HP Pavillion hinge issue and difficulty with warranty / customer service

[b_a_barracus]

I bought my HP Pavillion notebook in August of last year on Amazon.com. At the beginning of July of this year, the hinge between the screen and the keyboard started separating despite extremely gentle use --- from the day I received it I thought this design looked flimsy and I was careful with it. The screen was coming apart from its casing, and there was a crunching noise any time I tried to adjust the screen. Looking this up online, this seems to be a very common problem which HP is well aware of as a design flaw.

I am currently in Germany, and all the customer service numbers I found online for Germany were disconnected. I tried entering my laptop's details into the online warranty check, and even after several attempts and being completely certain about what I had entered, it told me they were the wrong details. I got a customer service representative from the U.S. on the phone after a long wait, she told me that a repair center in Germany would have to handle it, it would likely take several weeks (which would be a major problem since like a lot of people during the pandemic, I have to work from home on my laptop). I asked if I could have a local computer shop repair it and be reimbursed, and she gave me another contact number in Germany to ask that question, and that phone number was disconnected as well.

At this point, I managed to find a German version of the customer support site that was able to automatically discover my laptop's information if I downloaded some software. I did, and it told me my warranty expired one month after I purchased it, which was obviously a mistake. They sure weren't making it easy to take advantage of warranty!

I looked up what the process was to dispute warranty validity, but at this point it was late July and I was getting discouraged after all this wasted time, and the fact the German site said only printers could be serviced in Germany. At a bit of a loss, and on top of everything else dealing with a grisly divorce which also required regular computer access, I convinced myself I could live with the computer as is for now and just deal with this later if it somehow got worse.

And of course it did. Now the mouse functionality seems to be compromised, as well, and seems to be linked to the hinge issue, as the mouse works fine if I manage to get the hinge to just the right angle. So it's now August, about 3 weeks past when my actual warranty would have expired (if I went back and disputed when it should have started), I get back on the phone with HP customer service, which somehow sends me to Latin American customer service, who can't help me, then American customer service, and after I explain my whole situation they tell me I have to contact Germany as there is nothing they can do for me, and give me a number. I explain all the numbers I've seen for Germany have been disconnected. The rep assured me this worked. Of course, it was disconnected. 

(Why could the reps from Latin America connect me to America, but America couldn't directly connect me to Germany?)

Anyway, going back to the German site where I had gotten my warranty info, I finally found a number that worked (+49 69 29993434). I spoke to a senior rep who told me that my computer couldn't be serviced in Germany. When I asked if HP could reimburse me for repair costs given I have been trying for weeks to get useful information on all this while my warranty lapsed by a matter of days, I was told that my two options were to call U.S. customer service to see if they'd do anything for me because of the previously less-than-helpful customer service, or get it repaired at a local shop at my own expense.

Given the passing the buck I'd experienced to date, it seems I could have simply saved myself a lot of time and headache and gotten it repaired myself; the local repairman estimates about 100 euro. That's still a significant portion of the original buying price for a computer with a known design flaw that cropped up during warranty and is now 3 weeks past warranty. This whole experience has been very disappointing. I can't see buying another HP product after this.

[TEJ1602]

@b_a_barracus, Welcome to HP Support Community!

We shall escalate this issue to the concerned team.

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