[ltp] Lenovo Service and Support - My last Thinkpad

[Peter Lemken]

Dear all,

I'd like to share with you my experience with the Lenovo support I have had=
 in=20
the last 2 weeks. There are two notebooks, my spouse's X60 and my own T60 a=
nd=20
both have been purchased with an extended 3 Years on site warranty.

The X60 became unbearably hot, i.e. 90=B0C during compile, draining the bat=
tery=20
in less than 45 minutes. A support request with Lenovo has been filed on=20
=46riday, March 14 with a detailled description, together with the informat=
ion=20
that the battery has lost 60% of its original capacity. I received a call=20
from the local on site technician on Tuesday, March 18, i.e. one full day=20
after the guaranteed one-business-day policy of the warranty upgrade. He=20
changed the motherboard, but couldn't say anything about the battery. We=20
needed to leave the house right after the technician was finished so I call=
ed=20
Lenovo on March 19, reporting the battery. They could not find anything abo=
ut=20
the battery in the original report and then told me that since the machine=
=20
has been bought on March 16, 2007 the battery would not be covered by the=20
extended warranty, since the report came 4 days late. That was it, my spous=
e=20
is now left with a battery that has 40% of its original capacity.

Thanks a lot.

But that's not all: My T60 has some problems too and I reported these on=20
Thursday, March 20: The DVD-writer has problems reading and writing CDs; it=
=20
only writes at half the speed and most of the writing fails at the first=20
attempt. The display has started going red upon switching on and it takes=20
about a minute until it is white again. I know this symptom from my old R51=
=20
and know that the CCFL is going to fail soon, so I asked them to replace th=
e=20
display. The battery is little over 1/2 year old (machine bought in July=20
2007) and has only 80% of its capacity left.

It's now March 26 and I haven't heard back from Lenovo since March 20. I kn=
ow=20
it's been the Easter Weekend, but they are already one day behind again. I=
=20
received a call from the Lenovo UK-support center on Easter Monday, but=20
couldn't take the call. I tried to call them back under the number I saw in=
=20
my phone display, but it seems that this number blocks incoming calls. I=20
tried calling them twice today, having waited for their call all day=20
yesterday, but always got stuck at one support guy who tried to put me=20
through to the lady taking my original support request, but she wasn't=20
available both times. They promised me a call back from her, but=20
so far nothing happened. Besides, I don't understand why it would need the=
=20
original person to take the service request, it should be in their ticket=20
system and they should be able to give me a status report.

Update:

I have just been called by Lenovo UK. They will hopefully send out a DVD-dr=
ive=20
and a battery today. They can't do anything about the display, since the=20
store where I bought the machine has changed it from XGA to SXGA+ upon=20
purchase (I specifically bought the machine to have the combo of Intel GPU=
=20
and the SXGA+ Flexview display which they didn't have in stock).

I now have a bricked display which the store won't exchange, since the disp=
lay=20
change itself voided the warranty.=20

What pisses me off in particular is the way I was treated as a customer. No=
t a=20
single apology for the delay and reaction time and not a single effort to=20
find a solution for the problem; mere shoulder shrugging is all I got.

I am sure my company will rethink its decision to buy Lenovo notebooks that=
 is=20
in planning right now; we can't use that kind of business policy in a=20
professional environment.

My last Thinkpad; Goodbye Lenovo.

Peter Lemken=20
Stuttgart