I’m so fucking pissed, I should probably wait to post.
Just got off the the phone with the supervisoer 2 minutes ago. I aksked him where I was calling as he sounded foreign. He said the Carribean. (not obscure enough for me!)
I have a Philips home theater system and it’s stuck on reading a fucking CD! I tried unplugging it to reset it for 5 mins. I tried hitting stop and eject repeatedly, I tried holding eject/open for a minute, I almost just pried the fucker open.
No chance of getting radio or tv sound from the other buttons as it’s stuck on dvd “reading”. I’m screwed here! The CD is stuck, no stereo sound from anything else (satellite,dvd,XBox), no help from Philips (at least the fucksticks answering the phones an purporting to be reps of Philips)
FUCK!
Fuck Philips and every venture they have. I’d appreciate anyone who can tell me what other companies they own so I can boycott them, too.
Fuck, I thought I was militant about avoiding the French (MCI, Michellin, Drakar Noir, et al) then I come across these fucks.
Fuck you Philips. You just lost the average of four thousand dollars a year I spend on electronics. Add it up fuckers, over the next 40 years or so I expect to keep up with the latest shit.
To any Doper reading this, I’d suggest buying stock in Sony or Toshiba or RCA. Guess where my money is going.
I’m not sure what you’re angry at- Philips for having bad customer support, or Philips for having overseas support?
If the former, did you even work with the guy, or did you just rant on like you did in your post? Take a few deep breaths and call back and try working with another rep. It sounds like the software locked up, unless you hear grinding and popping and shit. Sometimes when the software on your disk is incompatible, you get results like this.
I have, in the past, had to open up the CD transport by hand(either the “butterknife” trick, the pinhole access that is on most CD transports, or by opening the cover).
If the latter, well, get the fuck over it. Unfortunately, business is tight in the US and other economies around the world right now and overseas support is very attractive. In a few years, hopefully the amount of overseas support used will back off a bit.
Nope, opened every new cust rep with “Hi, I understand you’re not the one doing what’s annoing me…” and was VERY polite. I understand the ladies taking my calls are just doing thier jobs. (I’m actually one of the nicest people a cust rep can get)
But when they tell me they’re in the Carribean and refuse to say which Island (I didn’t press) I expect a US-based 800 number they can bump me to.
Nope, Philips is too cowardly to take my call and instead shunts me to good people trying to do a job, trying to keep the jobs they are fortunate to get by pacifying me. Cite? I asked for a supervisor and was bounced to a sales lady. Trying to sell me a home theater system!
They were all (I asked) in the Carribean. Still (after checking the website) can’t get a fucking US contact.
Again, fuck Philips. I loved the products, but have bought the last.
Once again, just in case it wasn’t clear, FUCK PHILIPS!
Just out of curiosity, are you looking for USA based CSR because you think that they will have a better handle on the problem, is it a language barrier thing or a matter of principal?
I’ve been able to handle a lot of problems with a soldering iron and an occasional socket wrench. But this isn’t something I can do on my own. It involves the actual laser and the drive. Too far out of my comfort zone.
FWIW, I asked the 3rd CSR if it would be possible to hand in this peice of shit for 25% value against a new Philips HTS.
That 25% was current market value of the present system ($500 new) and only for a new Philip’s system. (Credit) I don’t think any of the three knew what I meant by that.
Philips is a Dutch company. Maybe you were talking to people in St Martin or one of the other Dutch West Indies. Why would a Dutch company be expected to have U.S. tech support?
out of principle I reject this. Even if it cost me $5 to get it updated to be something better than what’s offered now, I want to talk to someone whom can DO something about the problem I’m having.
I have no problem with Philips’ products. But I DO have a problem with spending that much cash on a product I can’t get help with. Sending me to a 3rd party (Don’s Stereo) to get it looked at doesn’t help me out. Considering I have to pay the service charge, the actual fix, and the diagnostics to find out what’s wrong with the thing, I hardly would call that good customer service.
Look, all Cust Serv Reps are likely to be good people doing thier jobs. They weren’t the target of this flame. They have no control over what happens in the main corporation’s plans. Do they follow a script? Yeah. Are they allowed to deviate from said script? Hell no. If I demand to speak to a higher-up do they have another script? Uhh…yeah. It’s obvious when they speak over me with an obvious monotone voice.
In short, my OP was to say fuck Philips and I’ll never spend another penny on those products.
Unless they get someone in the same country that makes the product and can take a call from me. Then maybe I could get somewhere. I know this, if McDonald’s get’s my order wrong, all I have to do is call and bitch and I got a few Big Mac’s coming my way. Nothing doing when I’m dealing with someone outside the US.
Please excuse all moronic statements I may make, I’m REALLY pissed Still!
I’ve had this happen with my DVD player–a Phillips, as it happens. Two minutes isn’t long enough. Unplug the machine now, and let it sit over night. Then plug it back in and try it again. It worked with mine, who knows, it might work with yours. If it doesn’t work, I don’t know what other advice to give you.
The US has almost 300 million people, and Philips sells a shitload of products here. Is it too much to ask that at least some of the customer service people be IN the US?
Granted, US companies are shipping off cust serv reps to India by the boatload (snort) but with the EU trying to be the non-US, wouldn’t that make Philips prime to have at least ONE person in the US answering phones?
Again, neither I nor any of my family will buy this shit till I can talk to someone inside the US.
I have a feeling this thread is going somewhere I didn’t mean it to. Best analogy would be buying a Jaguar in North America with the closest dealership being in London.
