28
Who should I be angry with?
26 Comments · Posted by Mr Angry in Consumer Issues, People, Places
I have been working from home a lot recently, and as such have decided to replace my knackered old printer. Nothing fancy, just a simple printer for occasional printing. No photos, or glossy brochures. Just printing.
I did a bit of research on-line and discovered that the prices of printers have dropped dramatically in the years since I last purchased one. It is also difficult to actually buy a dot-matrix nowadays.
After visiting the Staples store in Slough I settled on the HP 4300 multifunction device. According the marketing literature it is a printer, scanner, photocopier, sex toy and fax machine.
I carried it to the cash desk and went to pay for it.
“Would you like some extra ink with that?”
“No thanks, it says here that it comes with both a black and a colour cartridge.”
“Yes, but that is generally just enough to test the machine, not enough to do any real printing.”
“Oh, that’s not what it says here. It says two cartridges included. No mention whatsoever of use only for testing.”
“They’re only about 20% full. HP machines are all the same. You’ll probably get through the test pages and then it’ll run out.”
This was disappointing in the extreme. My initial cheer at finding a suitable printer in the sale was now tempered by having to spend an extra £30 on ink. I did not want to come back straight away to buy more ink, so I relented and purchased my ink there and then, at Staples.
Later that evening I set up my new printer, and checked my ink levels. I was surprised to find that both the black, and colour cartridges were almost full.
It is clear that one of two things have happened here. Either I have been extremely lucky and the tight people at HP have accidentally given me more ink with the printer than they had intended, or the staff at Staples lied to my face in order to get me to buy more ink from them.
But which is it?
I have resolved to uncover the ugly truth, and I have begun by writing two letters to the organisations concerned. Stay tuned for the next instalment of the investigation.
No tags
26 comments
<< Car accident
Shambo's revenge · February 28, 2008 at 8:13 am
I’d hate to think they just lied to your face, but you could take the printer back, say you’re not happy because you only wanted cartridges 20% full as advised by said member of staff (I imagine they were spotty for some reason?), as such you felt you were mis-sold a product and under the 1994 Sales of Goods act you felt it was your duty to advise them of their mistake so in future they didn’t LIE to any other potential customers
Al · February 28, 2008 at 8:18 am
Yep, I had the same thing on the HPF380. I bought the cartridges they told me I needed,(from Staples), and then found that for a fraction of the price you can buy a refill kit.(Tesco or Asda). It is messy if you are a clumsy git like me but I reckon I,ve saved a lot of money since and I still have the spare cartridges that cost me £32. Which was £3 more than I paid for the printer!Great printer though.
clarissa · February 28, 2008 at 8:36 am
Sounds like a Halliburton tactic.
GeorgeC · February 28, 2008 at 9:17 am
My gut instinct tells me that the less than cheery people at Staples have led you down the Primrose path angry!!!
I congratulate you on taking the initiative to dispatch letters to these two companies, your only failure was failing to include a bit of Poo in the envelope!
Nothing demonstrates your commitment to protest like a bit of Poo in the mail!
Lin · February 28, 2008 at 9:24 am
Working for a smallish company I have taken over office supply ordering recently and am amazed at the variation in pricing. At present I have 2 suppliers on the go, get price quotes each time I ring in an order and go with the best. So far I have managed to get HP prices down to £10.50 for one printer and £8.50 for the rest. Ok so VAT has to be added but hells bells these Staples people do take the piss. Get together with someone needing the same size and buy in bulk or go to a computer fair. Unless you have money to throw away of course. In this case I am thinking of opening my very own personal charity bucket. Print on!
keef · February 28, 2008 at 9:32 am
I think the spotty youth in Staples was lying to you Angry to increase his commission
I have a Lexmark and it came with a couple of new cartridges.
Printer ink is the biggest rip off going, cc for cc it’s about 10 times dearer than Chanel No 5. they virtually give you the printer so they can soak you on ink sales.
I don’t print much but my kids go through ink faster than a tramp goes through meths.It would cost a fortune to buy a new cartridge every time, so I have 2 of each and every time I swap one I take it to Cartridge World who refill it while I wait at under £10 a pop rather than £25-30 each for a new cartridge.
There’s a limit to how often a cartridge can be refilled before it has to be replaced but I’ve always got at least half a dozen times out of each one.
StokeySiren · February 28, 2008 at 9:33 am
Crikey who knew printers and ink could cause so much trouble and sadness in the cosmos!
Vikki · February 28, 2008 at 10:37 am
I was told the same thing when I bought my printer, I didn’t buy the extra ink though, thankfullly. I get my cartridges from http://www.stinkyinkshop.co.uk. It’s a fair bit cheaper there.
CodPast · February 28, 2008 at 10:49 am
What keef said. Cartridge world = half price & they’ll deliver.
Glammer · February 28, 2008 at 11:21 am
And make sure you get a grovelling apology from a manager. As we speak, they’re giving some poor contractor a hard time just because they’ve got a manager title. Corporate fuckers are all the same. Fuckers. And they’d be driving a taxi if they weren’t corporate fuckers ripping people off with too much ink. Ask to speak to the Ink Manager, or the Cartridge Coordinating Supervisor, or a Corporate Fucker With a Title.
Grumpy B · February 28, 2008 at 11:41 am
Make sure the letters are smudged and start to fade out half way down the page (photoshop if necessary) so you can complain about the quality of the printers too.
Or give them a bit of a laugh and use your old dot matrix. That will give it pride of place the museum, along with letters written in Crayola or on tablets of stone.
Equine Pimp · February 28, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Just put it down to experience.
You’re a fuckwit, you got scammed!
Have you also got payment protection on your loan, mobile phone insurance (both from the company that sold you each) and 27 bars of half price Dairy Milk from WH Smith? (all sold in a “honest guv, you need this, I’m doing you a favour” type of way)
Fair play to the power of the cross sale technique
Kerri · February 28, 2008 at 12:20 pm
I think someone was just trying to up their commission….
Jaggy · February 28, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Your first mistake was being more gullible than Mr Gully Gullible from Gullibleton.
Second mistake was not to buy an Epson. You can then buy compatible cartridges at £22 for 12. Yes twelve.
I used to work at the Epson manufacturing plant in Telford, and they changed production of their printers to the Phillipines where labour is cheap and changed the entire plant over to Ink Cartridge Manufacturing because they can make a cartridge for about 27p each and sell it as a genuine Epson cartridge for £27. Bargain.
But then, you buy Macs…
GH · February 28, 2008 at 1:23 pm
You should be angry with yourself Mr A. for being so stupid as to believe a salescreep. Some printers do come with a cartridge that will be less full than a store bought one, but you’ll still get a lot of use out of them.
Go on, smack yourself for being a muppet. Then go find the spotty oik who lied to you and introduce him to the other face of “customer relations” i.e. a boot up the jacksie.
GH
Jo · February 28, 2008 at 1:26 pm
Ooh. I love a good complaint letter. Knowing Staples, the theiving bastards who ticketed my car for £40 when I stayed in their carpark for too long, it’s just another way of scamming some money.
gnarlyswine · February 28, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Im afraid he was kinda telling a mangled version of the truth – the cartridges that come with the printers arent 20% full but they usually only have a fraction of the capacity of a proper one so they do run out by the time they have printed 2 or 3 pages. Its HP that should get a visit with a baseball bat full of nails and a taser tied to it (no – not the sauce manufacturer. Its why they often give free printers away with new PCs as well – so they chain you to buying their refills – the c***s
xl · February 28, 2008 at 1:51 pm
It is the old “Would you like fries with that?” marketing scheme run amok.
Sam · February 28, 2008 at 2:43 pm
So I also bought a printer from Staples, and they told me the same story. Now 6 weeks later the original cartridge is still printing just fine. The funny thing is that I bought it in Davie Florida good old USA so it seems to be a world wide scam (May be that the ink cost $80 and the printer cost $70 was another reason that stopped me buying another cartridge)
KT · February 28, 2008 at 6:02 pm
My friend’s mum went to Staples the other day to buy a new ink cartridge and they did a full sales pitch for the larger size of same cartridge – insisting it was much better value and she’d be a fool not to etc etc. Practically forced it on the poor woman. Only problem is that with the large black cartridge you can’t fit a colour one in as well so it’s completely bloody useless.
She’s a nice trusting lady though – can’t understand how they conned you Angry!
ubermouth · February 28, 2008 at 9:23 pm
I bought a box of 12 ink cartridges for my epson prinnter for 12 lb.
That’s a pound each. From EBay and they had all brands.
Most printers do only give you a bit with the printer.
BBC · February 28, 2008 at 10:09 pm
I got sick and tired of ink jet printers and having them fuck up and having to always ink for them.
So I went to Staples here and bought an HP 1000 Laserjet printer that just prints in black. They told me the same as they told you, that the toner cartridge wouldn’t last long, but I didn’t buy another one.
Set it up and put the settings on economy mode as all I print is text for the most part and it still reads well, I’ve printed well over a thousand pages and it’s still on that first cartridge. I bought it on 9/8/2003 and haven’t paid a penny more for all my printing since.
It’s a damn fine machine, I’ll never buy another fucking ink jet.
Oh, and if I want to steal something off of your blog you can bet your butt that I will. Like me you have not had an original thought in a long time, you’ve borrowed them from others.
Ldbug · February 28, 2008 at 11:09 pm
those people at Staples always seemed shady to me…i applaud your investigative nature!
anon · February 29, 2008 at 4:17 am
I have to stick up for Staples on this one, being in IT Support.
In past years, most standard inkjet printers that you bought did normally come with only around 30% ink supplied. This was to cut costs by the manufacturer, not something shifty the retailer had done.
MFD Printers may come with 100% ink but, again, it depends on the manufacturer. HP, on the other hand, normally sell ALL their printers now with FULL ink. On the other hand, they don’t say on the boxes that it’s full ink, so there’s no way of knowing either way.
So Staples may have just not been up on their products or just following an old script.
Recently purchased a HP MFD in Australia, had exactly the same script thrown at me, but a senior staff member corrected the monkeys and told them the HPs now come with full ink.
Melissaria · February 29, 2008 at 3:40 pm
HP ink is more expensive per ml than some designer perfumes. I know ths because we run an HP5000 and an HP5500 which take 6 cartidges at about £125 a pop. They are very, very talented at making their machines look like great deals, but screwing you on the accessories. And don’t even think about using non-branded if you value your warranty. Bastards…
Scaryduck · March 1, 2008 at 4:18 pm
7dayshop.com – Based in the Channel Islands, so dirt cheap and VAT-free
That is all.