Voices
HP laptops leave bad taste in the mouth
By Natalie Tsao (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-03-30 08:13
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Hewlett Packard has been in the news recently after problems with its graphics card caused laptop screens to die for many frustrated users. These things happen from time to time and the standard practice is a complete recall of affected products. However, in this case, HP has refused to recall the malfunctioning laptops or even accept blame.
Public anger grew and eventually the American IT corporation was forced to take a direct approach and speak to the whole country via television.
However, its spokesman had a peculiar message.
When questioned at the CCTV customers' party on March 15, the HP employee gave a fascinatingly unique explanation for the problem: "The environment of the affected users is probably just too dirty, like a dormitory at a Chinese university," he announced." The problem is undoubtedly caused by cockroaches that have climbed in and damaged the laptops."
I laughed out loud. Various questions flew around my head, but the overriding one was how such a large company like HP could come up with such a ridiculous excuse.
What happened afterwards was natural. Chinese netizens were absolutely furious at the company's irresponsible attitude and demanded a better solution than to simply "kill cockroaches".
The so-called "HP cockroach scandal" flooded the Internet, which made the media focus even more attention on it. At that point, even non-HP users like me started paying attention.
Not surprisingly, the leader of HP China was forced to hold an emergency press conference in Beijing the following day to soothe the public. He apologized about the quality problem, promised to improve the company's service standards, and even came up with a mysterious plan called "HP Customer Care".
But yes, that's right, still no mention of a recall of the faulty laptops.
The public wasn't impressed at all. They no longer trusted HP's sincerity, let alone its proposed customer care program. This was a major public relations failure for the world-famous company.
Their first mistake was that they did not treat their customers with respect. HP ignored the situation in the beginning and this led to the need for the first TV appearance. However, when presented with a chance to resolve the issue, they took the easy way out and placed the blame elsewhere. What they should have done was deal with the real issue - the graphics card.
By ignoring it, the problem never had a chance to go away. For whatever reason, no one took responsibility for the problem and the affair escalated.
Their second mistake was their spokesman. He was simply amazing, but not in a good way. Faced with an airtime opportunity to win back customers and save the company's reputation, HP instead dug its own grave by stating an absurd explanation in front of millions of people. It was pure stupidity.
Seconds after hearing their justification, I wondered how they would explain why cockroaches favored HP laptops over rival brands - was it that they were tastier?
HP probably thought it was convenient to blame cockroaches. After all, they are good for nothing, completely disliked by everyone, and cannot possibly defend themselves. However, by giving an explanation like this, HP grossly insulted its Chinese customers.
Stating that student dormitories were unclean did not exactly please its customers either. It seriously angered many Chinese people and hundreds of articles flooded the net in defiant proof of how clean Chinese dormitories were.
Which leads me to mistake number three. Possibly the biggest error HP made in this scandal was that it did not respect the feelings of its Asian customers. Its arrogant attitude and insulting comments were deeply offensive.
Chinese people often believe they are discriminated against - whether true or not - and get extremely angry when, after comparing themselves with the rest of the world, they find their belief is justified.
When this case came out, Chinese netizens researched similar situations abroad, particularly in America and Europe, and saw an obvious difference in customer service standards. They rightly noted that everyone pays the same amount for a laptop the world over and were furious about the inequality of service.
In its handling of the situation, HP resembles the very insect it foolishly blamed. And what do you do when you find one of these creatures? You step on it.
