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Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Eveshambles

Evesham Portal - all the Evesham-related links from the Eveshambles saga

Updates

Evesham have got to be the worst laptop company in the history of the entire universe.

I had an Evesham laptop through one of those company lease to buy tax free schemes that the UK government has just abolished. I got it a couple of months ago. It was a nice laptop, bristling with features and a nice big wide screen. The only problem was that after a couple of weeks the battery stopped charging.

I phoned Evasham and told them about the problem and they told me to send them the faulty battery for repair and they would return it when repaired. Bearing in mind that I am also paying for an on-site warranty, I declined the offer and insisted they send me a replacement and I'd send the old one back to which they agreed.

After about a week I phoned to chase the battery to be told they were waiting for me to return the battery to them. I explained the situation again and reminded them that they had supplied me with inherently faulty good and that I had only had the laptop a few weeks and they eventually sent a courier to exchange the battery.

Anyway, after a day or two the replacement battery also failed to charge so I called Evesham and told them what was happening and the person on the end of the phone agreed with me that it was probably a motherboard problem and that they would need to collect my laptop for repair and this would take 7-10 days. Bit annoyed at having to send the laptop in for repair but if needs must and all that.

The 7-10 days was up and I'd not heard a peep out of Evesham so I called them to chase it up. The laptop had been sent to the manufacturer for repair they said and it would take another 7-10 days. I thanked them for not telling me and asked who the manufacturer was. It turns out that it's Mitac and my laptop is a tantalisingly close 2 minutes from where I live. Rather annoyed that it took them over a week to decide they couldn't repair my laptop and have snet it to a factory down the road which I could have done myself and saved the effort.

Anyway, more time passes and still nothing from Evesham so I start ringing every day. The repair was supposed to take 7-10 days when I first phoned with the problem and every time I phone it gets further away. In the end, they obviously get fed up with my daily phone call and tell me that they are going to replace the laptop with a new one because the delay is unacceptable. This was last Tuesday, three weeks from when they collected the laptop. The new laptop would be dispatched asap. Lovely.

Nobody calls me to tell me when to expect my new laptop so I phone them up again. The laptop has to be built first, it normally take 5-7 days. Fed up but resigned to the fact that they might not hold that many in stock. Ask them to find out when I can expect it and let me know. They don't. Phone again the next day and it's now 7-10 days. By now I am starting to get irate whenever I phone them. Whenever I ask when the laptop has been requested so I know when the 7-10 days is starting from I get evasive answers and fob-offs.

Today they tell me that my replacement laptop was ordered on Friday last week and that they are doing everything they can to get it to me asap. I point out that they aren't because it's taken them 4 days to order the replacement. They tell me it will probably be built by next Wednesday taking it to over four weeks without a laptop.

I'm seriously considering cancelling the agreement as they haven't supplied the goods or service they agreed to. The build quality is poor to say the least (our company has had hundreds of complaints about Evesham) and the customer service is terrible. The on-site warranty isn't worth the paper it's written on because even when they do come out they aren't interested. My colleague had the same laptop as me on the same day and his has a faulty DVD drive. An engineer came out, replaced it, tested it, found it still didn't work and left it! He's now had to send his laptop for repair and has alrady been told they are 2 days behind schedule.

Don't touch Evesham with a barge pole. They are a terrible company and their laptops are rubbish.


Update:
Evesham Emails
Evesham Promises to Deliver
Piss-up & Brewery
I DON'T have idiot stamped on my forehead
Naughty Evesham - revelations from an ex-employee
Eveshambles Part 2 - here we go again