Laptop repair store dumped my laptop

Pompey Magnus

Last October I handed in a laptop for repairs to a local repair store (it had fallen on the floor and wasn't powering on). The following week they phoned back to say that a replacement part would need to be ordered and the repair would cost €120 and I agreed to this.

After about 2 weeks I went back to the store, the laptop was completely disassembled, I was told there was corrosion present and would require more work. I was in contact with the store roughly once every 2 weeks between then and Christmas (it was always me either phoning or visiting, they never contacted). About a week before Christmas I went to the store and they could not find the laptop, I asked the staff member to phone me if he found it, on the 23rd he rang back to say another staff member had taken it home to repair it and it wouldn't be available until the new year.

So I returned a couple of weeks into January, again they weren't able to find the laptop, I was told that the corrosion was very bad and they were unable to repair it. I went back about a week later to see if it had been found so I could take it home, it was then that I was told that it had been thrown out at some stage (they wouldn't tell me when). All I was given back was the hard disk.

When I asked the manager why it was thrown out without my permission I was told that they only run a small store and can't keep unclaimed items indefinitely. I told him that I was either into the store or phoned approximately once every 2 weeks and that I never received any call requesting me to collect it, all he said was "I'm sure we were in touch", I then asked him to check his phone bill and to find when they rang my number but he wasn't willing to do that. I know for a fact that between October and January I only ever received two calls from their store, one to agree the price and the second saying a staff member had taken the laptop at home.

Am I right in thinking the store has no right to discard of a customer's property without seeking permission first or at least making a reasonable effort to seek that permission? If so what kind of comeback do I have against the store?

sawdoubters

small claims court


http://www.courts.ie/Courts.ie/library3.nsf/pagecurrent/781D7D5227918A618025715C004CAEF3?opendocument&l=en&p=110

Kaizersoze81

Totally unacceptable of them to dump it:

foggy_lad

They took it apart then most likely made up some nonsense about corrosion before just dumping it in the bin, I'd be thinking they used the parts to fix other laptops and are hoping they can tell you that it was worthless and you will be happy with your hard drive back! Does the HDD even work? Did you pay them any money yet??

Legally they must replace what they took from you which was a laptop which wouldn't turn on but otherwise worked fine. Get a good working laptop off them or take a case in thesmall claims court!

Another crowd of cowboys that think they can fix laptops because they did aN ECDL course in the tech.

Pompey Magnus

foggy_lad wrote: »

Legally they must replace what they took from you which was a laptop which wouldn't turn on but otherwise worked fine. Get a good working laptop off them or take a case in thesmall claims court!

Would they be entitled to give me some other laptop they might happen to have in the back of the store which won't turn on as a replacement?

When I agreed the price it was with the understanding that our contract was for the replacement of one component, there was no mention of corrosion damage at this stage, this work was begun without informing me and I was surprised when they said they were doing it as it had been working fine before falling. At the very least am I entitled to get back a laptop of similar specs which only requires the replacement of this one component in order to work?

rovoagho

They sound like a bunch of muppets.

If it was me, I wouldn't engage with them in person or on the phone any more, I'd send a registered letter explaining that if you don't receive a /working/ equivalent within a week - one that you'd be taking to another shop for evaluation - that you'll be filing in the small claims court for compensation. I'd be specific about this, they'll probably know they'll lose in the SCC, whereas they might be sceptical about a generic "legal action" threat, as people rarely follow through on them at this scale.

You should find a way of backing up your call history too, and anything else relevant. And write down as much as you remember about it immediately.

cintec

They probably took it apart and couldn't put it back together so they made up a bunch of excuses.

€120 is expensive did they say what part was required that would cost 120, unless it was a high end laptop most people wouldn't put that into a second hand laptop as it would be better to put the money off a new laptop with a warranty.

do you know what spec your machine was because they may try to pawn you off with some cheap piece of crap as a replacement.
As mentioned you should threaten them with the Scc but follow through if they don't replace the laptop.

donegal.

if the op goes to a solicitor for help with the small claims court and wins the case, would the repair shop have to pay for the solicitor ?

Pompey Magnus

cintec wrote: »

€120 is expensive did they say what part was required that would cost 120,

No they never mentioned what part they needed unfortunately.

do you know what spec your machine was because they may try to pawn you off with some cheap piece of crap as a replacement.

It was a Dell XPS M1330, I have the specs at home alright. Never had any trouble with it before it was dropped so I reckoned it was worth repairing.

L1011

donegal. wrote: »

if the op goes to a solicitor for help with the small claims court and wins the case, would the repair shop have to pay for the solicitor ?

No.

Pompey Magnus

Just out of interest, if there was such significant corrosion damage present so that all the components were deemed irreparable, how obvious would that corrosion be to a qualified repair technician when the machine was first inspected?

They had the laptop for the best part of a week before contacting me to agree a price and at that stage there was no mention of corrosion damage. Is their story plausible that this significant problem was present but not noticed until later on?

foggy_lad

The corrosion story was probably a delaying tactic when they realised they had thrown out or used your laptop for parts or maybe it was fixed and given to someone else?

cintec

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

No they never mentioned what part they needed unfortunately.

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

Just out of interest, if there was such significant corrosion damage present so that all the components were deemed irreparable, how obvious would that corrosion be to a qualified repair technician when the machine was first inspected?

They should have told you what part needed to be replaced if they had to order parts and give you a price then they would have to know what was faulty.

The laptop was dropped but up to then was working fine then I don't know how corrosion could have been a problem unless there was liquid damage I would assume this was a lie from them.

Axwell

The main thing here is they threw out your laptop without your permission. Even if it was damaged its not their property and they should have returned it and said they couldn't repair it. At least then you could get a second opinion. We are talking about a period of weeks here not months, they are a small setup. I doubt they have that many laptops waiting to be fixed that they don't have room for a few sitting around waiting to be collected. As it is you just have a hard drive that may or may not even work anymore depending on what they did and the have destroyed your property without cause.

On the corrosion damage - have you ever spilt anything on it? Its not reason to throw it out and to be honest sounds like an attempt to get even more money out of you or just a delaying tactic. Even if there was corrosion damage they should have repaired it or returned it and said they couldn't fix it. That model of laptop is a good few years old so I dont think the parts would be of much use to them to use on other machines so its more than likely a case of they fried the motherboard on it trying to fix it, if they were going to throw it out because it wasn't collected why did they even keep the hard drive?

rovoagho

donegal. wrote: »

if the op goes to a solicitor for help with the small claims court and wins the case, would the repair shop have to pay for the solicitor ?

Contrary to MYOB's answer, it's depends on how the action is brought, and the judge.

I wouldn't go near a solicitor with this though, the M1330 was deprecated years ago, and while it was quite expensive when it was being produced, it's not worth more than a few hundred quid these days. This is why I recommended Small Claims.

Pompey Magnus

Bit of an update:

When I was told the laptop was dumped I asked specifically if they still had the HDD, the manager said they would have kept it but that it was very badly corroded and I probably wouldn't be able to recover anything off it, I gave him the description anyway and he emailed back the next day to tell me they had it in the store. I came in later that day and he had it with my name clearly marked but again repeated that there wasn't much chance recovering data, showing me a few small spots on the casing that may have been due to corrosion.

Today I got around to getting a HDD enclosure, just so I could check. The good news is that it works perfectly fine, the bad news is that it isn't my HDD! They have tried to fob me off with some other guy's hard disk (I found his phone number after a quick look through his personal folder so I probably should let him know...). Bad enough that they have obviously lost all my data which I had on it, but to treat me like an idiot in the process has just put the cherry on the cake.

Time to write them a little letter I think...

TheDriver

sounds like a data protection issue also?? I wouldn't like my laptop being given to someone else, or even the hdd

Corkgirl210

Hi,

Corruption is usually on the HDD? i.e. data corruption? So why would they give you the corrupt part back and dump the good part? Sounds to me like they made matters worse and are hiding the fact and pawning you off with garbage thinking you would fall for their lies? Regardless of what spec it is, they have no right whatsever to dump anything.. you have a win/win case there. Go to small claims as suggested..

They would have done a scandisk or chkdsk or whatever initially and found bad sectors showing corruption and should have advised you there and then.. not keep the thing for months?? The fact that you have someone elses HDD, you have a bigger issue that shows complete unprofessionalism...

zarquon

It really sounds like they botched up the repair job and are making excuses. Small claims is the way to go. Make sure you have everything in writing from them as these cowboys sound like they will change their story once it gets to court. At least you have someone else's hard drive and they cannot argue against that.

Nino Brown

I had a similar experience with a laptop repair shop in Maynooth before, they wouldn't return the laptop, kept saying they were waiting for a part to arrive, I went in one day and demanded they return it, they said they didn't have all the parts together, but they would get it together and drop it to my house that night. Of course they didn't, so I went in the next day and to my surprise they had the laptop there assembled and all. A few weeks later the keyboard fell off, they'd stuck it on with silicon sealant!
What can you do with a place like that, if you complain, they'll offer to fix it, which means handing the laptop back to them which isn't going to happen.
I think a lot of these places are just chancers, ordering the parts from ebay and fixing it following videos on youtube. I can do that myself, last time I bring my laptop anywhere to have it fixed.

Pompey Magnus

I have written up a letter to send on to them, outlining each step of the process. My closing paragraph is:

"I am writing to you to request a replacement laptop with equivalent specifications as that which I handed in to your store which I will be having independently checked for evaluation. As it was not just the laptop itself you have failed to return to me but also the data stored on it I feel it reasonable to expect that the replacement should fully work in order to compensate for this added loss. If you do not agree to meet this expectation by the 11/02/14 then I will proceed to file a claim in the Small Claims Court in order to resolve the dispute."


Does that sound reasonable?

dilallio

Make sure you register the letter.

foggy_lad

You should also inform the data protection crowd about being given someone else's hard drive and there is every chance that someone else has yours.

coillcam

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

Last October I handed in a laptop for repairs to a local repair store (it had fallen on the floor and wasn't powering on). The following week they phoned back to say that a replacement part would need to be ordered and the repair would cost €120 and I agreed to this.

After about 2 weeks I went back to the store, the laptop was completely disassembled, I was told there was corrosion present and would require more work. I was in contact with the store roughly once every 2 weeks between then and Christmas (it was always me either phoning or visiting, they never contacted). About a week before Christmas I went to the store and they could not find the laptop, I asked the staff member to phone me if he found it, on the 23rd he rang back to say another staff member had taken it home to repair it and it wouldn't be available until the new year.

So I returned a couple of weeks into January, again they weren't able to find the laptop, I was told that the corrosion was very bad and they were unable to repair it. I went back about a week later to see if it had been found so I could take it home, it was then that I was told that it had been thrown out at some stage (they wouldn't tell me when). All I was given back was the hard disk.

When I asked the manager why it was thrown out without my permission I was told that they only run a small store and can't keep unclaimed items indefinitely. I told him that I was either into the store or phoned approximately once every 2 weeks and that I never received any call requesting me to collect it, all he said was "I'm sure we were in touch", I then asked him to check his phone bill and to find when they rang my number but he wasn't willing to do that. I know for a fact that between October and January I only ever received two calls from their store, one to agree the price and the second saying a staff member had taken the laptop at home.

Am I right in thinking the store has no right to discard of a customer's property without seeking permission first or at least making a reasonable effort to seek that permission? If so what kind of comeback do I have against the store?

Firstly what was the part that was required to fix your laptop from the initial assessment?

Secondly if they had assessed the laptop properly, it would have to be completely disassembled. There is no way possible that "significant" corrosion would have been missed unless Stevie Wonder has picked up an A+ cert and given them a digout.

Furthermore your laptop should never have been brought off site without your permission unless you had agreed in principle initially by signing a waiver for example. There are possible insurance implications here for the shop by letting your laptop out of the shop.

If you purchased the laptop from Dell, look for the receipt(s). Hopefully you can find the original spec or the service tag. With the tag you can find the make, model and size of your hdd. It might help the shop locate your drive at least. Also the shop should have recorded the tag when you dropped it in. Every store should do this. The serial or service tag must recorded. Failing to do so is a display of incompetence.

Finally my advice is to go to small claims court. Yes your laptop can be replaced just like any other device, however your data cannot, also they have wasted enough of your time. They have dicked you around long enough at this stage. Even just having the letter from SCC arrive should be a rocket up the arse and they will cop on.

What do I think happened? I feel it could be a couple of possibilities.: An employee dropped or accidentally damaged the laptop further. Another idea would be that it was mistakenly dumped/scrapped with obsolete or non-repairable items. Either way they have had ample chances to fix the problem. If this had happened in my store, a member of staff would be receiving disciplinary action pending investigation of the circumstances. Compensation would have been offered, most likely a laptop of similar quality/value along with a free repair in future or voucher as a gesture of good will.

No Pants

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

it isn't my HDD! They have tried to fob me off with some other guy's hard disk (I found his phone number after a quick look through his personal folder so I probably should let him know...).

Call the disk owner and let him know how you got it. Do not give it back to him. Better to have two pissed off customers bothering the store than just one.

TerrorFirmer

You definitely should go back to the store once more and state that not only will you go to the small claims court, but you will also be going to the data commissioner as you were given another individuals hard drive.

Pompey Magnus

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

You definitely should go back to the store once more and state that not only will you go to the small claims court, but you will also be going to the data commissioner as you were given another individuals hard drive.

I sent off a registered letter today demanding a fully working replacement laptop with equivalent specs as the one they lost. I also told them that I expect them to purchase the hard drive enclosure off me as it was only bought due to their untrue claim that the disk I was getting was my own, as I now have no further use for the enclosure and I can't return it I don't want to be out of pocket. I have told them they have 5 working days to reply before I lodge a claim in the small claims court.

I haven't looked into the data commissioner yet, would it be my place to make the complaint or the original owner of the hard drive as it was his personal data that was given to a third party? Or can I make a complaint just on the fact that they have lost my data?

foggy_lad

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

I haven't looked into the data commissioner yet, would it be my place to make the complaint or the original owner of the hard drive as it was his personal data that was given to a third party? Or can I make a complaint just on the fact that they have lost my data?

Both, You don't know that they have not given your drive to someone else and they have an obligation to look after the data of all their customers.

dirtyden

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

I sent off a registered letter today demanding a fully working replacement laptop with equivalent specs as the one they lost. I also told them that I expect them to purchase the hard drive enclosure off me as it was only bought due to their untrue claim that the disk I was getting was my own, as I now have no further use for the enclosure and I can't return it I don't want to be out of pocket. I have told them they have 5 working days to reply before I lodge a claim in the small claims court.

I haven't looked into the data commissioner yet, would it be my place to make the complaint or the original owner of the hard drive as it was his personal data that was given to a third party? Or can I make a complaint just on the fact that they have lost my data?

Hopefully they sort it out. Even the original corrosion excuse sounds like BS, it is unlikely your laptop will suffer from corrosion unless for some reason it got sopping wet. Sounds like chancers who took it part hoping it was something simple but could not resolve the issue. Id get on to the data commissioner yourself as well, they have lost your data and have been lax in the control of someone else's. That other person appears to have got lucky that you have got his drive rather than someone less honest.

Best of luck and keep us updated.

Similar happened me with a tv years ago, but to be fair they replaced after a few weeks of fobbing me off with excuses, they finally admitted they dropped it on the workshop floor.

Pompey Magnus

I received a long text reply to my letter tonight, the highlights include:

"we don't and never do crap jobs"

"You know was your fault as well!"

"that laptop was a write off. same as the hdd you have...i am sure our electronics engineer can testify about the state"

"you know you've been contacted or messages left.phone records will tell if the case may be."

and

"Best we can do is give you a same spec or better laptop for same price you've been quoted for the repair".


So basically their best offer is for me to pay them €120 for one of their laptops. Looks like there isn't much point negotiating further so small claims court it will have to be...

No Pants

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

"You know was your fault as well!"

Did they elaborate on this any further?

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

"that laptop was a write off. same as the hdd you have...i am sure our electronics engineer can testify about the state"

Great. He can submit a report to the SCC. You keep that HDD you have.

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

"you know you've been contacted or messages left.phone records will tell if the case may be."

Great. They can bring those along to the SCC.

Pompey Magnus wrote: »

"Best we can do is give you a same spec or better laptop for same price you've been quoted for the repair".

SCC all the way. Don't hand that disk back and don't delete any emails, texts or phone calls.