media business. I keep missing the calls from the VC guys so I have a small budget to work with.
When I first mentioned this, referring to myself as a miserly Luddite was a bit of an over simplification: I've held down the position of consumer reporter and taken an MS certification course. But there is enough truth to that characterization, at least on a comparative basis, to be worth saying. I combed the internet, local sale papers and manufacturers' sites to find what I thought was a suitable compromise of technology and price. My target was the HP Pavilion a736n. It had an Athlon 64 processor so I could look forward to it being compliant with 64 bit processing without waiting for the price drop of the coming Pentium 64 bit chips. It had the connectors on the motherboard for a Serial ATA HDD and the slots for up to 2 GB of memory. Ol' Paint II was conceived. Bringing it home was going to be somewhat difficult.
It was then that I took my first serious plunge into the online shopping pool. I started bidding on ebay for some different computers but found that I was impatient with that and http://stores.ebay.com/hp-marketplace had a refurbished a736n as a "Buy It Now" for $539 plus shipping. Their item description stated there was a one year warranty from HP. The computer arrived about two weeks ago and that's when the fun began. The box was clearly marked as being a refurbished computer and having a 90 day warranty. The same day I contacted HP.
When the nice fellow in India at HP's call-center discovered he was up against an unordinary problem, he turned me over to Sam in stateside sales. Sam said the people in corporate were astounded by all the HP one year warranties offered and stated that despite what the ebay site said, HP's only shopping presence on the web was http://hpshopping.com . I was left with no idea what the relationship was between HP and the ebay store. I had selected the manufacturers' and retailers' adjunct ebay stores as being the most likely to be hassle free but it certainly didn't seem so at this time.
New Age is the company that runs the ebay store. The ebay store and the New Age site looked serious and legitimate. But the web is a funny place (think about how authentic "phishing" attempts look when you receive them). At the New Age site, Bill DeLacy, vice president of Sales, U.S. Consumer and Supplies, at HP is quoted as stating that New Age's execution has been "flawless". I then googled DeLacy and HP. The quote came up (in the top three results) and enough of the other results that came up made me even more uncertain, given what was an obviously large disconnect on the warranty issue and that DeLacy really was an executive for HP. So late that night I fired off an email to the general counsel's address taken from the HP site. This email did move through the HP corporate structure and get notice but I couldn't be sure of that at the time.
The next day I contacted customer service for New Age's ebay store and talked with Sylvia. She was still maintaining that there was a one year warranty and said I should tell them it was bought from New Age. She even sent me an invoice to use as proof of purchase. I, once again, immediately contacted HP and found their answer was still no one year warranty. It was enough for that day, I was tired and had other things to do. I had received a response from HP asking if I could be identified. I guess standard form for their corporate compliance office. My email to HP was going to be forwarded through HP. At that time, I was still uncertain about that.
I contacted New Age, again, the next day. This time I asked to speak to a supervisor. I spoke with Jamie Tumas. This was the first conversation from which I came away with the impression that this issue would be resolved in my favor. I don't know if the email to HP had found the way to his desk yet, but I know that it eventually did. Later that day I received an email from Amy Bockman, the sales manager for the New Age account at HP, asking me to contact Tumas. He had offered me 10% off my purchase price and I went for the advertised warranty. The next day, after some back and forth, my account was credited with $99.99; the cost of a two year service agreement from HP (the closest thing available). But the story doesn't quite end there.
It was now ebay's turn to screw up. Because of the partial refund, my ebay account was showing that I needed to pay for the computer, again. I contacted Jamie and he said they could help with that. Ebay was nice enough to inform me (after a couple of days and a few emails)that the dispute was being withdrawn and no action would be taken against my account. Mighty nice of them.
The computer is great. It needs some more memory to perform as I need it to but the only problem I had with the computer itself was that the disc for Encarta 2004 wasn't included. Javier Fiqueroa, Executive Quality Case Manager at HP, (thank you, very much, email to HP) offered to have it sent. I don't need it. He told me if there was any problem, to let him know. He was great.
When you work as a consumer affairs reporter ("On Your Side", whatever) the stories that bring the greatest vindication generally fall within two categories. Once in a while, you get a story that is a "gotcha"; somebody is perpetrating a serious fraud or crime and you are able to address it. But you are more likely to find the ones that in a way support what is the master narrative: That everybody is honestly trying to do their job and most issues can be resolved through communication and a thorough presentation of the facts. This was one of those. I don't know that it would have been resolved this way had I been the average consumer. I know that there are some good reasons for the confusion. The length of warranty offered by HP varies depending on the class/price range of the item. I know that http://www.compusaauctions.com/ has recently had refurbished HP's described as having a one year warranty. When I contacted them, they also said the warranty was provided by the manufacturer. I'll send them a link to this. But they have other problems; the product specifications (at both CompUSA's auction site and their ebay store) for HP products don't always match those at HP (not to mention that rebate problem that CompUSA has had). And then there are the differences in doing business that our high tech world presents.
This isn't the same world of business where Jamie could have walked out into the warehouse and seen the 90 day warranty stickers on the boxes. Somehow, word never drifted up the chain. I contacted Bockman at HP and hp-marketplace when they continued to post descriptions of refurbished computers with one year warranties on ebay after all this occurred. I asked how long the 90 day warranty had been the standard for home computers. The listings were changed the next day but neither responded to me. And the site is still having some problems. If you go to the descriptions of the computers at New Age's hp-marketplace ebay store, you'll find the 90 day warranty in one part and down further in the description it is stated that they have been refurbished to "class A" standards and have a one year warranty.
I am not shopping at hp-marketplace by accident. I've found their prices tough to beat. I've purchased a new printer/scanner/copier from them. I haven't fired it up, yet. I continue on my tech buying spree and will continue to look there. ¶ 4/16/2005 03:35:00 PM
When I first mentioned this, referring to myself as a miserly Luddite was a bit of an over simplification: I've held down the position of consumer reporter and taken an MS certification course. But there is enough truth to that characterization, at least on a comparative basis, to be worth saying. I combed the internet, local sale papers and manufacturers' sites to find what I thought was a suitable compromise of technology and price. My target was the HP Pavilion a736n. It had an Athlon 64 processor so I could look forward to it being compliant with 64 bit processing without waiting for the price drop of the coming Pentium 64 bit chips. It had the connectors on the motherboard for a Serial ATA HDD and the slots for up to 2 GB of memory. Ol' Paint II was conceived. Bringing it home was going to be somewhat difficult.
It was then that I took my first serious plunge into the online shopping pool. I started bidding on ebay for some different computers but found that I was impatient with that and http://stores.ebay.com/hp-marketplace had a refurbished a736n as a "Buy It Now" for $539 plus shipping. Their item description stated there was a one year warranty from HP. The computer arrived about two weeks ago and that's when the fun began. The box was clearly marked as being a refurbished computer and having a 90 day warranty. The same day I contacted HP.
When the nice fellow in India at HP's call-center discovered he was up against an unordinary problem, he turned me over to Sam in stateside sales. Sam said the people in corporate were astounded by all the HP one year warranties offered and stated that despite what the ebay site said, HP's only shopping presence on the web was http://hpshopping.com . I was left with no idea what the relationship was between HP and the ebay store. I had selected the manufacturers' and retailers' adjunct ebay stores as being the most likely to be hassle free but it certainly didn't seem so at this time.
New Age is the company that runs the ebay store. The ebay store and the New Age site looked serious and legitimate. But the web is a funny place (think about how authentic "phishing" attempts look when you receive them). At the New Age site, Bill DeLacy, vice president of Sales, U.S. Consumer and Supplies, at HP is quoted as stating that New Age's execution has been "flawless". I then googled DeLacy and HP. The quote came up (in the top three results) and enough of the other results that came up made me even more uncertain, given what was an obviously large disconnect on the warranty issue and that DeLacy really was an executive for HP. So late that night I fired off an email to the general counsel's address taken from the HP site. This email did move through the HP corporate structure and get notice but I couldn't be sure of that at the time.
The next day I contacted customer service for New Age's ebay store and talked with Sylvia. She was still maintaining that there was a one year warranty and said I should tell them it was bought from New Age. She even sent me an invoice to use as proof of purchase. I, once again, immediately contacted HP and found their answer was still no one year warranty. It was enough for that day, I was tired and had other things to do. I had received a response from HP asking if I could be identified. I guess standard form for their corporate compliance office. My email to HP was going to be forwarded through HP. At that time, I was still uncertain about that.
I contacted New Age, again, the next day. This time I asked to speak to a supervisor. I spoke with Jamie Tumas. This was the first conversation from which I came away with the impression that this issue would be resolved in my favor. I don't know if the email to HP had found the way to his desk yet, but I know that it eventually did. Later that day I received an email from Amy Bockman, the sales manager for the New Age account at HP, asking me to contact Tumas. He had offered me 10% off my purchase price and I went for the advertised warranty. The next day, after some back and forth, my account was credited with $99.99; the cost of a two year service agreement from HP (the closest thing available). But the story doesn't quite end there.
It was now ebay's turn to screw up. Because of the partial refund, my ebay account was showing that I needed to pay for the computer, again. I contacted Jamie and he said they could help with that. Ebay was nice enough to inform me (after a couple of days and a few emails)that the dispute was being withdrawn and no action would be taken against my account. Mighty nice of them.
The computer is great. It needs some more memory to perform as I need it to but the only problem I had with the computer itself was that the disc for Encarta 2004 wasn't included. Javier Fiqueroa, Executive Quality Case Manager at HP, (thank you, very much, email to HP) offered to have it sent. I don't need it. He told me if there was any problem, to let him know. He was great.
When you work as a consumer affairs reporter ("On Your Side", whatever) the stories that bring the greatest vindication generally fall within two categories. Once in a while, you get a story that is a "gotcha"; somebody is perpetrating a serious fraud or crime and you are able to address it. But you are more likely to find the ones that in a way support what is the master narrative: That everybody is honestly trying to do their job and most issues can be resolved through communication and a thorough presentation of the facts. This was one of those. I don't know that it would have been resolved this way had I been the average consumer. I know that there are some good reasons for the confusion. The length of warranty offered by HP varies depending on the class/price range of the item. I know that http://www.compusaauctions.com/ has recently had refurbished HP's described as having a one year warranty. When I contacted them, they also said the warranty was provided by the manufacturer. I'll send them a link to this. But they have other problems; the product specifications (at both CompUSA's auction site and their ebay store) for HP products don't always match those at HP (not to mention that rebate problem that CompUSA has had). And then there are the differences in doing business that our high tech world presents.
This isn't the same world of business where Jamie could have walked out into the warehouse and seen the 90 day warranty stickers on the boxes. Somehow, word never drifted up the chain. I contacted Bockman at HP and hp-marketplace when they continued to post descriptions of refurbished computers with one year warranties on ebay after all this occurred. I asked how long the 90 day warranty had been the standard for home computers. The listings were changed the next day but neither responded to me. And the site is still having some problems. If you go to the descriptions of the computers at New Age's hp-marketplace ebay store, you'll find the 90 day warranty in one part and down further in the description it is stated that they have been refurbished to "class A" standards and have a one year warranty.
I am not shopping at hp-marketplace by accident. I've found their prices tough to beat. I've purchased a new printer/scanner/copier from them. I haven't fired it up, yet. I continue on my tech buying spree and will continue to look there. ¶ 4/16/2005 03:35:00 PM
