Analysis of the response from John Browett

As a result of my two letters to John Browett I elicited a response of which Joseph Heller would have been proud. It is "signed" (actually an electronic signature) by "Pam Hudson, Executive Correspondence" but would appear to emanate from PC World, and not DSG International itself. Pam's letter is shown below in blue, with my comments in red:

Thank you for your letter of 17th December 2007 (no mention of the letter of 23rd December which further elaborated on issues) addressed to John Browett (whose office clearly cannot be bothered to respond themselves to customers), Chief Executive of DSG International (how he must be regretting taking that job on), who has asked me to reply on his behalf. Please accept my apologies for the delay in sending this response (and presumably also an apology for omitting any reference to my further letter?).

I sincerely regret (no you don't Pam) the problems you have experienced with your Hewlett Packard 9572EA laptop computer (at least you admit there is a problem). I do understand the frustration and inconvenience you have suffered as a result (if you did you would be just giving me a refund).

PC World are more than happy to exchange or refund a faulty product within a reasonable time from purchase (so when I went in to get a refund I imagined the conversation where I was refused a refund did I?). However (here it comes), on this occasion, a hardware fault cannot be identified (didn't the last paragraph just say that I had problems with my laptop and suffered "frustration and inconvenience", or did I imagine that too? In addition, Pam, you obviously don't realise that the laptop, in between my letter and yours, had gone back to The Tech Guys and had come back with a note which clearly stated that there was a fault). Therefore (I love this bit) there is nothing that PC World or the Tech Guys can currently do.

So here's the argument: your computer does not work, for which we apologise. However, because we cannot work out what is wrong, we cannot refund your money, which we would have offered you had you asked, but you only imagined that you asked so you cannot have a refund. Does this not all seem a little bizarre? Pam obviously thought so, and so went on to offer a solution in the next paragraph.

All I can suggest (other than a refund and an apology?) is that you obtain an independent engineer's report. Any decision to act upon this report, or over the cost of it, will depend on whether the findings differ from our own (your findings being what exactly, that there was a fault, or that there wasn't a fault. I have had so many different responses from PC World and The Tech Guys now that I have lost count).

PC World and The Tech Guys (tweedledum and tweedledumber) strive (but fail) to offer the very best in customer service (call me an ambulance, I've just split my sides laughing). I trust that in the future, (why the comma Pam, it's not necessary) the service (now that word should really be inverted commas, Pam) you receive will prove to be more in line with your expectations (give me my money back then).

Yours sincerely

Pam Hudson
Executive Correspondence

I will write a reply as soon as I have got over the dismay at receiving such an extraordinary response. My computer doesn't work, no one can fix it and we are all wasting a huge amount of time and energy on this when I cannot understand why I cannot just have my money back.