Gateway Tech Support Problem

I NEVER buy warranty..

Because when thing do happen, the never work anyway.
And the warranty (i think) is just a money machine.

Un-frickin-believable. Apparently, technicalities replace common sense. (Does that make sense?)

Hello,

What a disappointing experience, especially after having paid a premium for warranty the vendor refuses to honor. I am reminded of a ThinkPad owner who had a similar experience with IBM—although he was able to get it resolved, eventually.

Perhaps for your next computer you should go with a locally-built system. A friend of mine in Issaquah has been buying computers from Puget Custom Computers for a while now and seems happy with them. I do not know if he has had to get one serviced due to an accidental liquid spillage, though.

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

Several years ago I bought a Gateway laptop that was misconfigured to share an interrupt (yes it was that long ago!). I took it into the Gateway store to have them fix it and after several days I called to find out the status. They hadn’t done anything since they needed my software, the standatd PC software that came with the laptop, the CDs that GW ships with the laptop. I dropped off (their!) software and waited another week. They had reformatted the harddrive and reinstalled the OS, but it still didn’t work and now all the other software was wiped. By this point I was fed up and contacted Gateway to return it but they wanted to charge me a restocking fee since I had not used their phone tech service. Even after I explained I used their Gateway store instead and waited weeks for results, they argued with me. I finally talked to a supervisor (two actually) and got my full money back, but since then I won’t touch Gateway products. I can see nothing has changed with them. And I never buy extended warranties. They are just pure profit for them.

Chris,

With the kind of money you make you surely can afford a second hard drive. You put the little metal box into the system and configure it for RAID 1 either in hardware or software and then you will always have a backup whenever you have to send in your system…

-David

Wow. Just wow.

Thanks for the reminder not to buy Gateway! That said, not sure any of the other PC vendors are much better..

I just moved my coffee further from my laptop!

You bought a “GATEWAY” yep it sure was self induced.

I used to buy hundreds of thier desktops back in the early 90’s then I had a run in with Gateway’s customer unsupport team. Replaced them all in a year. Sales team used to call me up to win me back but they got tired of the laughter and you guys suck remarks. They forgot that in the end I do have a choice.

Much better. If you had posted about “ADP” from the get go, you would have been received much better.

Your original post made it sound like you had no idea what you had purchased.

Chris, I read through your story twice and cannot decide if you are telling a joke or not. The Accidental Damage Plan covers accidental drops, spills & power surges, so I can’t see why Gateway won’t cover the coffee spill. It looks like Gateway is using the extra money they got for the ADP just to fatten their bottom line as pure 100% profit.

Contacting a lawyer is probably out of the question because that will cost more than the replacement part.

Keep us updated on this Gateway fiasco.

That’s pretty bad service, Chris, but I notice two things that weaken your argument:

1. It’s not too unreasonable to be required to send the system to the manufacturer for warranty service. They can’t trust every idiot out there to install their own video card without ******** anything else up - and they can’t even be sure that the video card is really the faulty component. For all they know, you could have been misusing terms and talking about the motherboard or power supply.

2. Don’t you have backups of your data? It’s a huge inconvenience to be forced to restore your data unnecessarily, but you DO have that choice, and you’re not completely stuck.

The bigger issue is having to go without your otherwise-working computer for a week or two to replace an non-critical secondary component.

I have had a couple of similar incidents with tech support, and the damage was not even caused by me. The laptop came broken. After I had sent it in 3 times I had to call their legal department and ask them where I should send the small claims court paper work. I had it back from Toshiba 24 hours later.

As a policy I no longer by warranties on desktops. It is just not worth the aggravation involved.

My next computer will probably be from a gaming company and will come with a premium price tag and premium service.

Ed Morrissey of Captain’s Quarters has had some Gateway difficulties lately as well

I knew there was a reason I never wanted to get a Gateway. Thanks for the heads up and the confirmation that my instincts are correct.

I used to work in Tech support, and the rules for the agent that answers the phone in many organizations are as follows:

1). Get the customer off the line as fast as possible

2). Do as little for the customer as possible

3). Never accept responsibility for anything

These rules are never formally presented, but they are clearly implied to every agent that works for such companies. Such organizations seem to have the idea that appearances are everything, and substance comes in a distant fourth or fifth behind such concepts as maximizing profit and minimizing after market liability.

If I were you, when I ran into this brick wall about the issue being customer caused, I would have pulled out the false advertising card - the notation on the WEB site clearly includes spills in your coverage …

Just a thought

Wow Chris, I hear about this sort of thing all the time, but haven’t experienced it myself. I’m a support person who has worked with Gateway almost exclusively for the past eight years. Now, I do know that corporate support is different than consumer support. That said, most of these issues like you are having can be resolved by actually reading the warranty you purchased. Of course, this means you actually need a copy of the warranty you purchased. There are a few stories out there of people who retained their original warranty texts, and when they had a problem, the company tried to impose the current warranty text. Some of these people were able to show the CSR that in fact, a different warranty applied.

So, step one is to see if you still have the original warranty information, read it and try to understand it. Second, if the warranty does in fact state that you need to send in the entire unit for repair, quit whining and send in the unit. I know it seems odd since you were able to identify the faulty component. Remember that the CSR has to deal with more than dozens of differenty warranties and often they have little room for flexibility. Not just Gateway, but all of the big companies. So cut them a little slack and follow the rules. To prevent hard drive image loss, there are lots of options: image the drive before shipping, swap out the drive before shipping (maybe with a new inexpensive one, or with an old one you may have laying around.), back up individual files (lots of different programs to help you here.)

I could go on here, but you get the idea. I have little patience for people who have access to the information and the rules, but choose not only to not follow the rules, but also whine about them.

Well, Chris, your first mistake was buying a Gateway system. I nearly ejected Coke through my nostrils when I read the opening to your rant. Who buys Gateway? This company is a relic PC maker leftover from the great dot com implosion.

In terms of quality support I would recommend Apple, personally, as I’ve always had outstanding support from them. Dell would be my second choice. Yes, I know Dell has slipped over the past two or three years, but hey - they still offer decent products, and my past experiences with them (at least for desktops) has been trouble-free.

My uncle used to own a heating and cooling business. He told me that he sold warranties on his products because he read in a trade magazine about how much profit was in them and how little cost was involved in providing them. He also told me to never purchase one.

That being said, I’d try calling your sales rep and raising holy hell. The moron you spoke with obviously hasn’t a clue what Lockergnome is or who Chris Pirillo is, but your work is widely read - and I can’t imagine Gateway would want this to go unresolved.

So they are saying that even though you have both accidental damage AND onsite, they are mutually exclusive warranties.

whatta bunch of maroons.

Wow that sucks a boat-load of ***. Gateway’s support makes no sense whatsoever.

I had discovered that certain Core Duo chips could replace certain Pentium D chips (which my Gateway has), depending on which version of the Intel chipset it had.
I contacted tech support and asked them if my system would support , and if nothing else, if they could find out which chipset my system had, as the internet wasn’t producing the results I needed at the time.

“Gateway does not support upgrading processors in systems.”

A friend of mine spilled coffee on her new Dell laptop (yep, she ruined it totally by accident) and they replaced it for free. without even a hiccup. She got it replaced right away.

I’ll never buy a gateway, ever. My next new computer will be a … MAC

Hi Chris-

In my opinion call back and speak to another rep. I really think you got someone who was reading off their cue cards and chose the wrong type of warranty in the system to quote from . Seriously, if the warranty says “accidental spills” then it should bloody cover accidental spills. How can they cover the “system” and not the video card.

Only one other thing I will say, if you are sure it is just the video card you may want to replace it yourself. Most of the ADP warranties will only cover ONE major part each year. If there is a chance of another spill, I would wait to claim a more serious issue.

[...] The State of PC Tech Support ~ Chris Pirillo A sad story of Chris Pirillo trying to get support from Gateway. No wonder their business is in the *******. (tags: chrispirillo chris pirillo gateway customerservice customer care bullshit) [...]

Chris,

I’ve been fighting with Gateway service as well. I feel your pain. However, I think your problem is the tech not the policy.

First, I recommend that you ALWAYS call. The chats have never been productive for me. Second, try to get a hold of a supervisor. Third, I think there may have been some miscommunication from the tech. To have the ADP resolved, you’ll need to send the whole computer in. To just receive the part, you’ll have to buy it.

I agree these policies are extremely frustrating, but you may be able to get some satisfaction.

Have a great one,

Paul K.

Used to work for Gateway doing phone & email support about 10 years ago. At that time…during the dot.com boom…the only thing I used to hear over & over was “bonuses…bonuses…bonuses”. This meant that if you wanted your monthly bonus…you replaced nothing…UNLESS you had no other choice. Got to the point that no matter what tech support skills you used…your supervisor ( which usually was not a tech)…would/could make sure no parts would be sent out…unless the supervisor “committee” saw the need to keep the sale from going South.
Plus…used to see VP’s & other executives go in & out the door every 6-9 months. The reason is that after throwing millions out the window on every hair-brained scheme they could/would do…they would get canned to make room for the new VP flunkie to do the same thing. One of these boondoggles was putting people into chat rooms to solve their issues. At first…the local supervisors thought this was better than sliced bread. After finding that users were using the chat rooms to complain with everyone able to read that users were saying…the VP’s/supervisors were amazed this was happening. Months later & thousands/millions of dollars blown away…they called the “experiment” a failure. The VP would go onto another company to blow their millions on their ideas.
Just remember this…any time you deal with a large company…you are funding the executives to be able to do their hair-brained ideas. Love seeing my hard-earned money being wasted by someone with less brains than the ceiling tiles in their offices.

Hi Chris: I, too, had a Gateway nightmare! Bought a Gateway 835GM via TigerDirect.ca pushed ON button & took 8-10 tries to boot to desktop. Purolated 3 times to e-machines tech support paid by Gateway and problem never fixed so I gave up even though I explained it was a “timing” problem and they kept re-installing the operating system evey time. A Staples store technician suggested a timing problem with peripheral devices loading so now I press “F10″ key at Gateway splash screen; wait a few seconds to create a boot delay; then hit “enter” which boots to desktop. Other than this startup irritation, the Gateway runs great but the runaround and failure of them to fix their own PC is a big turnoff so Gateway never again! I love my HP notebook with HP all-inclusive web & people-friendly support and tolerate my MDG Desktop “bring it in whatever is wrong policy”.

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My first PC - purchased in 1996 - was a Gateway. We did buy an extended warranty, and made several calls to tech support over the next few years. They even stayed on the phone with me while I installed a new hard drive, taking me through it step by step. That was in 1997 or 1998. So, at that point, I had good things to say about Gateway and their tech support.

A friend of mine used to work for Gateway - until she was “outsourced.” She was required to help train her replacement or the company would challenge her unemployment application. I am guessing that their tech support suffered when they ruthlessly dropped their trained tech support people for less-experienced people. When my friend lost her job, I promised myself I would never buy from them again.

I’ve had nothing but problems with my current Gateway. I’ve had to replace the hard drive, the monitor, and a USB port is not working at all. I’ve been a Gateway customer for a long time, but never again. Think it’s time to give Dell a try with my next machine.

It would have been interesting to see the timestamps on this - it took me 3 hours to get the tech to agree that the nic card on the motherboard was faulty and send a new one after i’d already wiped the hard disk to rule out software problems. I was told 3-5 days and then he turned up unannounced the next day when I was 50 miles away!
In your case - it pays to read the small print for your warranty. I’d also ring up and start again by saying you need a new video card as it is not working anymore. You’ve run diagnostics, (difficult without a working video card) but maybe all the diagnostics you need is a) the monitor works in another machine b) it doesn’t work in this one c) a different graphics card works.
You may need to format the drive to put a new os on to ensure it’s not drivers though ;-)

Several people have hadf success in taking Gateway to Small Claims Court. Concating the Consumer Adocate at your local TV news organization or local newspaper also sometimes works. GW2K needs as little negative publicity as possible these days

Repairing computers as a hobby and a side job, I’ve dealt with gateway enough to despise them as much as your experience has. I highly suggest however that you try calling and ask to escalate to a manager. One of the reasons they want the whole system is so that you can’t complain it doesn’t work because they want to test it, and in some cases rather than make sure it works right they’ll replace the whole thing with a spare and maybe put your drive in our just give you a new stock bare drive. They don’t want to have to repair it again for free. Often the front line people aren’t authorized to discuss anything beyond what is frimly printed in writing, but the supervisors have a lot of leeway in keeping customers satisfied. That being said, this is Gateway, and I’ve often questioned if that gateway leads to hell, as their support sucks and the systems for the most part are subpar, but it’s worth a shot. It’s simple enough for them to RMA the hardware, get their money back and send you a new one.

I’ve been using Gateway computers (desktops and laptops) since 1996, and I’ve never had a problem. In fact, my first Gateway (1996) is now being used by a friend of mine — 11-yrs.-old and still ticking along just fine (and without any hardware changes except additional memory and with the original monitor).

I bought a warranty on my first and second machine (desktops), but not on my last desktop. I did have a warranty on my first laptop but not my second; however, I’ve never needed the warranties. And while I’ve heard stories like yours, Chris, about Gateway, I’ve heard worse about computers from Dell, Compaq, HP, and IBM. Let’s face it, no company is perfect. If I were you, I’d have asked for a supervisor, Chris. When a friend of mine had a similar issue, she spoke with a supervisor and the part was sent to her free of charge.

I bought a Gateway at CompUSA in the state of Maryland in December and have had no problems but when I went to their website to register for support I was surprised to be informed that my computer serial number was not in their database which they said meant it was purchased outside of the US and therefore I could not register it. I hope I don’t have problems.

[...] Step one: Blame the user. Step two: See step one. Last week Chris shared his not-so-great customer experience with Gateway. My own two recent palavers with Cingular and Utah’s DMV (you can have more than one palaver can’t you?), have also reminded me of abysmal bureaucracy. Posted: May 06 2007, 10:22 PM by alexbarnett | with no comments Filed under: :-/ [...]

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I had a HP (compaq at the time) notebook that I dropped and one whole side of the casing cracked. I had an ADP warranty and I called them up and set it in and they replaced the casing, no questions asked. From what I recall my hard drive and data were still in tact. This was a “business class” machine so perhaps that made a difference. I always buy business class hardware when possible because it seems like the support you get when them is much better. On my notebooks I always buy ADP warranties but never did on desktops. Now that I have switched to Mac, I do buy AppleCare for each machine, just because you cannot repair a Mac as easily as you can repair a whitebox PC. Lastly, I do have to agree that you kinda shot yourself in the foot by buying a Gateway in the first place.

You’re a dumbass… Thats what you get when you go to email support, and chat to some fcukin ninny in India….. Call 1 800 846 2301 and get REAL support for your notebook or PC..

Where to begin.

The tech was right - you needed to service the machine.
Replacement parts, for a video card damaged by fluid spills — not an option. You’d have had the opportunity to remove the HDD prior to sending it in for service.

To whoever mentioned upgrading CPUs in a machine — absolutely correct: no manufacturer anywhere will suppor the upgrading of a CPU while the machine is in warranty. Warranty becomes void if you upgrade the CPU. Why blame a vendor for trying to keep you in warranty?

Let me give you an example.
You buy a 2007 Ford Mustang - with a 3.8L V6. You decide that you want to swap in a 5.4L V8, because it will fit and is more powerful.
Would you blame the dealer for saying - “you swap out engines your warranty will be voided” ? Exactly the same - the CPU is the engine. If you were out of warranty — you could do whatever the hell you want to the machine, at your own expense.

As for whoever is suggesting a lawyer… get real. By accepting the machine, you agree to the terms of the warranty - which states that you will cooperate with technical support to resolve your issues. I’m so sick and tired of hearing you people bring up lawyers like it is supposed to scare us. You agreed to the terms of warranty, abide by them.
If you didn’t want to agree to the warranty, you had 15 days to respond in writing to the company — and return the machine. Its a contractual agreement. Furthermore — if you did plan to take legal action against Gateway — you’d automatically lose. Warranty states that you must go through “arbitration”, and failure to do so will result in you (the plaintiff) covering all cost expenses for Gateway’s legal fees, document processing, and penalty fees issued for not going through arbitration.

Want to play hardball - prepare to go home with a few bruises.

My actual encounter with the support professional was EXTREMELY poor. I did not hold back any personal information with the sup. professional. I did refrain from giving the s/n and stated why. I only recieved OKAY answer from the agent. I will not ever use this type of support again. Neither will I call your support line as its not a toll free number. The ignorance of the professional was very eveident. In my profession it is rude to ignore a person in any way, shape or form. I would have just denied the service presented till the cst would have the s/n number available. Count a loss of new cst to purchase your products and a very rude comment on many blogs.

Jamie Lobzun

Spoken like a true idiot that wasn’t aware of what he bought.
You bought a system with a retail/toll support warranty.

Get off your high horse - that calling the wrong number you aren’t getting support.

By the way… not giving your serial number, which is what is used to verify the system configuration… you’re just making it more difficult to receive assistance. Of course… it’s your system… you can be an idiot if you want to.

Gateway from hell.

Buy a Toshiba or Sony. I have had such bad experience with Gateway Customer Service.

My hardware- motherboard, drivers, 32 files, etc are all bad. I just purchased the computer @ the end of February. I just love that blue screen from hell that pops up on my computer every 5 seconds!!

I call Gateway to report the problem, and go through a complete nightmare of calls. The first person was so rude to me that I had to ask to speak with someone else.

The second one accused me of having someone else on the line….crazy.

The third person was actually nice and gave me good advice.

I had to escalate my problem and they want me to send in my whole computer, however, I do background checks for a living and I will never allow them to have access to my hardrive…… Now I have to buy a new computer, which will never be a Gateway again. Their customer service workers also loved to blame Microsoft Vista, Best Buy and The Geek Squad for the problem as well. It is so sad that they talk about vendors/partners in such a manner as well.

you obviously have no idea or you would have saved your money and not had warranty, contents inurance covers accidental damage on the component level.

Companies Gateay Dell HP, mass or manufacture parts that work together with pre-built software images, so they treat the whole things as a system rather than parts to save money, therefore they cannot simply take a part theyll infact deal with the entire system this saves money in the long run and they simply replace the machine as a whole. this system saves them money and works.

the fact that you lose your data isnlt there problem, thats what backups are for. Alos if you call them back an repeat the same thing and accept the system service under warranty they still will its just thye warranty does not cover parts it covers the system as a whole to save costs.

I have a Gateway and apparently, it’s nigh impossible to get a new video card for them. It currently has an ATI 3D Rage Pro card in it, which I think wasn’t there originally, so maybe it accepts some video cards, hmmmm.
I don’t even think it has a warranty, so I hope putting a new video card in it doesn’t break it.

i had a problem with gateway also, the cpu fan kinda burns out and the laptop is as hot as fire. i call tech support at 1-800-846-2301 for replacement, and i was out of luck, having them criticizing me for putting the laptop over the carpet or lap. since i bought the laptop from bestbuy, i called geek squad. they told me to call the number under the laptop, right on top of the serial key, 408-273-0808. i have to tell them the problem and what is the possible cause. the operators had zero knowledge and she told me that the hard drive could be reseted to factory default. i ask her for sure and she told like 15 minutes to give the answer of “yes.” however, i did get tech support and ended up sending the system back and they replaced a new fan and a new ram, since one of the ram got burn out. still never ever again buy gateway. they are garbage.

i had a simaler problem….. i have a gateway notebook that i purchased from best buy(beast butt) and the sales rep in store sold me tat for an extra 99.99 i could get an A_D_H acentental damage and handling …………………………..the sales rep was like “” *wink winnk( if you acendentally break your system.. you can just bring it in and get it replaced… or get a refund

so i had a legit broke dvd driv keyboard and mouse that was manu defects………

i made the 65 mile trip up to bestbuy with gas at 3.29 a gallon at 10 miles to the gallon…………. went in looked at a system….. a nice hp that was 50 dollars less than mine…………..

i went up to the geek squad service center in the store and told them that ive had it with this laptop…………………. the waranty will expire soon and could i replace it with the HP ****9z notebook ( i liked the looks) they said no.. your warranty dont cover replacement.. i swaid i was tild ot does.. this went back and forth about 5 times before i just had to say whatever.. and they tld me to just call gateway for the replacement part….. so go figure………..

Hi …can you tell me why my icons on desk top dissapper?…i had to do system restore to get them back…no new software and total scans was done , no virus detected…also at times when I happen to go to a web site internet explorer will stop it saying it does not support the site?

Yes, that really sucks for having to send in the laptop. You can take out the harddrive and connect it to any PC with a notebook drive kit. And backup it up before sending it in. I think that’s you major concern.

Overall, I’ve been pleased with the on-site service for notebooks-gateway. When I knew the problem was the heat sink and fan, and the hard drive, they send the parts, and a technician even called the next day to replace it.Onsite NBD means next day fed ex air delivery. I’ve also had the laptop just die on me-no screen, no hd activity, just the power light on, which required me to send it in. They offered me the option to replace the motherboard, but you know you can’t guarantee that’s what’s faulty, and I sent it to get the whole thing replaced.

O.K.

For one where did you buy that accidental plan i know for a FACT gateway sells but only the 1 year extended service

99.00 = 1 Year desktop
139.00= 2 Year Desktop

109.00= 1 Year Notebook
189.00 = 2 Year Notebook

And They Cover EVERYTHING On The Notebook/Desktop That Is A MANFUCATER DEFECT, So If You Spilled Coffee Guess What Idiot Thats Your Fault.

P.s The Accidental Coverage Is Thru The Store
Go Take A Look At That.

I Love MY Gateway
Its Had Problem Like The Hardrive But They Shipped Me Out One For 75. Hold On A Credit Card PAYED FOR SHIPPING AND HANDLING Then I Just Used The Prepaid Shipping Labels To Ship The Defective One Back And They Took Off The Hold, Took Only All Togather 8 Days.

Their Technical Support Is outstanding Have You Read About Or Heard About DELLS TECH SUPPORT!!!!! You Better Be Glad Their Based In The U.S And Take The Time To Answer Questions..

I LOVE GATEWAY.

Gateway Technical Support in my opinion should be renamed to Technical Collapse!

I had a Gateway laptop from new for one month and the external powersupply/transformer died. Rang Gateway tech and they said they would send a new one via courier straight away. Two wks passed and nothing. Rang again an they knew nothing of my original enquiry despite I had a origination/reference code for the first call. They said they would send one out straight away again…..Three wks later - Nothing! Went to Staples where I bought it from and they exchanged it there and then with a display model’s supply.

Circa three months later I got a mysterious unexpected package through the door…..You guessed it!

Currently, have a broken hinge on this laptop, Spoke with gateway and they concluded I would have to send my laptop to Germany (from UK) for it to be replaced. I can fix this myself quite easily, I just require the parts.. They would not even give or find out the part number for me.

This is despite, and I quote from uk.gateway.com, they have a

“End-User Replaceable Parts Programme (EURPP)
This innovative programme gives you a fast and easy way of solving your computer problem. If your Customer Care representative concludes that your equipment needs a new part, it will be shipped to your door along with simple, step-by-step instructions on how to replace the defective part.”

Thats only for desktops I was told!!

I am currently waiting for a response to a vivid letter I sent to their UK HQ.

Will post with response, if I ever get it!

I will never ever again touch or go near a Gateway product. I have absolutely no faith in them whatsoever.