Retailer Refuses Hardware Repair Due To Linux

Tikka writes "Today I visited PC World (London, UK) because my 5-month-old laptop has developed a manufacturing fault: the hinge to the display has started to crack the plastic casing. Anyone in the know will know that this is due to the joint inside, and it means that in time the screen will separate from the keyboard. Repair was refused, because I have Gentoo Linux on my laptop, replacing the Windows Vista that was pre-installed. PC World said that installing Linux had voided my warranty and there is nothing they will do for me. I spoke to a manager, who said that he has been told to refuse any repairs if the operating system has been changed. I feel this has really gone against my statutory rights and I will do everything I can to fight it. I will review comments for your advice."

UK consumer protection laws

[cunamara]

For those of us on the new side of the pond, it will be interesting to see how UK consumer protection laws compare with US consumer protection laws (such as they are). In the US, the consumer would have several options, including consulting the Better Business Bureau and also with the various state Attorneys General offices. Good luck!

Rights in England?

[Gothmolly]

Maybe you're screwed, maybe not. England isn't the socialist utopia the rest of Europe is, but its also not the kill-the-consumer wasteland the USA is.

Talk to a solicitor/barrister/whatever-you-people-call-it.

The operating system does not matter

[unlametheweak]

It shouldn't matter what operating system is installed. Many (most?) of the large retailers will tell you to expect your hard disk to be reformatted with a "Recovery Disk" when you send your computer in to be repaired. I doubt if they would even try to boot off a virgin customer disk do to liability and privacy issues. This is a case of warranties gone wrong and managers not having common sense to resolve issues outside (the warranty) box. My advice: take it up the chain of command, or threaten to sue them. That seems to get the ball rolling in my professional and personal experience.

Embarrass them into compliance

[Moblaster]

Stand outside the store with a big sign ("ASK ME HOW PC WORLD RIPPED ME OFF") and patiently explain to everyone coming by what happened. The manager will be out in 15 minutes to kiss your ass clean.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[langelgjm]

Possible scenario: the sleep function didn't work under Linux, so he just left the lid closed with the laptop running. The excess heat, over the course of many (5) months, weakened the plastic case, causing it to crack. So actually, Linux is to blame.

I am completely serious. This is totally plausible.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[cpotoso]

Possible scenario: the sleep function didn't work under Linux, so he just left the lid closed with the laptop running. The excess heat, over the course of many (5) months, weakened the plastic case, causing it to crack. So actually, Linux is to blame.

Well, what do you know. I had a winxp laptop suddenly wake up while it was secure inside a padded bag (= in a good thermal insulator. It ran all the way until the battery discharged itself. When I opened the bag a couple of hours later it was *HOT*. I probably lost 1/2 of the battery life right there (and was lucky the thing did not catch fire or explode). Windows sucks!

Re:UK consumer protection laws

[Ungrounded Lightning]

In the US, the consumer would have several options, including consulting the Better Business Bureau and also with the various state Attorneys General offices.

Also the Federal Trade Commission.

The company's refusal to fix a mechanical flaw totally unrelated to the software violates the "implied warranty of serviceability and fitness". That's a BIG no-no.

Lunix machine failure

[retired03]

In the US, there is a common law that states any product must be fit for it's intended purpose and thus carries an implied warranty. I bought a computer from Fry's, 1 month store and 1 year manufacturer's warranty. It failed after 17 months. I asked them to fix it or replace it or give me my money back. They refused so I filed a claim in small claims court for all the costs involved. They called 30 minutes after the summons arrived and paid all costs. Fit for it's intended purpose means the product should last as long as any other like product - for computers that should be about 5 years.

Re:install windows

[shadowbearer]

  What for? Back up your data (4 GB usbsticks are about $60 right now if you watch the sales), do a OEM fresh install, bring it in to whatever idiotshop there is locally and tell them that a fresh install of windows from the OEM disks didn't fix the cracks in the casing. *sarcastic grin*

  If that fails, beat them over the head with it. Or just plain don't worry about it. (I have two laptops, both with various physical defects that don't detract from the usability. One of them is held together by Black Gorilla Duct Tape (800lb). It's probably sturdier than the other one, which doesn't have the duct tape. I use it to administer the headless cli ubuntu server VM from my main machine; it's perfect in the role, and I didn't have to throw away that 'old' pcmcia 802.b card. :) )

  What, are they supposed to retain their resale value, or something? Oh come on...

SB

Repair the Laptop

[bobbonomo]

Remove the disk drive and tell them the information is classified and highly sensitive.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[tacarat]

More than likely the note the manager read was intended to keep the cheaply paid minions from working on Linux related hardware problems. No letting the underlings break a .config file worse than it already is (and thus incurring the customer's wrath). Rather than hire more expensive techs with Linux+Windows knowledge, keep them in Windows only. The "fine print" was worded with common sense in mind, so it didn't seem necessary to stipulate that hardware issues with non-driver/OS causes would be ok.

Re:It's happened to me before...

[Anonymous Coward]

Although you're absolutely right in this case, it's worth noting that Sad Macs could (and often were) caused by faulty software -- this was probably much more common that hardware Sad Mac errors. Not applications of course, but broken system software or a corrupt directory. You could also cause the Sad Mac by pressing the interrupt switch immediately after turning on the machine. A friend was banned from the computer lab after doing this to every Mac present. Later Macs played a lovely little dirge when the Sad Mac came up, which alone made it worthwhile every now and then. Even later there was screeching with shattering glass sound, but it wasn't nearly as nice as those musical tones. A very broken Mac sometimes couldn't quite make the sound correctly and it would come out with some nasty static (that was a bad sign).

You could also accomplish all sorts of other mischief with the interrupt switch, but on very early Macs, even if you didn't know anything to type in the prompt, you could sometimes generate some amazing results by simply typing lots and lots of gibberish. I've seen the displays start flickering in weird ways and had static coming out of the speakers on a couple occasions.

Ahh, Good times.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[athdemo]

As a Best Buy employee, I take every opportunity to switch those stickers around on various products. We were one of the stores that got some macbooks to display in store, and while setting the display, I slapped one on it by the keyboard.

The computer sales reps tried to explain it away, saying it's x86 compatible and everything, lol.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[rtb61]

Only problem of course for that fanciful scenario, is heat would cause plastic deformation and not weaken the plastic to allow brittle fracture unlike of cause exposure to excessive sunlight. Now of course the heat might cause problems for the lcd transistor and I could pretty well guarantee, that dead transistors due to heat would occur well before exposure to heat would cause brittle weakness in plastic, not that exposure to heat does not cause some types plastic to become brittle but generally speaking that just about right before things go up in flames, or specifically the plastic used in laptop cases does go up in flames.

So I can only assume you are being completely serious in ignorance.

Being in the UK there is bound to be a consumer affairs department to which the complaint can be forwarded, for remedial action, I know of the ones for South Australia and for Australia. These government departments are very useful as they will handle any prosecution, so not only will your laptop likely be repaired, but other people in similar situation could also get legal rectification and very likely the retailer could get stuck with penalties well in excess of the cost of repairs.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[Architect_sasyr]

Well you wouldn't know if it has been closed for over a year now would you?

Personally I see this as a purely hardware issue. I'm still trying to work out exactly why the laptop was turned on in the first place or how they even found out Gentoo had gotten on there.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[stunted]

What I've been doing for years is, as soon as I get a machine, taking an image of the install with knoppix, dd, ntfsimage and an external hard drive, then if it needs work, I backup the running install/s, zero / urandom the drive, restore the original and send it back with the exact original install on it so they can't wiggle and blame updates or any other rubbish.

I've done this twice with SWMBOs little Sony TR2 laptop on which you can't remove the harddrive without voiding the warranty, it's usually dual boot Debian XP, both times it's come back with various updates installed, which I just over write with my old install.

The whole principal aspect of it never occurred to me before, but I absolutely see your point and in future will return all my broken PCs with fresh linux installs on them, irrespective of what they usually run, out of shear bloody mindedness.

Hard Drive Substitute

[grilled-cheese]

Do you think they would notice the hard drive was missing if I used my WindowsVistaLiveDVD?

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[cerberusss]

Amen, brother. I did the same and for others wishing to do the same, here's a template to send:

To: [e-mail]
Subject: Laptop with hinges broken, bad publicity

This is just an informational message telling your department that PCWorld has gotten some bad publicity on the internet:
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/12/0011209 [slashdot.org]

Slashdot is a tech news site with thousands of visitors per hour and I suggest you resolve the issue described as soon as possible.

Thank you and best regards,
Your Full Name

Similar story

[jalet]

I'm currently waiting for an answer to a formal letter I've sent to ACER wrt a similar problem where one of the two machines I purchased on the very same day don't start anymore and beeps at POST time (looks like CPU or memory problem), after ten months of perfect working in dual boot. Their brain dead tech support was only able to read her decisional flowchart instead of being able to just think. It basically went : Her : "I can't do anything for you until you reinstall the original Windows XP". Me "the original Windows XP is still installed on this machine, but the machine doesn't even boot, so how do you want me to reinstall Windows XP ?". Her "I can't do anything for you until you reinstall the original Windows XP". Me : "Please could you just think a bit about it ?". Her "I can't do anything for you until you reinstall the original Windows XP". Me : "Could I speak to your manager please ?". Her "Good bye!". Me "Could you give me your name again please ?". Her "Good bye!". Problem for her : I had her name already...
Still waiting (one week and running)...

It would be better for them to directly use robots : this wouldn't change anything for consumers, and would be better for their bottom line.

Re:Setting aside the humor, do they have a point?

[nnull]

"While Linux is not designed to destroy a computer, one can't expect every manufacturer to be aware of every flavor of linux or to know if it has the proper drivers and regulations. Someone who runs gentoo is exactly the kind of tweaker who might just try to disable thermal performance limiters."

As opposed to someone who overclocks their hardware in Windows? I fail to see the relevance in this case. Plenty of people running Gentoo just fine without tweaking anything on the hardware side.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[fbjon]

Why not claim that the HD contains sensitive data, and remove it from the laptop before sending in? This way they can't turn it on to discover strange OS's. They'd have to be lunatic to claim they can't repair the hinge without the hard drive.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[yakumo.unr]

In general they still are, lenovo was building the machines for IBM long before they actually put the name on them (from what I've heard, haven't completely verified it tbh)

Their carbon fiber reinforced plastic cases are tough as hell, active protection system and motherboard roll cage seems to keep them ticking long after most cheep plastic machines kicking arround today would be in peices imo

This lenovo blog article should interest you ThinkPads are Ruggedized Machines [lenovoblogs.com] :o)

Re:Setting aside the humor, do they have a point?

[eiapoce]

He can also take satisfaction in the amount of international negative publicity he's just brought down upon them.

Good POINT!. I remeber having my warranty uphold by posting the story on ciao! [www.ciao.it] and then having the store manager have a look at it. There is a marketing law that states that ten positive opinions on a product are needed to counterbalance a negative opinion (People tend to remember more the negative ones). It was a online shop (obviously he loked at the visits counter 1000+) and it was quite sensitive to users ratings.

Now listen, you should really post the Clear BRAND, MODEL and possibly a link to a page describing the defective notebook, i suggest epinions.com or something close to it. This could make really a difference. When you do be careful to be objective and not to let you go into hate speech. Then point the attenction of some PCWorld's upper managment there and you'we got excuses and the new laptop (And I think you deserve both).

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[arivanov]

NC4000 does not. ALI chipset as well.Overheat if you run a kernel compile and halt. In fact it is so bad that it cannot complete a full debian sarge install. I had to do a minimal install and put a custom kernel with working p4_clockmod before continuing.

Same for NC6000 and most other 2001-2006 business notebooks. Every single P4 or PentiumM based one I have tested during that period failed thermally under Linux if you ran it on ACPI alone.

As thermal tolerances differ from model to model your mileage may vary. In your case you ended up on the better side. This is rare.

Re:Setting aside the humor, do they have a point?

[Proofof. Chaos]

IANAL, and IANB(ritish), but what I'm wondering is if the legal situation in the UK encourages businesses to exploit such loopholes in order to avoid their responsibilities like it does in the US.
Obviously, in some situations, they have every right to argue that they won't fix your problem if you've changed operating systems. But in this country, businesses are encouraged to push such limitations as far as they can because if they are proven wrong, there are very few negative consequences.
If YOU hire a lawyer, and YOU take them to court, and YOU take dozens of hours of your own time to sue them in small claims court, you will probably win. BUT, their lawyers will make it very hard because they know that, even though they have a poor case, they will get paid, even if they lose. Whereas your lawyer has to worry that he won't make a dime if you lose (either you hired one of those lawyers who advertise that "we don't get paid, unless you get paid," or they are worried that you just won't pay them, and you don't have enough money to be worth suing.
If you do win, the defendant will have to do the repair they should have done, and they will PROBABLY have to pay your legal fees, but good luck getting money for all of your wasted time (or for that matter, as a reward for the monetary risk you took in order to sue them).
They are hoping that you would rather take the hit for a few hundred dollars, than deal with all that shit.
Now look at it from their point of view. There is no precedent that they have to conform to, so they can argue ignorance (in reference to the aforementioned car analogy, I'm sure that the whole after market car stereo thing has been used as an excuse to not repair things unrelated, but someone eventually beat them in court, setting a precedent, so they don't use that argument anymore). They know that most of their customers don't have the resources to fight them. They know that if they they lose in court, they will basically just be forced to do what they should have done in the first place.
It's like walking into a store knowing that if you steal something, you probably won't be caught, but if you are, the worst the cops will do is make you pay for the merchandise you took.

Rubbish

[RMH101]

The contract is between buyer and retailer, not buyer and manufacturer. You may well have a 12 month warranty with the manufacturer, but using this is not optimal. Many retailers will insist this is the only way to get problems rectified, but if you do this you lose the better protection of the warranty between retailer and buyer. Dig in, quote the Sale of Goods Act, go see Citizens' Advice if necessary, and use the free online UK small claims court form to raise a case against them electronically. Usually this latter thing alone is enough to get them to cave as they'll receive a document that basically says "don't show up in court or ignore this and you're legally liable".

Don't put up with it. They sold you a product, it's failed. Get them to replace/repair and KNOW YOUR RIGHTS.

Re:Setting aside the humor, do they have a point?

[twistedsymphony]

well I would think there are some exceptions for user serviceable parts... otherwise they could void your warranty for changing the ink in your printer or the tires on your car.

Where would it stop with a PC? What if I put in a bigger hard drive, or more ram, or a new drive or card? Should the OS be considered a user serviceable part?

Depending how shady you're feeling you could probably pop out the factory hard drive and plug in a clean one to install Linux, then when if you start having problems swap the drives back to get the repairs done.

Re:ahem.... are you sure?

[Tony Hoyle]

Again this is a thing they *cannot exclude* under UK law. PC world take the piss regularly.

Opening the software is a reasonable use of said software - in fact you can't tell if it works or not without opening the box! You have a legal right to use something before rejecting it as faulty/not as described.

Avoiding the issue entirely...

[Anonymous Coward]

Take out the hard drive when you bring the laptop in for maintenance. Tell them that you cannot allow unauthorized personnel access to your hard drive for privacy reasons, so you took it out. They'll assume you're either a pedophile or a government worker. Up to you on which they infer...

Or install a bios password. They won't get past the bios password screen (they wouldn't clear it without permission and wouldn't need to to fix a hinge) and wouldn't see that the PC had linux.

On the other hand, I'd rather you kicked'm in the arse and had them change their FUD policy.

Linux hardware repair refused

[Brix Braxton]

Are we all sure that the request wasn't that the end user wanted to keep his linux install intact? If so, then I can understand that they will not accept a repair and still promise to return all data intact since they might just want to swap out systems. If the request was not to leave Linux intact, then they should honor the repair.

Re:Setting aside the humor, do they have a point?

[Bravoc]

In the US, the responsibility falls onto the manufacturer to prove that the non-stock modification caused the failure before denying warranty work. For example, if you buy a motorcycle and make exhaust system modifications and the transmission fails, the manufacturer would have to prove that the exhaust modification caused the transmission failure in order to deny warranty service.

Seems to me, the same would apply here

Re:Setting aside the humor, do they have a point?

[insanemime]

I agree with this wholeheartedly. I used to work for a large retail chain here in the US and we had managers who would deny services like this when questioned by unknowing warm body tech workers. Just because that one manager said no does not mean that his word is the law for all of the store. The next step would be to speak to either a different manager or speak with the store's general manager. Usually, if it goes all the way to the GM you will get what you want. If taking those steps does not help then it is time to go and speak with their corporate office where they usually bow and scrape to the customers because they have no idea how it is out in the real world cause they live in a world of fantastical numbers and to hear from an actual human is a wondrous thing, and they must make this mythical "consumer" feel like they care. If you still don't get satisfaction...then it is time to start a holy crusade upon the chain...but usually it does not get that far.