PC Half fixed - Whats my legal position?.

[Scania]

https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/letmerepair.co.uk Not the best of reviews at a glance....

What the hell is a supposedly reputable brand such as Asus using cowboys like these for in the first place? - I feel for the OP, direct to the manufacturer whilst almost certainly wouldn't be the cheapest, you'd think would still be the ideal solution for an out of warranty product return & repair, to see this has surprised me.

Bought plenty of Asus kit in the past (typing this on an Asus Z97) I'll think twice next time having realized how they operate their repairs.

 

[Jonny ///M]

I can't see them keeping any old screen for that exact laptop lying around to be honest. They probably just said they binned it to make it seem like you had no choice but to pay up.

I'd expect to be paying for the motherboard and some sort of labour, no new screen and no labour for their **** up with that side of it.

 

[FatRakoon]

Not the best of reviews at a glance....

You're not kidding... I did write one myself just now, then I deleted it as I still dont have the Laptop, so who knows... They might even come up trumps.

What the hell is a supposedly reputable brand such as Asus using cowboys like these for in the first place? - I feel for the OP, direct to the manufacturer whilst almost certainly wouldn't be the cheapest, you'd think would still be the ideal solution for an out of warranty product return & repair, to see this has surprised me.

Exactly. Its not new, its well out of the warranty, but its still a decent Laptop and I like it. Its never failed me, and its extremely upgradeable, as I have done to it.
Its got a new GFX Card, the DVD has been swapped out for another HD and so it has an SSD and 2x2TB HDs, and 32GB RAM, oh, its also had a new Keyboard so its lovely and looks the biz.
Its running Linux sweet as honey too!

So yeah, I wanted to know that if anyone is going to touch it, then Iwanted it to go to the best place I could think of, but these bozos have proven to me that they are nothing but idiots.

I can't see them keeping any old screen for that exact laptop lying around to be honest. They probably just said they binned it to make it seem like you had no choice but to pay up.

I'd expect to be paying for the motherboard and some sort of labour, no new screen and no labour for their **** up with that side of it.

They kind of had me to ransom.

I paid for Labour and for handling and for the screen, and I told them there and then for the second time, that there was nothing wrong with the screen, but they simply dismissed me. I paid anyway and then a week orso later, they said they did some more testing and the motherboard has also failed... I told them they should have diagnosed it initially and that I am NOT paying anymore and after some argueing, I then decided that I needed to contact My solicitor.. He advised me to contact CAB but he said that they have broken a Common law and its a mid-contract breach ( IIRC? ) and eve nthough they said in the fine print that the price may change, they cannot do that once you have paid up. I paid up and for that they need to fulfill the repair contract. He did say without reading the fine print, so he suggested speaking to CAB and they told me a few things and they have got Trading Standards involved but with this Corona stuff happening, its not going quickly enough!

I dare say I wont hear from them for another week or so, but I am not expecting them to give good news because everything they have done has shown me that they are absolutely useless.

This has also shocked me about Asus too! - I expected much more from a company that I have liked for a few years now.

I have AsRock, Asus, and Gigabyte Motherboards, Graphics cards, all my sound used to be Creative but now Asus ONLY... In fact I have my ZXR ZX and Recon3D on teh shelf above me doing nothing.. All my DVDs are ASUS - Im looking now... I have 14 PCs in the Computer room ( only 6 are actually plugged in ) but they all have at least one or two ASUS parts, and now, after this... I will NEVER buy ASUS again.

Oh yeah and my Main Linux Laptop is ASUS too - thats the one thats duffed.

 

[FatRakoon]

Cool. I had a great morning this morning.

Last night, I saw my solicitor while I was doing some shopping and we got chatting about the Laptop. I said that Im not really gtting anywhere with T.S because of this lockdown issue and they are taking their time, however I do seem to be getting place with the shop and they do seem to be fixing it or at least they seem to... I dont like how they are working things and so I have been recording every phone call and I have kept every email to and from them. He said can I possibly send him a copy of what I have, including the phone calls and so obviously,yes I can.

Anyway, he has looked over everything I have had off them, he has looked through the fine print etc, and he has read each quote very carefully and listened to our conversations on the phone and he said that it is fairly clear to him, that they are trying to pull a fast one on me. He has said that since T.S are taking their merry time with it all, he will help me out.

At this time, it does look like they are replacing the motherboard, however according to the conversations we have had, they have definitely replaced my screen and they have scrapped my original, but now they are saying that they are going to leave my screen on it. So, thatmeans that they may try putting a broken screen on the thing and that is where he will step in. According to the wording they have used, I should be getting a fully working laptop back.

My only issue is a 50-50 on whether my screen was working or not, when they had it.

It was working perfectly fine, and it has ZERO dodgy pixels and it was crystal clear.

Would they need to prove it was broken? No, they just assumed and replced it ( or not ) and realised it was not the screen and then replaced the motherboard.

I mean, I have had to fix enough Laptops to know that its a bitch... With PCs you can just trydifferent parts and you can find out fairly easily and quickly what part isbroken but with a laptop, its harder, I will concede that, so if the screen is blank, I will admit that sometimes you will assume its the screen, but then you consider other things... Does it work VIA the HDMI or VGA port? if it does then yeah, new screen should be it. But also you need to make sure that its still trying to go through the boot process, the laptop was NOT, it would come on but the Hard Disks would not spin up or it would not do anything other than you could hear the fans and they start up and then would slow down after a second or two if it was booting properly, but they never bothered to checkany of that!

So yeah, they are absolutely in the wrong and we have their own emails that will help us along.

Im just waiting got them to get the Motherboard and replace that, and hopefully they wil have fixed it.

But it better have my 32GB Corsair in it, and my 3 HDs and my Graphics card all back in it. ( Now I am wondering... Is it the graphics? LOL - no, that would be the same with it not booting surely ? hehe)

 

[Haggisman]

Did they tell you up front that it was probably the screen that was broken?

Call me cynical, but my gut feeling is that they broke the screen when opening it up to get to the motherboard, and they're now trying to get you to pay for their ****-up...

 

[BDEE]

Make sure you get the same spec screen and they haven't replaced it for a cheap inferior one.

 

[FatRakoon]

Did they tell you up front that it was probably the screen that was broken?

Call me cynical, but my gut feeling is that they broke the screen when opening it up to get to the motherboard, and they're now trying to get you to pay for their ****-up...

Make sure you get the same spec screen and they haven't replaced it for a cheap inferior one.

Wont surprise me one bit. I am hearing nothing but horrible things about these morons.

As for replacing it with a naff screen, that does worry me, absolutely it does. The one on it is imaculate and crystal clear genuine article and not some ebay junk, so yes, it is a worry that they put some sub standard pile of rubbish on it.

I kept telling them that I wanted any and all replaced parts returned with the laptop. I told them that I wanted the screen returned as I knew it was a good screen and thats when they then told me that the screen had been scrapped. They then said that they will replace the motherboard and take the screen off, they then said that it will be returned without a scren, Its now concerning me that they have now said that they are leaving the screen on it.

I think that the people I talk to and the people who fix things simply do not communicate with each other?

So, does it have my own screen on or not?
Does it have a new screen or not?
If its my own screen, have they put it on properly?
Did they assume it was broken and knocked it about not knowing it wasa perfectly good screen?

Im no wiser on the screen, but one thing Ido know, is that if they give me a junk screen or the laptop is returned and not working, then I will be going nuts and Iwill be using the solicitor not CAB and I will be taking them all the way... I have their emails and I have the clever way they have worded everything to get around the screen issues and now teh solicitor has told me a few things and shown me their dirty tactics, I feel that this might get me a new Top of the line Laptop if they fail to get mine sorted.

Either way bugger it, Im up for a scrap. Its not my main laptop and so I am in no rush at all.

 

["andy"]

Asus actually use this company as a contracted repair centre

They sound like SBC who many companies use to repair their phones. Absolute shambles

They obviously win the contracts by low prices but those low prices are surely due to money they make from scam like behaviour !

 

[FatRakoon]

Another update
This morning I had ANOTHER email telling me that they have discovered ANTOHER fault with the laptop.

These morons are clearly too stupid to know what they are doing!

Im done with it all

I am contacting trading standards ( for the third time now ) or perhaps who do I call when trading standards have not bothered to get back to me every time I contact them?
Some kind of ombudsman?

My solicitor has said I clearly have a sound case, so I might just have to bite the bullet and go with him, cos this is clearly some way for them to keep gettiong money from me and not actualy fixing the laptop at all.

Scum.

 

[stockhausen]

@FatRakoon just as a suggestion, try contacting Consumeractive at the Computeractive magazine [email protected] - they seem pretty hot on this sort of scam.

They will require your name, phone number and address - just to make sure that you are genuine and not simply a troublemaker -good luck!

 

[FatRakoon]

You know. I just might...

i will see what other thing they are going to come up with next, and go from there!

They said it was the screen then the motherboard, and now its something else and they are asking me to cough up BEFORE they do any repair and they are as someone said in an earlier post on here, basically keeping my laptop hostage and making me constantly pay up.

I have already got a solicitor interested in it, ( talked to him for free theen saw him and chatted and the second time I saw him in the town it was not official but he did say that I could have a case ) and trading standards but they are slower than a clacier in getting back to me and after contacting them 3 times, one to setup the ccrud and the second two to ask wtf is going on and getting nowhere, so yeah, I might just contact these guys.

 

[Mrwong]

Ok, a month or so ago, my ASUS RoG Laptop suddenly gave me a blank screen after I did something in the BIOS.

I was unable to fix it as there seems to be no way to clear the CMOS and so I decided that I will send it off to see about getting it repaired.

They checked it over and on 27/04/2021, they gave me a quote for £295.55

300 quid is a lot of money for a Laptop thats a few years old now, but its been a great one and so I thought ok.... So I sent off the agreement by post and I paid the £295.55 via my debit card on the phone ( They wanted the money up front as they had to order the parts ) .

So, a shoprt time later, they said that it needed some more work.

Then, the other day, I get another Email telling me that the Motherboard also needs replacing, and that I now owe them £512.39

Thyey also said that if I decided NOT to go ahead with the repair, that I will still have to pay for the LCD Screen as they have scrapped the original screen.

Now, I have told them that I wanted the screen returned with the laptop.

I knew that there was nothing wrong with the screen. They simply misdiagnosed the thing.

They are trying to charge me twice now. Of course if they assumed that I never paid the first £300 and thats an honest mistake, sure, after all I can prove it as I paid with my ddebit card, but can they do this to me?

I mean... The first quote of £295.55 was for it to be fixed, but I could have it returned to me but I would have to pay £45 for them looking at it...

But now it looks like if I dont pay this £200 more, that I will have paid out £300 for nothing and I will have a broken laptop.

Can they do this?

Is it even legal?

After all I was given a quote and I paid it and they were wrong to have given me the quote then arent they?

I am perfectly happy to have my laptop returned, but I will also want a refund of £250 too!

Or would it be best if I spoke to a solicitor about this?

Not worth the money, to low value for a solicitor. Under the Cameron premiership they changed the rules making it more difficult to use solicitors for this claim.

 

[Deleted member 651465]

You may have more luck, if you post with bullet points.

I'm finding this incredibly tiring to read

 

[FatRakoon]

You may have more luck, if you post with bullet points.

I'm finding this incredibly tiring to read

Yes, I agree. I have some mental issues and I waffle like a moron.

 

[FatRakoon]

Anyway... Small update.

They have yet again told me that yet another issue has been found ( The 4th time this has happened )

So, I have now contacted ASUS themselves and explained the problem

They asked me for a run down on what has gone on, and I gave them one, including giving them my emails, copies of my chats on the phone and the repair quotes and receipts etc and they are stepping in.

The marson I have been speaking with at ASUS seems to be disturbed by what I have told him ( Could be just acting I dont know )

So, we shall see what goes on now?

I will not be too optimistic because I have a previous email from LetMeChargemore stating that it will be sorted and then it was not.

 

[BowdonUK]

Does the small claims court require a solicitor?

I'd imagine this is quite a clear cut case if it gets to court.

 

[Deleted member 77746]

They messing you about, they have broke it. It's apparent from what you are telling us if this is 100% the true story. If it ever went to small claims court you would win.

 

[Haggisman]

Simple letter, advising that you want the laptop back, either repaired as promised, or in the state you sent it to them within 14 days. If it's not repaired then with a full refund of any money you've already paid, as they've failed to fulfil their side of the contract, otherwise you will start legal proceedings against them. As Mrbell1984 has said, this seems pretty open & shut if it's an accurate account.

"I was unable to fix it as there seems to be no way to clear the CMOS and so I decided that I will send it off to see about getting it repaired.

They checked it over and on 27/04/2021, they gave me a quote for £295.55"

Was this "checked over" on the phone or did they have the laptop in their possession at the time? If they had it in their possession, then I can't see any reason why they wouldn't be able to accurately diagnose the issue, so I don't see that as an excuse.

Do they have anything in their T&Cs about length of time to repair? If not, I'd also be asking for some compensation for the loss of use during the 2 months they've now had it...

 

[TonTom]

Does the small claims court require a solicitor?

I'd imagine this is quite a clear cut case if it gets to court.

No it doesn’t.

Hopefully Asus sort it out for you as they should have done in the first place, OP.

 

[FatRakoon]

They messing you about, they have broke it. It's apparent from what you are telling us if this is 100% the true story. If it ever went to small claims court you would win.

I will try to make this small.

A few years ago, I bought my son a 125 motorbike. It was ina shop and it was in great condition, but it had been dropped and so the brake lever on the right hand and foot were bent. The tank was also scratched but thats fine. He wanted £1800 for it and so I said that I want a 12 month MOT for that! - He said yes and I paid him.

Now, it had gone a month and I asked him whats going on, and he saiod it needs a bearing for the MOT, then he said they sent the wrong bearing ( Front and ack are the same )
Anyway, this kept going on, and so I started to ask for my money back. He then said that he is having issues with the paperwork and so on, and it had gone to 7 months later ( yeah 7 months ) and he finally camr to the house and dropped off a bike... It was the same model but this was a bit of a crapper.

Anyway, 3 days later my son said he hates it, its wobbly.

I had a lok and sure enough, it was a death trap. I took it to the local Honda dealer, and asked the mto check it over and they condemned it as too dangerous to ride. They gave me a list of the things wrong with it, and they include all the bearings in teh wheels, and the headstock, both tyres were below legal limit, both discs were broken, the chain and both sprockets below legal limit the front sprocket was held on with a hair clip, and so on and on....

So, I contacted Small claims ( its cost me by the way ) and I sent them some paperwork for them to look through.

I also need to point out that every phone call I made in and out, is always recorded, so I also sent them the phone calls on MP3 and I have written a small program to get the texts out of the phone for myself and the shop and his mobile, so I had them too, showing that he had lied to me on every point and then what I got in the end was not even the bike that I bought and paid for, and we first got mitigation, and the guy advised that if we go to court, there is simply no way that he could win.

So, he had until JULY 4th to fix the bike and get it an MOT.

on the 5th of July, I used vehicle check and I saw that it had failed the MOT, so I phoned him up and I told him that its just failed so what is he going to do ,and once again he said that the MOT guy was not in and he will MOT it as soon as he can... I then said that I just saw it had failed!!! - he is nothing but a disgusting liar.

Anyway, a week latyer he phoned me and said it was done.

By this time, I had bought my son a new bike and I said to my mate, that he could have it for his son so both our lads could ride out together!

So, my mates son came with me and we picked the bike up...

The lad got lost somehow...

Turns out that he had only just managed to get about a mile down the road and it broke down.

He had gone to a friends house and they threw it into a van and brought it back to his home.

I checked it out and the electrics were crap, and the pin on the coil had corroded and it had snapped and so it was unable to run the bike.

Now, I took it to get it MOTed again for a giggle and it failed on almost everything.

I Decided to escalate the process to going to court and guess what happened?

Because he had given it an MOT ( Like I said... HE gave it an MOT ) they would not even take it to court... There was no notice on the form that he had to do all the repairs, but because he MOTed it, they said that he did his part, and I lost the case.

No, I never eve ngot it to court.

Even though, all I needed to do, was to have the judge making the decision, read the same info that the mediation guy had seen and it would have been a clear case of fraud.

I have since managed to find the guy who sold it to the shop, and he sold it for £100 - he bought it from his mate for £50 with the intention of gettign it on the road, but it would have cost so much that he didnt bother and so he sold it as spare parts knowing that it would NEVER be road Legal and he told the guy that.

So, the guy ghave it an illegal MOT too!

So the moral of this story is that just because its absolutely impossible to lose in court... You still might.